This album smokes. Amadou and Mariam play a rollicking, good-natured blend of bluesy R&B and Malian dance band music. Amadou sings and plays a seamless rhythm guitar and the occasional crackling lead, while Mariam sings in a voice of sweet fragility.

Amadou and Mariam are a blind couple who met and fell in love at the Institute for the Young Blind in Bamako, Mali. Amadou spent several years as the resident guitarist for the legendary band Les Ambassadeurs du Motel, honing his chops on Mande music, Cuban tunes, French ballads and any other foreign music that was popular with the hotel's regulars. When Amadou and Mariam finally decided to devote themselves unequivocally to a shared life in music, they saw more promise in Cote d'Ivoire than in their homeland, which at that time was being squeezed by a military dictatorship. Temporarily leaving their three children behind, the blind couple made their way to this new country and, beating incredible odds, they are today one of the hottest acts in West Africa and France.

The music on "Wati" is very earthy, with roots penetrating the dark loam of many lands. As such, it seems a chilly undertaking to describe its grooves and emotions objectively, and the music may be better thought of in terms of the corporeal syncopations it induces . . .