Frankly, I don’t know much about the popularity of soca in Africa. I’d be curious to find out, though.

Machel Montano did a concert in Stockholm this weekend and he conducted a very useful informal statistical survey by constantly asking questions of the “is anyone here from the BARBADOS!???” variety. What was interesting to me was that the second most vocal demographic at the concert, after Stockholmers, was diasporadic Africans.

So. Is Soca popular in Africa and has it had an influence on the type of music we’ve been discussing?

Francophone people listen to Latino music… this means French AND Central-West African people. As a Puerto Rican, I am influenced by the world also. I think it would be a boring place if everyone was the same. Diversity is what creates new things. Many Africans I have met see this music as similar to theirs. Consequently, when I was with my friend in a Congolais club in Vitry-sur-Siene (outside of Paris)… the music sounded no different than what I had been hearing all my life. I could not stop dancing and felt right at home.

Caribbean people have strong African roots, this is obviously not news. As for the genre… I don’t really care as long as it’s danceable. People keep making music to define themselves by genre rather than just allowing their muse to experiment with ORIGINAL shyt that’s REALLY what people are hoping to hear. Some thing FRESH.

http://www.myspace.com/stormrydah
http://www.myspace.com/changoyomi
http://www.myspace.com/doublehelixmediagroup

Akili feat. B. Jahman – Bongo Bhangra

I love the idea of Black Atlantic, especially since in the US they have such a negative connotation of the middle passage, and all these cross ocean exchanges light up the pan-african in me.

That’s why I want so bad for this group of young Boricuas to have heard Premier Gaou and gone, yeah! I see it happen in the place where I play all the time. I played No Te Veo for my Salvadorean roommate and two seconds in to the song he said, “that sounds like that African song you guys play all the time.” I’ll let you all know the response I get this weekend.

As for melody I hear it I guess more in chord structure than melody, but it’s the Chorus on No Te Veo, and the synthesized Acoustic guitar in the Intro and background of Premier Gaou. I played a melody with the chord base B/A/G/F# and then transposed it to E, and it seemed to fit both songs, but maybe I’m just pushing it.

I also feel like if they got influence from any particular musical style it would be Coupe Decale mas que Zouglou, just because Coupe Decale is more pan-Francophone in production, I think it might have even made it to the French Caribbean. If they did get the influence from Zouglou, it would most likely be from the specific song Premier Gaou, because it was such a huge international hit.

Here’s an article with three interviews on contemporary Afro-Pop. The last two deal with the Ivory Coast styles Zouglou and Coupe Decale. http://www.afropop.org/multi/feature/ID/709

Thanks to all for entertaining this discussion!!!

Two other examples, both involving Indian film music, are Greek indoyíftika and Indonesian dangdut.

& while we’re on the champeta tip, I’m reminded that I’ve been dying to share this video (via MBQ) for a while now –

for further connections, watch it next to these !!