African pop tends to get treated as a thing of the moment. And when record companies do dig into the archives, it’s generally to appease a small ethnic audience. Often there’s no budget for even the most basic liner notes, so the merely curious get left in the dark. Which is one reason The Shed Sessions, Sadza Records’ new retrospective on the great Bhundu Boys of Zimbabwe, is so refreshing. This two-CD set presents the first four years of the band’s recorded output in its entirety, in order, with dates, personnel information, and explanations of the Shona lyrics.

Of course, it’s also the music that makes this release a standout. The sweet vocal harmonies and popping, guitar-driven grooves of the Bhundu Boys hit Europe and the US hard in the mid and late ’80s. Afropop was just rising, and the Bhundu Boys seemed like the African equivalent of the early Beatles — a tight combo of guys who could sing and play their hearts out and make just about anyone want to dance.

The Boys’ two best albums, Shabini and Tsvimbodze Moto, resulted from the Shed sessions, but until now they were never available on CD. This collection also delivers 10 tracks that were never released in any form outside Zimbabwe. For all the great guitar Afropop that has come and gone since, nothing surpasses concise, explosive Bhundu numbers like " Baba Munini Francis " and " Hupenhu Hwangu. " Guitars lock and chime with exuberance; voices blend to drive home unforgettable melodies; arrangements are brisk and breathless, as if there were no time to waste. Every note sparkles.

The sessions begin in the summer of 1982 at Shed Studios, an alternative site to the dominant Gramma Records studio used by the big stars of Zimbabwe’s early days. Gordon Muir’s liner notes explain that by then this township band started by guitarist and singer Rise Kagona had already undergone a series of incarnations as the Wild Dragons, the Zim Brothers, and the Black Superstars. It was only after a spirited guitarist, Biggie Tembo, joined in 1980 that they shrewdly chose the name Bhundu Boys. " Bhundu " meant the bush, the place where Zimbabwe’s guerrilla fighters had waged war on white Rhodesia. As the beleaguered fighters emerged into the sunlight of liberated Zimbabwe, no sound better captured their sense of relief, hope, and satisfaction than the pumped-up, soulful boogie that was the Bhundu Boys’ stock in trade.

They called their music " jit, " a twist on " jiti, " recreational drum-and-vocal songs played in villages during the Rhodesia years. But the Bhundus’ real gift was their ability to distill successful pop formulas that were already in the air. They boiled the sprawling rumba/soukous extravaganzas of Zaire down to snappy five-minute pop nuggets ( " Pachedu " ). They picked up on the stomping downbeat of South African township jive ( " Kuroja Chete " ), the swing of African jazz ( " Chimanimani " ), and the sinewy, minor-key, 12/8 strains of Shona traditional pop, which was then becoming world-famous in the hands of Zimbabwe’s greatest pop musician, Thomas Mapfumo ( " Manhenga " ). The Bhundus’ compositional brilliance and youth vibe, and the way Kagona and Tembo could sing and play guitar fabulously at the same time, gave rise to the oft-repeated Beatles comparison.

After these recordings, the band went to the British Isles; with Gordon Muir on their team, they spent a year in Scotland before moving on to London, where they were signed to Island in 1988. It was the beginning of the end. Subsequent recordings couldn’t match the spontaneity of the Shed sessions. In 1989, the temperamental Biggie Tembo, who had by then emerged as the best composer, left the band. And then the deaths began. A keyboardist and two bass players succumbed to AIDS. In 1995, Tembo committed suicide.

The Shed Sessions puts this remarkable outfit in the right perspective. Muir writes movingly about the war, the promise and challenge of life in the new Zimbabwe, the decrepit gear and venues that bands had to contend with, and the personalities of these gifted composers and players. In the faddish world of international Afropop, where so many stories have yet to be told, it’s a blessing to have such an important one told so well.