Ange Ebogo Emerent (Ozima rhythm from Cameroon, 1976)

(Africana Star AFRI005).

Singer from Cameroon, Ange Ebogo Emerent recorded his first 7inch in 1974 with Orchestre Essian on Sonodisc.

He then played with various bands from Douala as Les Supers Volcans de la Capitale, Les Fantomes, Les Vampires. He's surnamed "Ozima Man", as Ozima is his own particular rhythm played on this LP (his first album from 1976, backed by Les Super Volcans). It's a small early production so not with a perfect recording quality, but rhythms are really frenetic mainly due to the guitar play, and the music can remind some 70s soukous, or other cameroonese rhythms as bikutsi (might this new ozima rhythm be a bikutsi cover name because it was discredited compared to urban makossa?). Indeed the 17 years old guitarist, called Zanzibar (Epémé Theodore), will take part of the major bikutsi band in the 80s: Les Tetes Brulées.

Ange Ebogo Emerent - Enyin Bibon (Riotous living):



Ange Ebogo Emerent - Les Filles de Maintenant (Girls from nowadays):




          
Zanzibar (rhythm guitar), Atangana Pascal "Quelqu'un" (tumba + guitar) and Mbarga Come (drums).


Additional information about Ozima Man here and here (in french).