Album Review: Tinariwen - "Hoggar"

The Tuareg group's new tenth album, Hoggar, continues to be a delightful collaborative effort that highlights what makes the Tinariwen still so great and essential. Guest contributors include Sweden's José Gonzalez and Sudan's Sulafa Elyes, among others.

Wedge - 2026

The musical collective known as Tinariwen originated from parts of Mali and Algeria almost fifty years ago and are still cranking out fantastic records to this day. They first started releasing studio albums in the 1990's and started touring internationally then. They're a huge part of the Tuareg Western African desert rock scene and are arguably the genre's biggest and most influential act. The scene is vivid, colorful, and above all, full of hypnotic grooves and harmonies. They typically sing in the Tamashek language and sing about the problematic conflicts in their home country, amongst other themes of love, hardship, and togetherness. I covered their last album Amatssou back in 2023 and it's still a fantastic collaborative effort.

The group's new tenth album, Hoggar, continues to be a collaborative effort that highlights what makes the group still so great and essential. There are new guest contributors, notably from Swedish indie singer songwriter José Gonzalez and Sudanese singer Sulafa Elyes, who both add great textures and their own signature styles. Most notably what makes Hoggar stand out are the more prominent woman led vocals throughout the record. This decision is to highlight the recent difficulties faced by Tuareg women and the oppression they've faced. The harmonies are often lush, beautiful, and layered. They compliment the group's typically male led vocals very fluently in a harmonious way. Another notable change is that the founding members are often singing each other's songs that they've wrote, making it a much more collaborative effort. Thematically, Hoggar's songs are often about the group having to flee their country of Mali to Algeria due to the Russian backed mercenaries the Wagner Group, who have been involved in continuing conflicts within the area for quite some time. Often, Tuareg groups like Tinariwen have had trouble visiting other countries for tour and as a result of the recent travel bands from the United States, they're unable to tour this country (which is a shame, since we could easily lift these stupid bans to let these genuine musicians provide their gift of music to the world).

Like Tinariwen's other output, the album's flow is seamless and the production and mixing is vivid, clear, and bold. The guitars sound excellent, the rhythms are incredible, and the harmonies are the best they've ever been. There are numerous highlights like the album opener "Amidinim Ehaf Sola," the José Gonzalez featuring "Imidwan Takyadam,"Khay Erilan" and the infectiously groovy "Amidnin Wadar Nohar" among others. If you're looking for any excuse to get into Tinariwen or the Western African Tuareg music scene full of excellent desert blues rock, then Hoggar isn't a bad place to start by any means.

My Rating: 8 / 10

Favorite Songs: "Amidinim Ehaf Sola," "Imidwan Takyadam," "Amidnin Wadar Nohar," "Sagherat Assani," "Dounia Tau Ray"