Haut De Gamme – Koweit, Rive Gauche

Well let's say at the start that from the Wiki article he sounds like a pretty despicable person and when Papa Wemba is sitting right there, is this actually an album I need to hear?

Musically fine when it does the Afro-funk, but there are several tracks where it seems to aim at Afro-yacht Rock - more Charles Aznavour than Fela Kuti - and do we need that?

It’s a fun vibe at the beginning, but it all sounds the same after a while to my untrained ears

Great mood

Jesus...

Fine if not a little generic. Dudes a slimeball though. Way to fuck up the good will of your culture to the rest of the world.

*I can appreciate the musicianship and positive vibes of this sound, but it doesn't have too much variation on album

Pretty chill world music album. It's got a samba feel to it, and makes me think of like idk Carribean music too.

zvuči ko omot - mimasto, jeftino i loše

Pretty fun, but can be repetitive.

I probably would have given it a 2 perhaps a 3 on another day but the guys a rapist and did an astro world before it was cool.

Another situation where I like the art but not the artist. Assholes can be talented musicians!

Several of these songs started and made me think the production was dated and bad, but then each one of them warmed up and won me over, mainly because of Olomide's voice and the repetitive rhythm. I enjoyed this quite a lot, though it could have perhaps done with being 15 minutes shorter. Solid three..

African pop. It gets on my nerves. I was looking for the off switch during the second track. I'd much rather listen to real African music, and I don't like that either. I definitely won't be listening to this again. 1/5

Jeg tror dette kunne vært mye kulere om det ikke var produsert så livløst. Høres like 90s ut som coveret.

All these songs seemed a little similar for me. Maybe if I understood the lyrics I would have dug this more. The guitar tone was pretty neat though. Favorite song was Desespoir.

Before I listened to this, I saw that this guy was convicted of statutory rape (of a 15yo backup dancer). That makes it difficult to separate art from artist, so I won’t.
This sounds like the kind of cliche music that White Lotus would use to establish the scene for a new season set in Congo (or, if we’re honest, anywhere in Africa). It’s the kind of carefree and danceable music people look for when they’re dabbling in World music, and I’m sure there’s another, less controversial, musician that sounds just like Kofi Olomide whom I could listen to without the inner conflict. I genuinely don’t care if it’s just a cover band either, as long as they’re from Africa and not sex criminals. Let’s maybe find them for the next list update?

Happy music, but I agree, it sounds very clean, almost clinical.

Nah.

Listen to Kanda Bongo Man instead!

Aijettä kun on aurinkoinen levy! 4/5

I appreciate that much of this is upbeat and sparkly and happy. It starts to get quite repetitive by 3-4 tracks in though. The tracks are incredibly long, and it gets a bit wearing.

2.5 rounded down.