Sevil ~ Azerbaijan

Sevil. 1978 Melodia

For many years I was on the worldwide prog rock chase. But never once did I run into anything from Azerbaijan. Now Sevil isn't prog, but rather a very interesting jazz meets funk meets mugham, the latter an indigenous form of modal singing. I haven't been exposed to mugham before, so that sounds fascinating on its own - mostly handled by a female vocalist. To my untrained ears, it sounds Arabic, but of course that's not correct, it's just the similarity of scales and passion. The jazz is cool, mostly piano, bass, and drums in improv mode. The funk is the most interesting aspect to my ears. Mostly this element is brought forth by the wah wah rhythm guitar, sounding quite a bit like Isaac Hayes' 'Theme from Shaft'. You begin to wonder how that even came about - especially in the Brezhnev era of the USSR, not known for his tolerance of Western influence. 

Supposedly recorded in 1971, but I cannot find data to support this assertion. That would have been even more strange given how closed the Soviet Union was back then. Originals are a freaking fortune and mostly extinct. The album's obscurity is the same excuse that Firyuza and Gunesh's debut have - it was only released in the local region of the country itself, not throughout the Soviet empire. Perhaps even more bizarre is there does exist an "export" version with liner notes in English. I suspect that the Authorities didn't let this one get too far away. Probably the "art director" for this release suddenly disappeared without notice. No mention of the recording date either. A local Azerbaijan label (Molla Nasreddin) put this album back on the map (reading it's not from the masters). This reissue has already been scooped up from those in the know. There's also a Russian private CD release, that could be legitimate, but who knows. I probably wouldn't seek out either way, but it's fun to own something unique like this. So I might.

Priority: 3

There exists LP and CD reissues, both apparently from vinyl. In this part of the world it's difficult to know what is legit and what isn't. Creating the entry as it certainly fits the purpose of this site.

11/21/23 (review); 3/31/25 (new entry)