The World of Ridiculous Youtube Music Videos: First Bangs, then Ice JJ Fish, Kwality, now Berenice

Singing or rapping off key in an expensive or sometime low budget music video is now a cottage industry in the rabbit hole that makes up Youtube.   The African diaspora have not been spared. The pioneer of this subgenre was Bangs, the Sudanese-Australian rapper (see here for an “archive” of his exploits), then came the American IceJJFish, and last month we met Kwality (he’s from Nigeria, it seems). Some of these are the products of slick marketing campaigns (IceJJFish most definitely; Kwality maybe), but some are just people with lots of gumption and no self-awareness.  Which brings us to Nigerian “Youtube sensation” BERENICE, who does covers of pop songs. Like John Legend’s “All of me.”  Get earplugs:

She’s also done a cover of Beyonce’s “Drunk in Love.”

We’re being kind BTW. Just read the Youtube comments on her videos.

Further Reading

Writing while black

Percival Everett’s novel ‘Erasure’ raised questions about Black middle-class complicity in commodifying the traumas of Black working-class lives, but the film adaptation leaves little room to explore these tensions.

The Mogadishu analogy

In Gaza and Haiti, the specter of another Mogadishu is being raised to alert on-lookers and policymakers of unfolding tragedies. But we have to be careful when making comparisons.

Kwame Nkrumah today

New documents looking at British and American involvement in overthrowing Kwame Nkrumah give us pause to reflect on his legacy, and its resonances today.