MUSIC AND CITYSCAPES: Jua Cali's Nairobi, Olamide's Lagos

In their wide-ranging article of January 27th, 2015 titled "Songs About Cityscapes," Dorothy Lynskey et al reviewed some 47 songs about cities around the globe. One of these, in Congolese, was Mbilia Bel's Nakei Nairobi -- later released in Swahili as Twende Nairobi (that is Let's go to Nairobi).

About three weeks after the publication of the Lynskey et al article -- on February 20, 2015 to be precise -- Jua Cali, a leading light (and brand) in Kenya's music fraternity, released a video of his own song for Nairobi titled Karibu Nairobi (Welcome to Nairobi). In spirit, it vaguely reminds you of one of its precursors -- Will Smith's 2011 song, Miami; but the two are literally worlds apart. Here, below, it is:


Video of Karibu Nairobi


About a year and a half later, Nigerian artiste Olamide Baddo also released a video (shown below) honoring his own city of Lagos.


Click here for his I Love Lagos video

So we have in our hands now a tale of two cities, so to speak. That is: Nairobi and Lagos. What do we make of them?

The musicality of Olamide's offering is there for all to hear. The tunes and tones are more refined than one gets in Jua Cali's. And yet, if you really want to get a quick visual picture of Lagos and Nairobi, Jua Cali's video is more extensive and less tinted; and so more revealing. And so more rewarding. It's not surprising that each of those terrains is cast on a much larger canvas than Wizkid's neighborhood (mtaa, in Swahili) of Ojuelegba, which nevertheless has a charm of its own.

But Olamide's 'hides' the seams -- by highlighting the 'fun' images. It's more motivated by the urge to counter those memes and naysayers that he feels needlessly and perhaps maliciously (if not snootily) put Lagos down. It demands respect for his city, and seeks to steer the narrative a certain way. Not necessarily a bad thing.

READ: "POLITICS, URBAN DESIGN AND MUSC: To Love or Not to Love Lagos ~ Singer Olamide's Take" by Mauri Yambo

Jua Cali's simply 'rides roughshod' over and across the "raw and the cooked" slices of the cityscape. One senses that he is, that he feels, so much a part of the scene that he cannot 'hide' or peel off any part of it without concealing or stripping down his own Genge self. He celebrates all that his city (and he) stands for -- warts and all. Not necessarily a bad thing, either.

You be the judge.


PS: Nairobi has been a favorite city for Congolese musicians for decades. It has always been requited love, going back at least to the beginning of the Sixties. Here's what Phiona Okumu, one of the co-authors of "Songs About Cityscapes", said about Nairobi's attractiveness to Congolese musicians:

"When Congo's economy nosedived [in the late-Seventies] and Kinshasa's once-thriving music industry fell to ruin as a result, many of its music performers and producers migrated to cities like Nairobi where the demand for Congolese bands was high, as were the prospects for a decent living."