It has been five years since I first heard the haunting, pained music of Zé Manel, a Bissau Guinéan now exiled in the States for his politically-critical music against the then-President, now re-elected for another term. When I got back to England, I tried to get in contact with him, to get an interview. He seemed totally unreachable, no one knew where he was, and I eventually gave up.

In the wonderful way that these things happen, last night I met him. Some friends and I had gone to a small bar in the crumbling old quarter of Bissau, a bar which had rattan furniture downstairs, and a cyber-café upstairs filled with computer terminals. As we were sitting there wondering how we were going to get away from the terrible racket of the girl singing at the front of the bar, my friend noticed that Zé Manel sitting in the corner. Praying he would sing, we stayed until the end, through countless rounds of cover songs by women with far greater voices than she, but he eventually left without a song.

On his way out, though, he passed by us. My friend, a Guinean, tapped me on the shoulder and when I turned around, Zé was there with his hand out. He said he would be happy to see me at his studio this weekend for an interview.

**

When you’re standing on the dance floor of a Guinean nightclub, dancing to the latest in Ivorian coupe decalé or American dirty south, it’s hard to remember that you are in one of Africa’s most defunct countries. Sitting outside the club, eating egg sandwiches made by a mama, or a tia, as they call the motherly women here, it’s hard to imagine you were just inside a nightclub. The table lit by a candle, eggs fried in a pan over a coal brazier, the turbaned women pulling cold beers from a bucket, it’s the perfect way to see in a Saturday morning.