Congolese are coming back

By Dennis Asiimwe

In a world that seems rather far away, Congolese musicians dominated the music scene. They were everywhere: live music, in the clubs, at social functions…if you didn’t know better, you would think we were rather closely related to the ‘Democratic’ (ha!) Republic of Congo. There were several reasons for this dominance of course, and several reasons why it faded away.

The music and entertainment was geared towards an older generation, one that had grown up listening to this genre. Then there was the fact that this same generation dominated clubs, and the club owners obliged; ‘lingala’ music, as it is known, would play for hours on end, folks would actually dance to the stuff. Things, like they are wont to do, changed.

First, clubs often used Lingala as a sort of interlude before switching to ballads. But because ballads were being phased out of clubs (since folks coupled up and le clubs earlier than usual after a ballad or two), the role of Lingala as link music faded.

The second, of course, was the development of a new generation of yuppies who absolutely disdained Lingala. They were listening to Missy ‘Misdemeanor’ Elliot (and then Nicki Minaj) and Jay Z (and then Lil’ Wayne). Lingala quickly hit the musical version of ‘the forgotten genre’.

Except it wasn’t; not really. If there was one thing about this genre, one thing unique to it, it was the absolute seemingly harmless fun that came along with dancing to the stuff. It’s no surprise really; the lyrics of most Lingala songs, when translated, are mostly gibberish (though of course you could say the same for most pop-music today).

And fleetingly, some local musicians would drop tracks that borrowed from it, while other ‘mainstream’ live acts actually used Lingala-based formats in their performances.

Eagles Production and Qwela epitomize this borrowing of the strengths of this genre. The Eagles Production dropped a track called  Twakutegede, a hilarious tune with several implications for the person the song was attacking, but it’s the video, a delightful production itself, that showed the whole band dancing along and gyrating Lingala-style to the Lingala-genred track.

Qwela are a surprising choice on this line up but they often ended their gigs by lapsing into a 20-minute Lingala medley of sorts. It always caught me by surprise when they did this, but what was more surprising was the reaction of the crowd: they would hit the dance floor running, and dance like they didn’t have a care (one of the enduring and endearing traits of Lingala music of course). So within the sub-conscious of the yuppies themselves was a need for the carefree fun-loving nature of this music.

And slowly but as surely as the world turns, the tide is changing back. Congolese bands are creeping back. The announcement that Rumba Japan, one of the biggest Congolese bands in Kenya, are planning a one month stay in Kampala, with plans for possibly extending their sojourn starting May 1st must sound odd to the casual observer of the industry here. But it follows a trend that isn’t that unusual.

East Africa, even before its political alliances, is a musical chiefdom of sorts: Jose Chameleon, Navio, and Keko are regional and not just national celebrity names. The same is true of Kenyan acts like the charismatic Nameless. So with the Congolese music going through something of a revival in Nairobi, the flow-over effect is not that surprising.

The planned tour of Kampala by Rumba Japan (they start it off with a Labor Day performance at Sabrina’s) is probably the start of a trend that might just shake the industry up. It is a shaking the industry has needed for some time now.