Well, that caught most of the country off guard, eh? It really shouldn’t be that much of a surprise, a collaboration between Afrigo’s Moses Matovu and hip hop star Keko.

Moses Matovu is absurdly versatile, comfortable with jazz, soul and pop material. He also gets along with an equally diverse range of people. And then again, this is the same country where our President released a rap song in 2011 as a precursor to his re-election campaign, so really, nothing about our city, or rather, our country, should catch you off-guard.

Musically speaking, hip hop in Uganda has incorporated Afro-pop pretty seamlessly on several occasions.

NAVIO is an example of an artiste who has pushed this approach for a while, so Keko collaborating with Moses Matovu really shouldn’t be that much of a surprise.
The song is doing well on YouTube, which shouldn’t come as a surprise – after the social media announcement, most folks dashed to YouTube to see if this was for real.

Eventually we had to accept what we were seeing and hearing – a video of Keko and Moses Matovu, grinning ear to ear as she dropped her lines with that snappy delivery that she has made her own, and as Matovu killed the hook (no, he did not rap). The collaboration worked like a dream.
https://youtu.be/TPdHiLONK9Y?si=xSygvtcIXz7SBZ_j

I love that they did not make it a woke anthem, or one of those songs carrying a ‘message’. And few people can sing as convincingly about partying as Moses Matovu – after all, Afrigo Band have been the background sound for countless parties for about half a century. So you believe the man when he sings that hook: Twazze
Kukyakala.

The song has been greeted with warmth, because in Moses, we have a living legend. And in Keko we have a talented kid for whom this track is something of a homecoming.
This was song was a good idea, one carried on by the goodwill generated by the legend that is Moses Matovu and by two artistes who are at the top of the game within their respective genres. Would love to see this performed live.

Also, hats off to whoever was on the percussion (was that you Isaac?) The song also incorporates the brass that Matovu’s music typifies, with some wonderful synth work that typifies the hip hop beds Keko usually works with. Oh, and, of course, these are delicious sax solo from Moses Matovu – there had to be.

Find this song. It lives up to the hype.