On the 4th April 2025, Mariam Doumbia’s lifelong partner set off to join his idols Jimi Hendrix and John Lee Hooker in the paradise of virtuoso singer-guitarists.
A sad and brutal reality. One can’t help but look back in the rear-view mirror. The dizzying trajectory of an extraordinary career, firmly anchored on the international stage.
From giant festivals (Coachella, Lollapalooza, Glastonbury) to exceptional events such as the opening concert of the Football World Cup, Barack Obama’s Nobel Peace Prize ceremony, and the closing ceremony of the Paralympic Games, massive opening acts with U2 and Coldplay, and prestigious, cosmopolitan collaborations with Damon Albarn, M, Akon, and Santigold, even a Grammy nomination, Amadou & Mariam have ceaselessly made their music shine across the world. A sound, an afrofusion, a life-saving curiosity. And that extraordinarily powerful bond that united them for nearly fifty years, a civil union, a blazing artistic partnership, and a musical complementarity. Not to mention the many love songs that fill much of their repertoire, such as the title track of this new album, L’amour à la Folie.
A return-to-the-roots album, where traditional instruments and electronic artillery coexist, Malian blues and European textures, heritage and fraternity, learning and wisdom. It is a long-term record, crafted over sessions in Barcelona, Bamako, and Paris. It crystallises what the duo has always strived to honour: expressing as authentically as possible their impulses, observations, doubts, declarations of love, realisations, and worries. Within it lies the transmission of knowledge, the fruit of experience and of their many journeys, alongside a shared call for responsibility and peace.
LISTEN TO ‘L’AMOUR À LA FOLIE’
At its heart is Amadou’s guitar, the third vital force behind this new wave of songs produced and arranged by Pierre Juarez. Reuniting with the Malian couple after working with them in 2017 on a track for Lamomali, their connection was instantaneous. Nicknamed “the astronaut” by Toumani Diabaté, and also the producer of Fatoumata Diawara’s latest album, Juarez knows how to surf the crests of African music. His attraction to spatial sounds and his skilful vocal treatments subtly accompany the fluidity and essence so characteristic of Amadou & Mariam. This delicate balance also attracted Busy Twist, a leading figure of the new underground dance scene who travelled to Mali to work with the duo. Known for merging an impressive variety of sounds from around the globe, the boundary-defying British producer has infused his Afro, Latin, and Caribbean influences into projects for artists like Alewya, Greentea Peng, and Bomba Estéreo. Here, he produced three tracks, including La vie est belle, a previously unreleased song from the 2024 Best Of, with a hypnotic syncopated rhythm, now given fresh exposure alongside Mogolu, a joyful reunion track with Manu Chao, twenty years after their iconic Dimanche à Bamako.
An exotic-beat ego trip celebrating the return home (Nakan), a festive groove embodying the couple’s essential need for communication (L’amour à la folie), and English pop-rock vibes exploring the struggles of difficult marriages (Furu). Amadou & Mariam continue, mostly in Bambara, to craft a blend of body and spirit. They join forces with Fally Ipupa, the Congolese rumba prince, and oppose the poisonous effects of gossip in a modern, lo-fi-inflected blues (Sonfo). There are also songs reflecting on Mali’s situation, and by extension, the world’s fragile state, that call for awakening: Généralisé, with its Pink Floyd atmosphere, and On veut la paix, with its 60s sound-system aesthetic. The album closes with an incantatory finale, Tanu, a hymn to solidarity that ends with “I am grateful to you, I salute you.”
Mariam continues the adventure on stage, joined by her son Sam Baga and loyal musicians, carrying the melodies that made Amadou & Mariam’s success, including Sabali, Bofou Safou, Je pense à toi, and Beaux Dimanches, as well as the songs from the new album. She will perform an exclusive showcase on 24th October at 10:40 p.m., the day of the release, as part of Because Beaubourg, followed by a U.S. and Canada tour in November and a special date in Antwerp (BE) in December.