More song indentifying help please...

I haven't got much to go on I'm afraid. It's by a black South African and it's about a train taking people from the townships to work in the cities for rich whites. It features several onomatapoeic lyrics that immitate the sounds of said steam train.

The name of the singer is something like "Makulele" but I know I haven't got it quite right.

I guess the style of music it's closest to is probably blues.

I've only ever heard it on vinyl, once at Heathrow (can't remember the room) and once recently at a dealer here in Lisbon and both times it sounded superb. I'd like to get it not only because I really liked the music but because I have a clear memory of how it sounded on vinyl and I want to compare it to the CD (assuming it exists on CD)

I think it's a "demo" favourite so hopefully someone will know what I'm on about....

Michael.

 

Its not Hugh Masekela is it?

He's a trumpeter/vocalist, think he falls more under the branch of jazz though.

http://www.amazon.co.uk/exec/obidos...3154/sr=1-1/ref=sr_1_11_1/202-7777807-5548629

 

That's the one! Thanks Dino. Don't know which track it was (it's not one of the ones you can hear a clip of on Amazon) but I recognize the album cover.

Into the shopping basket it goes

Michael.

 

FYI the song I was referring to is called "Stimela (The Coal Train)" and is from that album "Hope" by Hugh Masekela

Sounding good on my iPod right now, will have to wait a couple of weeks before I can try out on my proper hifi back home

Michael.

 

I may actually have played it when you were round at mine! (I certainly did once when Lee was over). It must be one of the first jazz/world disks I ever bought (and he signed it for me too...or was that just George Melly?). I think Coal Train is the best track on the disk, although there are a couple of other pretty good ones too.

 

Fans of Hugh Masekela's "Stemela" might be interested that he performs this on Paul Simon's "Graceland - The African Concert" DVD:

http://www.amazon.co.uk/exec/obidos/ASIN/6305342784/ref=sr_aps_dvd_1_2/202-5923709-1011054

This is a live concert recording from 1987, which therefore looks a tad dated, but sounds pretty good. As well as Paul Simon and Hugh Masekela, there are also performances from Ladysmith Black Mambazo and Mirium Makeba.

 

Could well have been. I knew I'd heard it twice and I knew about the dealer demo here in Lisbon but couldn't quite place the other time so I guessed it must have been the Heathrow show but more likely it was at your place...in which case it wasn't on vinyl either

Also, a correction on the song's topic. It isn't, as I stated, about workers on a train going to work in the cities...they're actually going to work in coal and gold mines for, as the song says, "almost no pay"

Michael.