This Week's Playlist #45 - The African pioneers edition
Week #45 - The African pioneers edition
TL;DR: I'm running a weekly newsletter with 5 songs and a short description, and a matching Spotify playlist if you want to subscribe.
For the non-Spotify readers, there is a Youtube link for each of the songs on the cover.
Hello everyone!
I focused on a various range of topics and countries since I've started this newsletter but not on Africa.
Here are 5 songs from my collection about some of the African musician pioneers I've been listening to across the years.
Let's go!
![](https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fbucketeer-e05bbc84-baa3-437e-9518-adb32be77984.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fcc817ff0-30c0-418a-9ac3-e4170582f4b3_1200x1200.jpeg)
Fela Kuti, inventor of the Afrobeat genre of music, emerged from Nigeria to become both a musical and cultural messiah for his country in the '70s. Zombie is one of his massive hits, taking a stgance against the military power in Nigeria in that decade.
![](https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fbucketeer-e05bbc84-baa3-437e-9518-adb32be77984.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F46d43784-d4bd-439f-8069-ab03d5433818_600x602.jpeg)
Mulatu Astatke - Yèkèrmo Sèw (A Man of Experience and Wisdom)
Another classic, here, from the inventor of Ethiojazz.
![](https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fbucketeer-e05bbc84-baa3-437e-9518-adb32be77984.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F4ecf8489-f76e-4a31-a11c-bebfaa6e3d75_600x584.jpeg)
Nihiloxica harnesses the full force of the ancient Bugandan drumming tradition of Uganda and focuses it on the contemporary dance floor through a dark lens of techno beats.
![](https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fbucketeer-e05bbc84-baa3-437e-9518-adb32be77984.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F7e205cc2-c52d-4035-9776-c0d4038c9a67_600x598.jpeg)
Another pioneer here, Mamman Sani Abdullaye is a legendary name amongst Niger's avant garde & early West African electronic music.
![](https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fbucketeer-e05bbc84-baa3-437e-9518-adb32be77984.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F6070cb89-48cc-4b1d-a634-35566eaa5582_1024x1024.jpeg)
Toure Raichel Collective - Azwade
A collaboration track (or album, rather) to finish this week. Idan Raichel is one of Israel's top-selling pop musicians. Vieux Farka Toure is a virtuoso guitarist from Mali. A random connection in a German airport led to an amazing collaboration of 2 albums. A very meditative and unscripted, improvised jam session.
Until the next time, Godspeed!
Thomas
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Previous episodes
Week #43: The Halloween edition
Week #42: The London edition
Week #41: The Jetlag edition
Week #40: The Coolio edition
Week #39: The trumpet edition
Week #38: The Armenia edition
Week #37: The Piano edition, volume 2
Week #36: The Red Thread edition
Week #35: The Taylor Hawkins edition
Week #34: The Summer Bank Holiday edition
Week #33: The Readers' digest #2: the Jazz edition
Week #32: The Palestine edition
Week #31: The City edition (& a heavy metal bonus)
Week #30: The Piano edition
Week #29: The Heatwave edition
Week #28: The Bastille Day edition (+ another a heavy metal bonus)
Week #27: The "Best albums of 2022 so far" edition
Week #26: Happy summer
Week #25: The Hellfest edition
Week #24: The Pride edition
Week #23: The Basketball edition
Week #22: The Bank Holiday edition (+ another a heavy metal bonus)
Week #20: The Vangelis edition
Week #19: The Saxophone edition
Week #18: The Lebanese edition
Week #17: The "Labour Day" edition
Week #16: The "My friends got talent" edition
Week #15: Happy Easter
Week #14: Famous bands I started to listen to at the age of 40
Week #13: The Number of the Beast edition
Week #12: The Fat of the Land edition
Week #11: The Modern Soul voices
Week #10: Heavy metal goes pop music
Week #09: The Mask edition
Week #08: RIP Mark Lanegan
Week #07:
Week #06:
Week #05: The readers’ digest
Week #04:
Week #03: Albums for 2022 2/2
Week #02: Albums for 2022 1/2
Week #01: Happy New Year