WHEN Uncut speaks to Yousra Mansour at her home in Lyon, it’s the day after Bab L’ Bluz’s first live show since lockdown and she’s clearly still riding the high. “It was amazing,” she enthuses, of their al fresco set. “We really needed to play and so there was lots of energy.” As the band’s singer and lyricist, Mansour is the conductor of that surging energy, which also characterises their debut album, Nayda! - a mix of traditional gnawa music, funk-rock and psychedelic blues. The title is a reference to the push in her native Morocco for a more progressive youth culture and translates roughly from the Arabic dialect Darija as “waking up”. Despite that - and the fact that several songs address the exploitation of Africa’s people and resources by its own rulers - Bab L’ Bluz don’t consider themselves politically driven.
“I don’t know how to identify us as a band,” admits Mansour. “I think we just want to sing for justice, for peace and love - basic elements to have a good life. In Morocco, as in many societies, we suffer; the country is very rich and we see many poor people and this is not justice. People can eat because we have a lot of food, but they cannot go to hospital, they cannot afford school… We don’t want to live in this [kind of] world. I wouldn’t say we are engaged politically; we just feel free to speak about what is hurting us as people.” As to increased freedom for Moroccan youth, “It’s complicated. Basically, we’re so stuck in religion.” But she accepts that some things are changing: “Ten years ago it was forbidden, but now lots of girls and women are taking their place in the musical world.”
“We sing for justice, peace and love”: Yousra Mansour and her Bab L’ Bluz bandmates
BAB L’BLUZ; KAREN PAULINA BISWELL