I guess it must be intentional, but to my ear, the tuning sounds way off between the guitar and bass. Maybe this is part of the tradition or something, but I find it to be so far off, it's hard to listen to.

i would argue that discordance you hear is a taste thing. Not different from someone accustomed to western diet may find Indian cuisine too spicy.

That's a pretty good analogy.

This time for Africa