AfricaIs aCountry

Weekend Music Break No.81

Africa Is a Country Podcast
African Five-a-Side Podcast

Weekend Music Break No.81

By
Boima Tucker

J Martins and Koffi

Your weekend music break for July 18th, 2015

This week, master of the new school J. Martins, and master of the old school Koffi Olomide team up in Dance 4 Me, the remix; A busy week for Jidenna who angers Nigerian Twitter, apologizes, and then links up with Kendrick Lamar for the classic man remix; Holy Forest offers an impressive collaboration connecting different nodes in the Black Atlantic with “Africa Calling”; Kollins and Toofan link up for an Ivorian-Togolese party jam called “Crazy People”; Sierra Leonean crooner Famous sings on a London rooftop in “Throway”; Emicida, Inna Modja, and Killah Ace offer up political rap stylings; Tumi provides some more party rap offerings with “Visa”; and finally, top Jamaican artist Popcaan releases a new video this week called “Way Up”.

About the Author

Boima Tucker is a music producer, DJ, writer, and cultural activist. He is the managing editor of Africa Is a Country, co-founder of Kondi Band and the founder of the INTL BLK record label.

Further Reading

Progress is exhausting

Pedro Pinho’s latest film follows a Portuguese engineer in Guinea-Bissau, exposing how empire survives through bureaucracy, intimacy, and the language of “development.”

The rubble of empire

Built by Italian Fascists in 1928, Mogadishu Cathedral was meant to symbolize “peaceful conquest.” Today its ruins force Somalis to confront the uneasy afterlife of colonial power and religious authority.

Atayese

Honored in Yorubaland as “one who repairs the world,” Jesse Jackson’s life bridged civil rights, pan-Africanism, empire, and contradiction—leaving behind a legacy as expansive as it was imperfect.

Bread or Messi?

Angola’s golden jubilee culminated in a multimillion-dollar match against Argentina. The price tag—and the secrecy around it—divided a nation already grappling with inequality.

Visiting Ngara

A redevelopment project in Nairobi’s Ngara district promises revival—but raises deeper questions about capital, memory, and who has the right to shape the city.

Gen Z’s electoral dilemma

Long dismissed as apathetic, Kenya’s youth forced a rupture in 2024. As the 2027 election approaches, their challenge is turning digital rebellion and street protest into political power.

A world reimagined in Black

By placing Kwame Nkrumah at the center of a global Black political network, Howard W. French reveals how the promise of pan-African emancipation was narrowed—and what its failure still costs Africa and the diaspora.

Securing Nigeria

Nigeria’s insecurity cannot be solved by foreign airstrikes or a failing state, but by rebuilding democratic, community-rooted systems of collective self-defense.