From Kikuyu gospel to bongo flava, Swah rap (Tanzanian hip-hop), East Africans have great taste in pop music. But what's going on in the underground?
A team of international producers and artists put together a sort of artist residency in Nairobi's Elefant Studios in 2019 to produce an album of young Kenyan artists, play shows across East Africa and at Uganda's Nyege Nyege Festival, and film a short documentary about the artists and about this project. The featured artists include Karun, Slikback D'Njau, Jinku, KMRU, Pier Alfeo, TITE and FLEXFAB. If you don't know them yet, this seems like a decent introduction, no?
Extra Muros - Kenya comes out digitally and on a limited vinyl run on Sept. 4, but the first single just dropped.
The residency was supposed to move to Italy this year and then the Persian Gulf in 2021, but, like all best-laid plans, at the moment the future is murky.
The Nairobi project's release, though, is on schedule so far and can be pre-ordered right here.
