One of the biggest musicians in Francophone Africa now is Molare (real name Moïse Moriféré Soumahoro). He's popular for his track called On Est Ensemble with Mali's Mokobe. He's also a DJ and a former member of the famous Ivorian group, La Jet Set together with Coupe Decale legend, Douk Saga. Have you realised that most of the Coupe Decale stars are deejays? Apart from Molare, there is DJ Alex Funk, DJ Caloudji (Alhaji man), DJ Arafat, DJ Christy B, DJ Jeff, DJ Tony, DJ Erickson, etc. The trend is continuing in South Africa where a lot of deejays have started releasing solo and compilation albums and are ruling airwaves. Examples there are DJ Sbu, DJ Bojo Mujo, DJ Bongz, DJ Cleo, DJ Mbuso T, etc.

Watch some videos of Molare below

From guest blogger - Dominique

The Kotazo craze is sweeping the Democratic Republic of Congo. It's mixed with coupe decale (from Ivory Coast) but people from Kinshasa have created their own dance. It's kind of a reaction against coupe decale and traditional congolese dances described as too "quiet". So like in Coupe decale, people get crazy dancing on kotazo, mixing some capoeira dances, simulating fights. It's simple, you do what you can do ;) It's more aggressive than other Congolese dances.

• View all from Mokobe
  Artistes Mokobe, Patson
  Album Mon Afrique
  Year 2007
  Writer Mokobé Traoré
  Language French
  Track # 5
  Runtime 4:28
  Video URL http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2UJ9DMEhrb8

• View all from Mokobe
  Artistes Mokobe, Molare, 113
  Album Degrees
  Year 2006
  Writer Mokobé Traoré
  Language French
  Runtime 4:31
  Video URL http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n63GZijKgio

• View all from Kaysha
  Artistes Kaysha, Anofela
  Album Legendary
  Year 2007
  Writer Edward Mokolo Jnr
  Language French, English
  Track # 12
  Runtime 6:13
  Video URL http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tk4wbXzoKzo

Alhaji, Alhaji, Alhaji.... they don't say much in the song but it is a big big hit in Ghana.

The question is who is Alhaji? what is Alhaji? who sings the Alhaji song? what is the Alhaji song about? where is Alhaji from? Is there an Alhaji dance? What is the Alhaji dance? What is the Alhaji craze?

Africa meet China.
African music meet Chinese. :-D

A couple of years ago, a friend showed me a video of a Chinese man singing Makossa songs. Zhen Ping Liu, popularly known as Liu de Karmer to his fans was the first ever and lone Chinese Makossa singer.
The name of the song is Assiko chinois, pretty good :-). Some friends joked that he probably wasn't him singing the song and someone else was doing voice over, but who really does that these days?

Watch the video below

Stephan Hamidou Doukouré, aka Douk Saga, was a musician from the Ivory Coast.
Part of the group, La Jet Set, he is known to be the creator of the music genre that has taken Africa and the rest of the world by storm, called Coupé-Décalé and is affectionately called the President.

Coupe Decale means 'cut and shift'. It is a unique style using African percussions, deep bass among others. It expressed the pulse of the Ivorian society while giving an insight into the political situation of the country.

Here are a couple of his music videos ...

• View all from Teeyah
  Artistes Teeyah, Anofela, Kaysha
  Album Metisse
  Year 2005
  Writer Teeyah
  Language French
  Runtime 4:59
  Video URL http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zTUo-5kgKMk

This is the video for the famous Premier Gaou song by Ivory Coast's Magic System.
It is widely regarded as one of the biggest hits out of Africa to date, and has even been called a continental anthem.

There are a couple of instances that are testaments to this fact.
I happened to be at a Haitian students dinner/dance and at their party, Premier Gaou was the only Africa song played.
Another time, I was partying at a reggae/dancehall club and when the dj's bothered to recognise the Africans in the club, our presence was marked by the playing of Magic System's club banger.

Kudos to them!