DVD REVIEWS
Te Vaka Live in Concert (Warm Earth Records WMDVD 1006
Te Vaka
Live In Concert
Warm earth records WMDVD1006
Full price (101 mins)
Two storming gigs from Polynesian collective
The world’s most successful band to play original contemporary
Pacific music, Te Vaka, are based in Auckland.
Founded in 1995 by the Western Samoan singer-guitarist Opetaia
Foaí (whose Tokelauan language is a legacy of his Tokelau
Island heritage), Te Vaka is a 13-strong collective of musicians
and dancers from Tokelau, Tuvalu, Samoa, Cook Islands and
New Zealand (seven of them from the extended Foaí family).
Their compelling, upbeat brand of fusion has its roots in
the chants, harmonies and log-drums of the Pacific Islands:
their lyrics encourage awareness of the environment, stress
the importance of community, and take politicians to task.
Nominated for a BBC Radio 3 Award for World Music award and
with four lauded albums under their tapa cloth sarongs, Te
Vaka have performed in 30 countries around the world and forged
a formidable live reputation in the process. Here’s
why.
As great as they are on record (and they are), live they are
something else. This DVD shows the band in two separate concerts;
at Toata Stadium in Tahiti and Apia Park in Samoa. A traditionally
dressed line-up of impossibly beautiful men and women playing
everything from electric guitars and kit drums to pate (single
and double log drums) and pa’u (indigenous goat-skin
conga and bass drums), Te Vaka evoke the spirit of the islands
through music and just as importantly through dance. The deft
camerawork includes wide shots of the stage, behind-drum-kit
shots, close-ups of dancing feet and the delighted faces of
two spellbound audiences, raising their arms in the air and
singing along word for word. Male dancers in grassy anklets
slap their bodies percussively, their ancient fatele dance
enhanced by the chants and rhythms of a row of tribal-tattooed
drummers. Female dancers in coconut-shell bras and grass skirts
enact ancient tales with baskets of flowers, swaying hula-like
figures of eight. There are music videos of the hits ‘Tamahana'
and ‘Lakilua’, as well as behind-the-scenes footage
from the Tahitian tour- and of the bands arrival in Samoa.
They are greeted with songs, dance, garlands and pride, revered
as envoys of a beautiful, fragile part of the world.
Jane Cornwell
Songlines Magazine UK
SONGLINES MAGAZINE UK www.songlines.co.uk |
GLOBAL
RHYTHM MAGAZINE USA –TAD HENDRICKSON
TEVAKA
Live in Concert:
Toata Stadium and Apia Park
One of the few Polynesian bands to earn a reputation outside
its homeland, New Zealand’s Te Vaka shuttles between
poppy, guitar-based folk-rock and log drum-driven traditional
music. Featuring about 90 minutes of live music and several
extras, the DVD perfectly captures the feel of Tahiti, where
one of the sets was recorded. The band is certainly skilled
in its commercial approach to music making, but all is not
fluff- there’s racial pride in their dancing, and
the songs may be sunny but they address dark issues like
overfishing by non-natives. The second set features a triumphant
return to Samoa-a concert done to help raise awareness for
paying honest wages to farmers for their crops, and to protect
them and other landowners from encroaching business. The
fact that music this accessible comes with a message is
promising, particularly when enthusiastic fans are dancing
along. –TAD HENDRICKSON
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