Search - Simaro & T.P.O.K. Jazz, Tp Ok Jazz :: Pablo Tumbajika

Save Your Money for a Real TPOK CD

Play It By Ear | Sacramento, CA United States | 01/16/2007

(2 out of 5 stars)

"The only other marvelous TPOK is Youlou. I think Youlou married Franco's sister (does anybody know this for sure?) and that probably helped him get acquire franchise name. Youlou didn't need it, though, he just is excellent. These guys needed it because without it you wouldn't go near this record.



Back to this record. It is not a deep record. Like soukous, it has a surface that looks pretty but runs shallow. This is not quite as bad as soukous and ndombolo, though. If a copy comes up for under ten bucks, maybe give it shot, but you won't miss anything if you don't.



There are a few toe-tapping numbers that would sound good if you heard the radio or at a party, but, so what? There is a lot of wasted talent on this record and it's ashamed that Franco's musicians and singers couldn't dig deeper. The first song is the same as the seventh song. Yes you read that right. Franco and TPOK wrote 2 songs a week for over 30 years and Franco wrote half those songs himself."