(Disco, Afro-pop, Soul) [WEB] Kiki Gyan - 24 Hours In A Disco 1978-82 - 2012, FLAC (tracks), lossless

Soundway Records present ’24 Hours in A Disco 1978 – 82’, 7 cuts of relentless disco grooves from the sublimely gifted Kiki Gyan. Hailed as Africa’s answer to Stevie Wonder, Ghanaian multi-instrumentalist Kiki Gyan was a musical wunderkind who by 1975 had risen from the lowly status of high school dropout to being ranked eighth in a poll of the greatest keyboardists in the world (occupying the rarefied air of the top ten with heavyweights like Steve Winwood, Billy Preston, and Stevie Wonder) as well as becoming an in-demand session player in the top recording studios of London – all before his twenty-first birthday.
Out on his own, he produced a series of highly ambitious disco records aimed at positioning him as an international star, but weighed down by the excesses of the era, Gyan saw his meteoric rise matched by an equally swift fall back into obscurity.
Loved dearly by his contemporaries and sorely missed since his death in 2005 the story of the life of Kofi Kwarko ‘Kiki’ Gyan is one often told with warning by his friends to the new generation of aspiring Ghanaian popstars.
Soundway Records now collects the best of Gyan’s work as a frontman and solo artist, featuring an array of electrifying disco grooves that still sound contemporary (and in some cases futuristic) decades after their initial release.

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AllMusic Review by Tim Sendra:
Ghanaian keyboardist Kiki Gyan got his start in the early '70s as a member of the U.K.-based Afro-pop band Osibisa, but after leaving the group he recorded some excellent disco records under his own name and as the Twins and KG Band in the late '70s and early '80s. Soundway's collection 24 Hours in a Disco collects seven tracks that flow like the best disco of the era. Gyan proves himself a master of setting a mood stuck firmly on exuberant, creating grooves that are funky but smooth, as the songs percolate like sweet hot chocolate and inspire tired feet to get up and get moving. The best tracks, like "Disco Dancer" and "24 Hours in a Disco," are genius blends of dancefloor-ready disco and smooth African soul; the others aren't far behind. This collection feels short at only seven tracks, and hearing them once may lead you to track down his full albums (or at the very least hope that some enterprising label will get on the ball and reissue them). Gyan's life may have ended tragically -- he died at age 47 due to a drug overdose -- but the music he left behind is filled with joy and sunshine, and stands as some of the best disco made in Africa, or anywhere else.

Звезда Кики Гаяна (Kiki Gyan) горела недолго, но ярко. Став участником афро-фанк супергруппы Osibisa в возрасте 15 лет, к 18 он уже стал миллионером, а в 21 считался одним из лучших клавишников планеты. «Хорошие были времена», — позднее скажет он в интервью, — «возможно, даже слишком хорошие».
В 1983 году Гаян покинул родину и с головой окунулся в водоворот нью-йоркской сцены. Наркотики, бессонные ночи в андерграундных клубах, а также новые знакомства с местными музыкантами, совместно с которыми африканская звезда запишет свой третий и последний альбом «Feelin’ Alright». Пластинка, совместившая в себе хайлайф, электро-фанк и диско, мгновенно стала классикой глобальных масштабов. Наиболее точно данной формуле соответствует трек «Rosemary», разлетевшийся хитом по Нигерии и Гане. При этом в «Give It To Me», «Love To Love You» и титульной композиции улавливаются нотки буги, что обеспечило «Feelin’ Alright» статус одного из ключевых и жанрообразующих альбомов того периода.
В виду губительных пристрастий, Кики так и не удалось повторить своего успеха. Он скончался в возрасте 47 лет, в одиночестве и безвестности. Но несмотря на это, наследие музыканта продолжает жить, и «Feelin’ Alright» остается ярчайшим светилом в созвездии его работ.