Happy 10th Anniversary to Bombino's Azel

Today marks the 10th anniversary of Bombino's album, Azel. 

His third studio album was produced by Dave Longstreth.

Bombino had worked with Dan Auerbach previously for Nomad and the results were solid, but Longstreth seemed to connect with the Tuareg guitarist on a deeper level, getting more out of the players. 

Azel is RtBE's favorite Bombino album as the tone and tunes seem to swirl together wonderfully. In our original review we stated:

"Iyat Ninhay/Jaguar (A Great Desert I Saw)" combines all of Bombino's past and current loves as it amps up the rock riffs, while skewering the tempo and still managing to find an easy air thanks to a repetitive beat and groove; a real winner and an excellent summation of his career to this point.

While Bombinos lyrics directly address issues in his world, those not speaking the language will still enjoy this as a whole. Azel has once again raised the bar for Bombino and players whose engaging music and style will speak to everyone.    

We also ranked this album in our top 50 from the last decade, so on it's tenth anniversary give it a listen. 

Here are some tunes to get you started: