In stores
Article reserved for subscribers
The Nigerian artist imposes himself with “Love, Damini”, wrapping sixth album, confirming with a new assurance his unique style made of mixtures.
One of the most important pop artists of our time is Nigerian. Many who already know him will sigh as they read the sentence. The others are lucky: it’s never too late to see the mental world we have in mind returned to its foundations – and the West is no longer the center of gravity of the music that circulates the most in the world. , definitively. Originally from Port Harcourt and distantly related to Fela (his grandfather Benson Idonije, whom he introduced to his first album, was Kuti’s first manager), Burna Boy climbed Everest from the mainstream at the speed of a rocket to impose not a new, exotic color on pop music hitherto monopolized by Anglo-Saxon artists, nor to act for the naija culture, of which he is the most famous representative, but to impose himself same, with its taste and its idiosyncrasies. Namely a unique mixture of suave dancehall, very melodic reggae, plastic pop and r’n’b, full of rhythms and moods West Africans – Gambia, Ghana, Benin, Senegal -, culturally anchored well beyond the most emblematic guests of his previous albums, Angélique Kidjo or Youssou N’Dour, and whose Love, Damini very quietly prolongs the little miracle, Indian summer style.
Dazzling assurance
The major figures of the moment have certainly once more migrated in droves (the Jamaican Popcaan, the English Ed Sheeran and J Hus, the Colombian J Balvin, the Americans Kehlani and Khalid) but we retain…
