AfricaIs aCountry

Friday Music Bonus Edition

Africa Is a Country Podcast
African Five-a-Side Podcast

Friday Music Bonus Edition

By
Tom Devriendt

So drawn into the video (a plethora of faces, personalities and historic moments) Atlanta trio Algiers made for ‘Blood’, I forgot to pay attention to the lyrics the first time seeing it:

Yanigga recorded the video for ‘Dans un ghetto près de chez toi’ (“In a ghetto near you”) in Logbaba (Douala, Cameroon):

Fatoumata Diawara’s been busy touring since releasing her first album last year. Translation of her lyrics on ‘Sowa’ can be found here. Unplugged in Holland:

Michael Kiwanuka’s song ‘I’m Getting Ready’ comes with a new video:

That new video (we blogged about here) for K’Naan’s “Nothing to lose” featuring Nas, shot in Toronto. The video, in which Nas, K’Naan and an entourage of young Somali-Canadians, includes a visit to the Somali Social Club and K’Naan making a plug for countries in the Horn of Africa:

And, finally, AIAC favorite and Nas collaborator Damian Marley’s latest ‘Affairs of the heart’:

Further Reading

Slow death by food

Illegal gold mining is poisoning Ghana’s soil and rivers, seeping into its crops and seafood, and turning the national food system into a long-term public health crisis.

A sick health system

The suspension of three doctors following the death of Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie’s son has renewed scrutiny of a health-care system plagued by impunity, underfunding, and a mass exodus of medical professionals.

Afrobeats after Fela

Wizkid’s dispute with Seun Kuti and the release of his latest EP with Asake highlight the widening gap between Afrobeats’ commercial triumph and Fela Kuti’s political inheritance

Progress is exhausting

Pedro Pinho’s latest film follows a Portuguese engineer in Guinea-Bissau, exposing how empire survives through bureaucracy, intimacy, and the language of “development.”

The rubble of empire

Built by Italian Fascists in 1928, Mogadishu Cathedral was meant to symbolize “peaceful conquest.” Today its ruins force Somalis to confront the uneasy afterlife of colonial power and religious authority.