Weekend Music Break No.95—Afro-Europe special!

Fresh of a trip to the UK and Germany, with stops in Afro-European strongholds of London and Berlin, I thought I’d theme this week’s Music Break around some of what I saw and heard there. So enjoy this brief (and not comprehensive by any means) trip around young Afro-Europe, with stops in London, Paris, Berlin, Lisbon and Rome.

Music Break No.95

  1. MHD was a revelation for me on this trip, first getting hipped to his #AfroTrap series by a friend in Bristol, and then being treated to an onslaught of it in Berlin for their Carnival weekend.
  2. Belly Squad out of London come with a bit of a naughty song and video to show the youthful energy of the UK-Afrobeats scene.
  3. Amsterdam via London’s Jaij Hollands’s gravely flow is taking Afrobeats in a little harder edged direction.
  4. Maître GimsSapés comme jamais was also on repeat in Berlin, also coming from the Paris scene.
  5. YCEE who bursted on to the scene with Jagaban last year takes his new video to the streets of London, showing how many artists, even those based in Africa, prefer to go to London for their aesthetics.
  6. Aina More is killing it over this beat by DJ Juls!
  7. On the other side of Berlin, Daniel Haaksman recruits Spoek Mathambo for this chugging Mbaqnga influenced Afro-house jam.
  8. Lisbon’s Throes + The Shine recruit Argentina’s La Yegros for this high tempo Afro-latin-rock number.
  9. A few years old classic out of Rome, Pepe Soup’s Pump Tire!
  10. And finally, the absolute Dona of the Lisbon Afro-electronic scene in her Boiler Room Lisbon appearance to take you out!

Happy week’s end!

Further Reading

And do not hinder them

We hardly think of children as agents of change. At the height of 1980s apartheid repression in South Africa, a group of activists did and gave them the tool of print.

The new antisemitism?

Stripped of its veneer of nuance, Noah Feldman’s essay in ‘Time’ is another attempt to silence opponents of the Israeli state by smearing them as anti-Jewish racists.