Chocolate Tuba

T.P. O.K. Jazz, En Entre OK, En Sort KO

In the 1930s, western record companies didn't record much music in Africa. But they sold a lot, and what they sold a lot of was Cuban music. So by the mid 1950s when T.P. O.K. Jazz started up in Congo (later Zaire, then back to Congo), Cuban music had become part of the vocabulary of the local musicians. You can hear it in one of their early songs, "En Entre OK, En Sort KO", kind of their statement of intent, where when you come in to hear them you're okay, but by the time they're done, you're knocked out. But you also hear the beginnings of that guitar sound that came to rule the continent. A true classic.