On the surface, it seems like a simple case of opposites attracting. In one corner, you've got Juldeh Camara, a traditional musician from the backwoods of Gambia who specializes in singing and playing the riti, a simple but haunting-sounding single-string fiddle. In the other, there's Justin Adams, a suave Londoner who's travelled the globe with former Led Zeppelin singer Robert Plant's band, and who's amassed an enviable collection of fine vintage guitars. But when these two came together to record Tell No Lies—a CD that's destined to top many 2009 best-of lists—they found that they had a lot in common.

“Funnily enough, I'm sitting in the room where we played together for the first time, which is the garage at the back of my house,” Adams recalled, reached by phone at his U.K. home. “I had a microphone set up, and I had a rhythm ready for him to play to, and I just got him into the garage and pressed Record. He sat down and had one run-through, and then he said, ”˜Okay, let me have another go at that.' And then he sang what became the first track on our record, just like that.”

It all sounds very impromptu, but it's not entirely far-fetched to say that Adams's entire musical career had been leading up to that moment. The 47-year-old Brit grew up in the Middle East, absorbing the wailing tones of the Arab world at the same time that he was learning classic blues and rock moves on the guitar, inspired by Muddy Waters, John Lee Hooker, the Rolling Stones, and, of course, Led Zep. When he discovered West African music, thanks to the Malian guitarist Ali Farka Touré, he also discovered a sound that could contain all his passions.

As he notes, even the traditional acoustic instruments of the region seem to encompass everything most electric guitarists strive for. “We like distortion, we like drones, and we like that absolute link between rhythm and melody,” he explains. “What I don't get is why there aren't more American and English guitarists who have really checked out Ali Farka Touré and whose playing relates to that, because to me it was obvious. You hear that, and how can you ignore it? It's part of your musical language.”

In Camara, Adams seems to have found the perfect musical partner—and not only because the Fulani virtuoso finds it easy to thread his voice and riti around his English partner's crunchy, blues-drenched rhythms. Camara is the son of a traditional healer, and his musical aesthetic is all about making people feel better.

“That's the biggest message that I've learned from going to Africa,” says Adams, who'll join Camara and percussionist Salah Dawson Miller on the Vancouver Folk Music Festival main stage on Saturday (July 18). “You get to my sort of age and you've seen enough trouble in the world. You know what problems are, you know what pain is, and you realize that a load of people getting together in a room to listen to music is actually the good bit of life. That's the sweet bit. But that's not to say ”˜Let's make trite, happy music.' Far from it. Let's make really dark and weird music—and let's take great joy in it, too.”