“Mekong Song” (2015) – Deltas * Written by Deltas * CD: Ligerian Blues * Label: Buda Musique
With their origins in Angers, France, the trio Deltas currently includes Vincent Erdeven (guitar), Richard Bourreau (violin/kora), and recent addition Andra Kouyate (ngoni/vocals), who’s from Mali. Their second album’s playful title Ligerian Blues, which Dylan McDonnell at RootsWorld calls a “seeming portmanteau of the Loire and Niger rivers,” also has the lion/tiger fusion thing going for it. But the river aspect is key, with the band’s own name and track titles like “Mekong Song” inviting us to hear the music as a willfully cross-cultural exercise.