Just Cool

 

From time to time I listen to a song and I can't get him out of my mind. This happened last week when I first listened to Just Cool, the new one by the Nigerian-British singer and rapper Obongjayar. On its debut album, it combined genres such as afrobeats and Jazz, HipHop,  ambient and R&B with angry lyrics about the time. This righteous anger in the face of social inequality is also shared in the first single since the album. "All people are tense," the artist says of our track of the day. "How could it be otherwise? Where is our united humanity? Where is our shared love for our brothers, sisters and children who seek safety and perspective? Where is our love for our planet?" A danceable groove between afrobeat and house underlines his discontent. As with Fela Kuti in the 70s, new kinds of dance music transport political aggressiveness. For Obongjayar's rage is precisely directed at the division of a society that should fight together, not against each other. Dancing, on the other hand, unites.