“Dakan” is the title track of Orchestra GOLD‘s fourth album, released on vinyl 2nd October and digitally 16th October. The word means destiny in Bambara, appropriate for a band built from a meeting that happened half a world away from where they now work.

Malian vocalist Mariam Diakite and Oakland guitarist Erich Huffaker met in Bamako in 2006. Huffaker had gone to Mali for NGO work, spending his downtime studying djembe and dunun. Diakite had already spent years in Bamako’s music scene, trained in Arabic and voice at madrassa from age seven, and performed with Troupe Sewa, guitarist Djelimady Tounkara, and vocalist Salif Keita. They kept in touch across continents. When Diakite moved to Oakland on an artist visa in 2018, Orchestra GOLD formed.

The track runs on that shared history. Diakite sings entirely in Bambara, her voice moving through Huffaker’s psychedelic rock guitar, brass sections, and Malian percussion. Luke Bace recorded the sessions in Oakland, with Sergio Rios mixing and Myles Boisen mastering. The arrangement sits between 1970s Malian orchestras (Super Biton de Ségou, Super Djata Band) and psychedelic rock from Led Zeppelin and Jimi Hendrix, without leaning too hard either way.

Diakite’s lyrics reference her life as mother, musician, and practitioner of the Baye Fall tradition, a mystical branch of West African Islam from Senegal that prioritises direct spiritual experience over formal doctrine. Ten years of collaboration compressed into four minutes.

Stream and order your copy of Dakan HERE