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  • Tales of Droëland

    SFCD003

    Artist: Alex van Heerden, Paul Miller

    Label: Smallfunk

    Droëland is a place which exists, and yet seems to be a suspension of reality. Deep in the 'Kouebokkeveld' desert's mountains, inaccessable to cars, electricity, logic and stability, Droëland inhabitants walk the slow, fine line between khoisan shamanism and socio-economic despair. Their mythologies are inseperable from daily life: mermaids, shape-shifting snakes, 'tokoloshes' inhabit all corners of Droëland.

    The songs of Droëland are dangerous, playful, mysterious and childlike. To me they are mantras for negotiating the landscape of the Karoo, a gateway between the past and the future.

    Spending time in Droëland is like looking at the world through a magnifying glass. During our time there, both Paul Miller and myself were amazed at how the small, minute aspects of the environment become amplified to reveal their complex, normally hidden beauty.

    The creation of this album was inevitable, an amplification of the inaudible, the songs of a voiceless people. /Alex van Heerden