Biography
The Daktaris operated as an Afro-beat ensemble on Desco, a New York funk-revival imprint, laying down taut grooves modeled on Fela Kuti that evoked 1970s Nigerian recordings. Desco initially allowed that impression to stand unchallenged, issuing the 1998 album Soul Explosion in packaging calculated to resemble a long-lost African artifact and assigning Nigerian pseudonyms to several participants. The musicians were in fact Brooklyn studio players—many of them white—who had previously been convened by Desco principals Gabriel Roth and Phillipe Lehman to serve as the label’s house rhythm section, the Soul Providers. Inquiries regarding the music’s provenance, coupled with requests for live appearances, soon prompted Roth and Lehman to disclose the fabrication; because the record itself was strong, the resulting criticism remained muted. No second Daktaris session ever materialized, yet several of the same players launched the Afro-beat revival outfit Antibalas during spring 1998.
Albums
Singles
