Super Rail Band: Hear my train a-comin'

In the 1970s, the Super Rail Band were the toast of Mali. Now, after a spell in the sidings, they're back on track, their guitarist Djelimady Tounkara tells Philip Sweeney

If there's one act that Richard Branson should have signed, it's the band led by Djelimady Tounkara, a tall, smiling guitarist from West Africa. Not for the record label, but for Virgin Trains. The Super Rail Band may not be able to make the operation work, but at least they could inject some joie de vivre into British railway travel torment. For 20 years, Tounkara and his colleagues played in the Buffet de la Gare de Bamako - the outdoor café of the railway station in the capital of Mali, regaling travellers with a delicious mixture of the electric folklore they helped create - Congolese dance numbers and old Cuban hits - and spreading the fame of a sub-Saharan railway terminus throughout West Africa, and then to Paris and London. "They were good years," says Tounkara, sitting on the bed in a hotel in Brussels. "The Buffet de la Gare was the best place in Bamako."

The Buffet de la Gare was indeed a choice dive. Through the arched portico of the 1890s colonial station, prone figures slumbered on banquettes. In front of the track there was a circular concrete dancefloor with battered chairs and tables, a beer kiosk, palm trees connected by a string of coloured bulbs, many mosquitoes and the incense-fragrant night beyond. The Super Rail Band played an amalgam of haunting brass, plaintive vocals, loping percussion and ringing guitars. When Tounkara came over to a table to play an exquisite flurry of deep metallic notes on his red Gibson, a well-off punter would tuck a banknote into the guitarist's silk robe; once a griot starts wailing out the glorious deeds of your family, it's time to fork out serious cash, or lose a lot of face. "In those days," says Tounkara, "we did a lot of praise singing - there were big businessmen from Senegal and Côte d'Ivoire, French, all sorts of people. We played Thursday and Friday, the nights the train from Dakar came in. It arrived around 8pm, so the passengers had to spend the night in the hotel."

Djelimady Tounkara's foray into railway enter-tainment occurred 10 years into a career which began at the independence of his region. He was born in 1947, in a village in the bush, to a family from the musician caste of griots, whose role was to sing the histories of the noble castes of the great Manding Empire, which once stretched across what nowadays comprises Mali, Guinea, Burkina, Senegal and the Gambia. Tounkara learnt the traditional balafon xylophone and ngoni - ancestor of the banjo - and then transferred to the guitar. "I copied Django Rheinhart's playing from Radio France Internationale."

In 1958, Guinea, led by the charismatic dictator Sékou Touré, became independent. One of Touré's first actions was to ban colonial music and set up state-supported bands to create a new, electric, popular music on African traditions. The most remarkable product of this policy was, and is, the Guinean band Bembeya Jazz, who were renowned across Africa and led by their star guitarist Sékou "Diamond Fingers" Diabaté. "Sékou Diabaté influenced us all," says Tounkara. When an ex-teacher named Modibo Keita led Mali to independence two years after Guinea, he rapidly copied Touré's cultural authenticity policies. Guinean musicians were brought over to Bamako to start up the country's "national orchestras", snappily named "A" and "B". One of these was Tounkara's uncle, and the young musician was taken on board as guitariste accompagnateur. For some years, the national bands flourished, spreading the sound across West Africa and political allies such as Bulgaria and Cuba. In the meantime, Mali, like Guinea, descended into chaos, with rampant party militia and repression. In 1968, the army seized power while Modibo Keita and his entourage cruised down the River Niger - and the national orchestra system ended.

Tounkara's career "floated". He spent some time in Senegal, where he gigged with the Orchestre Baobab. Then the train took the strain. In 1970, Malian Railways had created the Super Rail Band, which rapidly became the toast of Bamako, largely due to the dynamic presence of its first singer, the albino world music superstar-in-waiting, Salif Keita. By the time Tounkara was recruited, Salif was leaving to front the Ambassadeurs, the resident band of a rival establishment across town, the Motel du Bamako. "It was a hard time for the Super Rail Band," says Tounkara. "All the clients would leave the Buffet around midnight and go over to the motel to hear Salif." The railway hit back, hiring the Guinean kora (harp-lute) ace and world music superstar-in-waiting Mory Kanté as singer and, for a couple of years, Tounkara worked with Kanté. "We worked from 7.30pm to 2.30am, like the other employees." From this period date many of the Super Rail Band's songs - odes to patrons, hunters' lore, moral tales - all adorned with rolling, repetitive Manding arrangements.

By the late Eighties, the Super Rail Band was making converts in Europe - then, in 1995, Malian Railways was privatised and broke. "Eight hundred of us were fired. We were given the instruments and our recording tapes, and told we were on our own."

Another period of flotation followed before the Super Rail Band took up residency in a new club, the Djembé. Their repertoire is rejuvenated, more up-tempo, shorter on praise songs and brass. But now there's a new international audience, too. Tounkara's guitar work, with maturity as subtle and refined as that of any guitarist in the continent, has put him in demand - a terrific solo album, Sigui, led to work with the American jazz guitarist Bill Frisell. Now, the whole movement is flavour of the year in world music circles, with the Senegalese Orchestre Baobab on the crest of a wave, and Bembeya Jazz touring Europe.

And, joy of joys - the Buffet de la Gare may soon reopen. "The Canadians have a contract to reorganise Malian Railways," says Tounkara, "including the Buffet, we hope. We're ready to go back." If this is true, British fans should seriously consider missing the UK gigs and opting for a return flight to Bamako later to experience the Super Rail Band in the glory of their spiritual home. For non-Londoners, it'll probably be cheaper than an Awayday to the West End, too.

The Super Rail Band's 'Kongo Sigui' is out now on Label Bleu. The Super Rail Band and Bembeya Jazz play at the Cardiff Coal Exchange (029-2048 8020) tomorrow, and the Barbican, London (020-7638 8891) on Sunday