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Album reviews Music

The Very Best – MTMTMK

Rating: NNN


The video for the Very Best’s first single, Yoshua Alikuti, from second record MTMTMK is a remake of Lil Wayne’s A Milli. Singer Esau Mwamwaya, who lives in Lilongwe, Malawi, saunters, flaneur-like, around the slums of Nairobi, hopping on cars and trailed by associates and bandmate Johan Hugo of London’s Radioclit.

The Very Best have benefited from the publicity gained by riffing on a video or song by a popular Western artist. Covers of M.I.A. and Vampire Weekend tunes on their 2009 debut helped bring attention to the Afro-pop project. But beneath the stunts, they’ve got strong originals, too, with Mwamwaya’s effervescent, giddy performances – usually sung in English or Chewa – bubbling merrily over Hugo’s sub-bass.

On MTMTMK, the duo moves through a range of global sounds, from Congolese kwassa kwassa to reggaeton to electro house. Fuelling the idea that polyriddims are the future, they’ve got features from powerhouses like Bruno Mars, K’naan, Amadou & Mariam, and other of Mwamwaya’s continental compatriots.

Top track: Kondaine

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