Tinariwen – ‘Hoggar’ album review: A laidback and mournful Tuareg classic
On their tenth album, the Tuareg desert blues pioneers, Tinariwen, take a less blistering and more mournful approach to shredding guitar. It creates a campfire sound that could becalm the fizz in a recently dropped can of Red Bull.
The Skinny: We’re now 45 years down the line on Tinariwen’s storied career, and the croak of graceful ageing is writ large across Hoggar. The vocals sound more weathered than before, the incantations carry more wisdom. The sounds fittingly follow suit with a laidback and languid approach.
Yet, there’s something unexpected in the mix, too: the sound of their growing success. Tinariwen are certainly no strangers on the global stage, but thanks to the fact that they inspired a whole scene to rise up around them, more and more people are flocking to the sanctity of desert blues. This attention has increasingly afforded the band a rich list of collaborators. On Hoggar, that rises to the fore.
Longtime fan José Gonzalez makes an appearance. Female backing singers join the fold. And, clearly feeling the spirit of community, Ibrahim Ag Alhabib and Abdallah Ag Alhousseyni sing together in harmony for the first time in 30 years. For a band who have been through so much to still be finding fresh avenues of expression imbues the album with profundity in itself.
But beyond that, there are also inflexions of country music in the mix. Perhaps working with Daniel Lanois on their previous album rubbed off on them. The result is a cosifying of their sound in the best possible way. Arpeggios are played as though Saharan winds are simply blowing over the strings, and there’s that paradoxical slapdash tightness you get from the genre, too.
Yet, it is also a record that feels deeply close to home. For the album, the founding members reached out to the local Tuareg musical community and worked closely with those they had inspired every day for a month. Displaced in Algeria, founding members Ibrahim Ag Alhabib, Abdallah Ag Alhousseyni and Touhami Ag Alhassane began working with younger artists like Imarhan’s Iyad Moussa Ben Abderrahmane, Hicham Bouhasse, and Haiballah Akhamouk.
You sense them all sitting around a campfire, passionately calling for change in these touching songs of unrest, wearied by how often they have been called to carry the torch for peace, but emboldened by the wisdom of age and the will of the ways of the world. Crisply captured by producer Patrick Votan, the result is a moving masterpiece and one of Tinariwen’s finest.
The Verdict: The story of Tinariwen is a vital one in the modern age, and this record reaffirms that with all the forcefulness of a summer breeze at sunset. It’s mellowed desert rock, with the twilight touch of stardust in the production.
Standout Track: ‘Imidiwan Takyadam’
Release Date: March 13th, 2026 | Producer: Patrick Votan | Label: Wedge
Never Miss A Beat
The Far Out New Music Newsletter
All the latest New Music from the independent voice of culture.
Straight to your inbox.