Yoga: Asake’s Crate-digging Is Monumental For African Music
This week, Nigerian singer Asake released his first single of the year. In 2022, it seemed Asake never sleeps, dropping one hit after the other and driving the music scene into a frenzy. It’s been a long time since an artist burst on the scene with an intensity that matched – and in some cases, beat – that of more established acts. His career has changed dramatically in almost a year since he dropped Omo Ope with Olamide. He has even changed the music landscape with his guttural expressions that straddle indigenous and Aladura realms.
His 2023 curtain-raiser Yoga takes off where he left off the preceding year: Asake is a genius sound bender whose degree in Dramatic Arts isn’t wasted. Yoga is a beautiful work of art: Asake’s continuous collaboration with director TG Omori will become one of this generation’s most important markers. Yet, as colourful and Afrocentric as the video is, even with TG Omori’s eye-watering fee these days, it is not why Yoga is such a landmark moment for African music. There will be breakdowns and analyses of the music, its visual elements and the entire motif displayed in the song in subsequent columns. The reason is in the composition of the music itself. Ladies and gentlemen, prepare for takeoff.
Takeoff for another level of brilliance for African music. The sample alone is a huge deal. Yoga samples Mo Capitaine, a classic by Michel Legris, a cultural icon in Mauritius in his lifetime. Legris died in 2015. They were one of the legends of Sega music, a genre of the islands just off the African coast on the Indian Ocean, including Mauritius, Seychelles and Reunion. Unsurprisingly, a large part of sega’s roots is from the music of Africa’s enslaved peoples, who made up 80% of the population of Mauritius. In the 20th century, sega, like many other traditional African genres, had evolved to include reggae, pop and whatever contemporary sounds widespread across the respective regions. Mo Capitaine- The Captain – became the name Michel Legris became known as, a homage to his status in Mauritius music industry. My one question was: How did Asake, or more precisely, producer Magicsticks discover this record? Especially in an age where it’s not common to embark on crate-digging, a seemingly lost art which hip hop previously carried out religiously?
I’m sure there’ll be more answers to how the record was discovered in the coming weeks and months. I know for now that this is perhaps an opening of a new era for Nigerian and African music: our heritage is too rich, too deep and too “us” to be looked down upon. Yes, we know that today’s contemporary music – Afrobeats, Amapiano, Gengetone or Bongo – draws extensively from global genres like hip hop and Afro-Caribbean music. Yet, the several decades and centuries of African traditional music are where the real treasure is. From time to time, we’ll see people from other places take these sounds and music and make it into something entirely theirs. For example, Michael Jackson’s 1982 Wanna Be Startin’ Something heavily samples Manu Dibango’s Soul Makossa. Yet, he had to drag M.J. to court before he was awarded a paltry one million francs in 1986 under the condition that he could never claim the song. Meanwhile, when Master P sampled I Wanted You Back for his son Romeo’s My Baby in 2001, the Jacksons took 100% of the publishing—all of it.
I’m trying to make this point: we’re at a time when African culture is a valuable global currency. From Wakanda to Year of Return to Detty December, there’s a renewed focus on Africa as the next frontier. While the politics of Africa still leaves much to be desired in terms of quality of leadership and representation, music and culture have gone far ahead by being the ambassadors of Africa. As the world returns to benefit from Africa, Africans must be at the forefront of sharing it with the world.
However, we are at an advantage this time – we’re no longer waiting for the rest of the world to embrace us. Instead, we’re making our music how we want it, and if they want to join in, they’re welcome. That is why the world must stop and notice when artists put African culture front and centre, as Asake did in Yoga. And then they’ll discover that the musical roots in Africa run deep. It is precisely why this website is called Sounds of Africa – because the sounds of Africa, as we say in Naija parlance, are plenty.
Jide Taiwo is a writer and media executive. He’s based in Lagos, Nigeria and tweets via @thejidetaiwo.
Lastly, stay updated with all you need about African music at S.O.A. right here.
Yoga: Asake’s Crate-digging Is Monumental For African Music
