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The new face of Les Têtes Brûlées
An eagerly-awaited comeback
Douala
06/03/2009 -
After a long break from recording and touring, Cameroon's legendary Têtes Brûlées are finally back on the scene in Yaoundé with a new line-up and a brand new single. RFI Musique hooks up with trumpeter Jean-Marie Ahanda, one of the group's original founding members.
Jean-Marie Ahanda: Well, we went through a period of friction within the group, mostly arguing about financial issues. The problem is we've never been able to make a living from our music. We had great highs when we were out on tour, but the rest of the time we found ourselves battling against this impossible contradiction - there we were, the most famous group in Cameroon, but we didn't have any work and we were basically 'persona non grata' wherever we went! The bikutsi* system totally rejected us. I eventually decided to call it quits, but other members of the group insisted on going on, looking for venues where they could play and express themselves no matter what. That only seemed to do more damage in the end because a series of bad experiences eventually tore apart the remaining core.
So what made you want to try and bounce back again?
I've always believed that we'd go through two distinct stages in our career - during the first phase of Les Têtes Brûlées we'd be like this great flash of illumination, striking like lightning out of the blue. Then there'd be this other stage where perhaps we'd be a little more reflective, a little more sensitive, and really try and get to the bottom of things. I think we're very much in that second stage now. The second stage of our career began the moment I bumped into Tino. He'd gone back to live in his home village where he'd been tucked away for several years. But one day we ran into one another outside this venue where a meeting of the Cameroon Music Corporation was due to take place. I turned round and said to Tino, "OK, let's seize this chance and make the most of it! I want us to work together!" And we turned on our heels there and then and never went into the meeting!
Why have you decided to just release a single?
Well, basically because we don't have a budget to do anything more right now. These days, music has become a product that rolls off the manufacturing line like anything else. And that means you can sell it like biscuits or sweets, retail rather than wholesale. This single is our way of trying to reach out and get back in touch with the public. They completely rejected us after the death of Zanzibar (the group's young guitarist). At one point, the press even accused us of having killed him. One newspaper ran a headline claiming that "Jean-Marie might not have personally killed Zanzibar, but he drove him to suicide!" Radio stations stopped playing our music altogether and people suddenly started hating what they'd loved before. Those were very tough times for us.
As I said, now we're trying to win back our fans and end this big quarrel once and for all. I think our new single, Repentence, introduces a bit of a new note, offering people something different to what they're used to listening to now. I believe people need novelty and difference and what we're doing here is a lot calmer than usual. Repentence is for all those people who've stopped us in the street over the years and said that they missed Les Têtes Brûlées and their creative spirit!
What's the song about?
Repentence was written by Tino and it takes a lot of inspiration from the Old Testament. Basically, the lyrics say that when the final trumpet sounds all suffering will come to an end. And those who have spent their lives sowing the seeds of good will reap goodness and those who have spent their lives doing evil will reap what they sowed, too. It's a simple Christian hymn with the power to bring everyone together. I think we really need this kind of music right now. The years ahead are going to be pretty tough for us all - the economic and social climate right now is already giving us a glimpse of what's in store! And I think that a lot of people who took the wrong course in the past are going to have to pay the price for what they've done. Repentence is 100% linked to the arrests that happened here as part of the "Sparrow Hawk" operation against corruption.
* Traditional music from southern Cameroon
1980 - 2009: the turbulent career of Les Têtes Brûlées  Music fans first discovered Les Têtes Brûlées in 1986 when the group appeared on Cameroon's newly-launched national TV. With their brightly-painted faces, strange hair-dos and fashionably ripped clothes, the five-strong band - who formed under the leadership of trumpeter Jean-Marie Ahanda - sent a revolutionary spirit rushing through the country's music scene, at that point still totally dominated by makossa. Thanks to the exceptional talent of their young guitarist, Théodore Epeme - better known as Zanzibar - Les Têtes Brûlées put their own vibrant new spin on bikutsi (a traditional sound from Cameroon's forest region in the south). The group scored an instant hit both at home and abroad, winning fans across Europe. The buzz around Les Têtes Brûlées was so intense that the group's first French tour, which followed the release of their debut album, Essinga, became the subject of a film (Claire Denis' Man no run in 1989). But the success story came to a grinding halt when Zanzibar died. Public opinion blamed the rest of the band for their guitar whizzkid's tragic demise and their fanbase gradually ebbed away. Trumpeter Jean-Marie Ahanda recalls that people "suddenly started hating what they'd loved before." Life went on for Les Têtes Brûlées who struggled to stay together as a band, recording three more albums together - Ma musique à moi (1990), Bikutsi rock (1992) and Be Happy (1995). But as the years went by the original line-up changed with older members leaving the band and being replaced by new recruits. Bikutsi Fever, a compilation of the "Burnt Heads'" Greatest Hits, was released on Mamadou Konté's label, Africa Fête, in 2000. But this was followed by years of silence - until Les Têtes Brûlées finally stormed back onto the music scene this year with a brand new single, Repentence. Recorded in New York with producer Francis Mbappe, Repentence marks a new stage in the group's career and brings a total change of line-up. The new-look Burnt Heads are fronted by Jean-Marie Ahanda (sole survivor from the original band) and guitarist Jacques Atini, aka Tino. |
Fanny Pigeaud
Translation : Julie Street
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