Trilok Gurtu: The Beat Of Love : Music Reviews : Rolling Stone

Album Reviews

Continuing his two-decade-long exploration of the territory where African and Asian music meet, tabla virtuoso and composer Trilok Gurtu moves as easily within the organic landscapes created by Indian, African and Western percussion instruments as he does within the modern electronic aesthetic. Not one to hog the spotlight, the Indian-born Gurtu allows his guest musicians -- who joined him in studios in London, Johanesburg, Bombay, Philadelphia and New York -- to add their own unique elements to the satisfying, multi-layered Beat of Love. "A Friend," a mid-tempo Afro-pop confection, is augmented by Beninese singer Angèlique Kidjo, whose usually incendiary vocals are toned down a bit here to be warm and reassuring. Indian vocalist Roop Kumar's adds broad strokes of romanticism to the upbeat "Maya" and the staccato, mesmerizing "Tuhe." Senegalese singer and songwriter Wasis Diop contributes his own "Passing By," an incantation imbued with a seductive, summer afternoon feel. Gurtu's music journeys have taken him far from home, but it is obvious that he has made the world itself his warming, welcoming hearth.

MARIE ELSIE ST. LEGER
(June 11, 2001)