Page 99 - Esquire - USA (Winter 2020)
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it, you feel better and you love it. You do it who was raising the family alone after
for yourself.” divorcing her husband. “She told me,
Moctar, whose father worked as a local ‘You’re just going to sit around home and
merchant, spent his early years in a tra- eat and drink,’ ” Moctar says with a sigh.
ditional dome tent with a palm-tree-leaf “ ‘Now you have to go and be a man.’ ”
roof. He had no plumbing, electricity, In Arlit, that meant taking a brutal,
Internet, or radio. The first time he ever eighteen-hundred-mile journey across the
heard guitar was one night at age twelve, desert to find work in Libya, where Tuareg
when he stumbled upon a man, Abdallah had been performing odd jobs, as well
Ag Oumbadougou, strumming and singing as fighting in the Libyan army, for years.
hypnotic, acoustic songs to an impromptu Leaving his guitar at his grandmother’s
audience under the stars. “It was crazy for house, he became a well digger in Trip-
me,” he says. “Everybody happy. Every- oli. After two years away from his family,
body dancing. The crowd was awesome.” and his guitar, he came back eager to play
Tuareg rock—a fusion of African folk again—only to find that his grandmother
and American blues and rock, nicknamed had kept it on her roof, where it had splin-
desert blues—has been around since the tered into pieces.
1970s. Tinariwen, a band from north- Once he scraped together enough cash
ern Mali, first brought Tuareg music to for a new guitar, Moctar felt the music
the world’s attention. They perform in pour out of him again. He resumed writ-
flowing robes and indigo tagelmusts, ing songs and began playing weddings,
headdresses that serve as both turbans gaining a following for his fluid picking,
and scarves—necessary protection from honey-sweet vocals, and heartfelt lyrics.
the blowing sand. Backed by repetitive, Moctar speaks passionately about the
psychedelic riffs and the seductive beat Tuareg’s matriarchal culture and high
of goatskin drums, desert blues is politi- respect for women, which he weaves into
cally charged music. The his lyrics. “Creator, cre-
lyrics are often about the ator / You must come to
struggles of the Tuareg the rescue / To all the
people, who, despite num- 0RFWDU·V women / Who are suf-
bering around two million, VRQJV VSUHDG fering in the desert,” he
have been fighting for DFURVV WKH sings in Tamashek, his
civil rights for decades. native tongue, in his song
For young Moctar, seeing GHVHUW SKRQH “Ilana.” “My music make
the Tuareg bluesman that WR SKRQH the lady cry,” he tells me.
night felt like destiny. “I “I talk about love a lot, and
just need to be like him,” %XW KH GLGQ·W you just going to think it’s
he recalls thinking at the GDUH GUHDP about your story.”
time. Unable to find, much RI DQ\WKLQJ In 2008, he recorded
less afford, a guitar of his several infectious and inno-
own, he built one him- PRUH vative songs—blending
self out of bicycle cables his bluesy roots with auto-
and sun-bleached wood. It tuned vocals. With no
was a crude instrument, with four strings Internet or sophisticated audio equipment,
instead of six, but when the left-handed locals would just record songs on their
boy plucked the sharp wires, he could phones and swap them with one another
bring them to life. using Bluetooth. Moctar’s songs spread
A bright student known for his majes- across the desert, phone to phone. But he
tic singing of the Koran, Moctar would didn’t dare dream of anything more. “I
hang out with older musicians after never think am I going to get money in my
school, hoping to learn. But the surly men music,” he says. “Never.”
just treated the gawky boy with bemuse-
ment, taking his lunch money for lessons BY THE MID 2000S, Christopher Kirkley was
they’d never give and using him to fetch just another hipster living the Pacific
smokes. Moctar resorted to learning on Northwest dream—in theory, at least.
his own. He discovered he had a natu- He’d gotten a good degree (bioengineer-
ral flair, a relaxed feel for the string, and a ing) and an upwardly mobile job (biotech),
poet’s passion for lyrics. When he outgrew and he was decorating his apartment on a
his homemade guitar, Moctar, who has six leafy street in Seattle. And yet, as he was
siblings, stole one from an older brother, a on the phone with Ikea one day discuss-
taxi driver who’d been given a guitar by a ing toothbrush holders, he felt miserable.
passenger but never used it. “I saw, like, this path,” says Kirkley, the
By his late teens, Moctar was writing son of a pharmacist and a schoolteacher.
songs and jamming with his friends— “I could make more money. And then
much to the disapproval of his mother, buy a boat. And buy a nice house. And
Winter 2020_Esquire 89
