Disco Rude, nee Shane Okouchi is a Kinfolk employee and a very excellent DJ from Oahu, Hawaii. WAX is Shane’s music column, a continuation of the #MusicMonday entries he’d share on the old site. Today he shares a story about Bibi Den’s Tshibayi’s, “The Best Ambiance.”
Before I moved out to New York I lived in Arizona for almost three years. Work-wise, I spent most of my time at this little coffee shop called Jobot in the Roosevelt Row area of downtown Phoenix. Jobot reminds of Kinfolk in the way people randomly come together, strike up conversations and make friends with ease. It wasn’t just a place of business, but a social hub.
I had the pleasure of working the brunch shift every Sunday afternoon, slanging lattes, cappuccinos and any other caffeinated beverage the good people desired. I’d go into work (pretty much always) a little hungover and a little tired, but always happy to be there. The owner, John Sagasta, would always have the radio tuned in to KEXP, the Seattle college radio station and we would start our day off listening to blues and soul til noon, when the next program would start and whoever did that one played a bunch of perfect Sunday afternoon sunshine jams. The show would always start with this song called “The Best Ambiance” by Bibi Den’s Tshibayi, which is one of those penultimate feel good songs. Hearing it would instantly put me in a great mood and I’d be steaming milk, steeping tea and taking food orders, all the while smiling my hangover away.
The music is ebullient afro-soul/funk with a Caribbean feel, but the lyrics are all sung in French (the band is from the Congo). The beginning of the song starts with the most pleasant guitar riff I’ve ever heard, before a synthesizer pops its head in a few times, developing into a beautiful yet simple riff itself. Once the rest of the band realizes the party’s about to happen, they all come together like a Voltron of joy looking to destroy any and all bad vibes within an earshot.
I found my copy of Bibi Den’s album at Good Records in the East Village while digging with my homie Milton Fakondo aka M-Fasis, a fellow DJ and vinyl enthusiast. We were at the cash register paying for our finds when I noticed they had a box of new arrivals I had missed. I decided to browse through it really quick while Milton payed for his records and after skimming through a good 10 or 12 others, I saw it. Originally, I had wanted a 7″ single of “The Best Ambiance,” but I decided I should check the rest of the record to see if it was anywhere near as good as the title track.
Listening to it always makes me feel too good. It brings me back to those Arizona afternoons serving other smiling faces both young and old, listening to feel good Sunday music and sharing my time with people I care about. I really couldn’t name too many songs with the uplifting power of “The Best Ambiance”, but that’s beside the point. In some funny roundabout way, AZ and NY come together for me with this song. I first heard it while working at a coffee shop in AZ and out here in NY I found the record with my friend Milton who just moved to Phoenix last month to be with his girl. I actually just spoke with him, getting a chance to let him know I posted an old mix of his I found amongst the many I’ve recorded for Kinfolk over the past year or so. Life can be interesting like that. Good stuff, this life. And it’s even better when there’s great music to accompany it. Like “The Best Ambiance,” for example.
Aloha
-Shane