Man ak Mom

Sunday afternoons here only mean one thing, ridiculous music videos. After lunch I decided to watch TV as my stomach digested the greasy rice and pork I had had. First it was all concert footage of French “adult contemporary” artist (think Celine Dion) and it was like watching the French VH-1. That at least seemed more “authentic” than the blatant imitations I saw on the French BET that came on afterward. So after seeing Cherish “Do it do it” and Young Jeezy spew his latest nonsense about cars, hos, clubs and jewelry, I saw the French imitations. The first video “Ma soeur” (my sister) by Vitaa is about the French Cherish finding out that her friend was sleeping with her boyfriend (and after she bought her that great bag for her birthday!) I shouldn’t have to explain how this is a ludicrous. The second is Kenza Farah’s "Je me bats." Maybe it’s just cause she’s not white, but I think she does a better job imitating American R&B. (The third clip is some of that VH-1 French pop nonsense.) Then just when I had forgotten that it could get worse the Senegalese imitation of American hip hop and R&B came on. Gaston featuring Titi in “Man ak Mom.” It’s Wolof for “Me and Him/Her” but it’s clear that it’s “her.” This clown had the audacity to wear a fur coat while shooting a video in Dakar. It’s hot as fuck. Motherfucker are you crazy? Do you seriously fantasize yourself as a flossin’, ballin’ American rapper so much (already a fantasy none of those clowns live either) that you lost your mind? A fur coat in Dakar! A fur coat! An animal died so this fool can wear a fur coat in 90 degree weather. Gente pero es verdad, en este mundo se ve todo.

I was happy that after that the shows shifted to the less enraging, more laughable absurdity of mbalax music videos. I love them. They too imitate American music videos in always trying to have the singer perform surrounded by luxury, except that they don’t have big houses and nice cars so the videos always looked like they are filmed in some rich Senegalese person’s living room. The rest of the scenes will be in front of a nice car (just one) that while genuinely a nice car like a Ford Explorer is something I could own if I ever get a regular job. No Bentleys. But at leas they are trying and the acrobatic, lively dancing is much more endearing than trying to look cool in your fur coat when you live in a poor, hot African country.

Viviane Ndour

• Saturday night I went to Yengoulene, a “cultural complex” in Dakar where one of my host sisters, Sophie, works. As we approached the place, the pattern for the neon lights made it look more like Chucky Cheese’s than a nightclub, or sorry “cultural complex.” I half expected to see a bunch of sugared up children playing arcade games chased by a man in a creepy-looking mouse outfit, and was disappointed that inside it just looked like a regular pretentious nightclub. We were there because Viviane Ndour performs there regularly on Saturdays. Viviane is the most famous female pop star in Senegal right now, and as you can guess is related to King of Senegalese Pop Youssou Ndour (see entry below, she recently divorced Youssou’s brother). She is like the Beyonce of Senegal. I usually hate it when people describe others as the “whatever of wherever” but in this case I think it’s apt because at least to me it is obvious that she is deliberately imitating Beyonce. She sings and dresses like American R&B singers. She wears a lot of fake hair like Beyonce, although I must admit that she had the best wig I have yet to see in Senegal, and considering that I see a good 25 wigs a day that is quite the accomplishment. Viviane has a Lebanese father and is therefore light-skinned like Beyonce. Granted she wouldn’t be light-skinned in the US but in Senegal she is positively “redbone.” She is lightest-skinned Senegalese-born woman I have seen so far. That the biggest female pop star in Senegal look nothing like the people of the country is scary, but don’t worry my fellow Dominicans our title as the “Most Self-Hating Group of Black People on the Planet” is still secure. One light-skinned female pop star in a country that is nearly uniformly black cannot beat centuries of self-hatred, anti-Haitianism and racial delusions.
• Unlike Beyonce, however, I got to see Viviane perform for US$6 (I imagine that the last time Beyonce performed for that little money it must have been a school play or something) and even got a chance to bump into her as she ran out of the restaurant after the show. The show itself consisted of the kind of pop mbalax songs that all sound the same (I don’t speak Wolof well enough yet to understand what the songs are about but they don’t sound much deeper than most of Beyonce’s catalog), only made interesting by the wildly energetic and acrobatic dancing. Viviane has a dancer that performs with her regularly, but about halfway through the show they started inviting people from the audience to come on stage and flash their stuff. There was also a brief interlude where various young women tried to sing some of Viviane’s songs, with some of them getting booed off-stage and one of them singing better than even Viviane. Check out her latest music video below.

Youssou Ndour

Youssou Ndour is basically the king of the Senegalese music scene. The tabloids are filled with news about his divorce, and even the divorces of his brothers (yes the man is so famous that even his brothers get shine). Everything he touches turns to gold. People here claim that even if he just shouts you out on a record you are going platinum. He released an album recently and not a day goes past that I don’t hear at least one of his songs. I think this is the song. Of course if I weren’t on a computer that was “built for Windows ‘98” I might be able to hear the song and let you know if this was really it. But it looks right. The other big craze down here is this song called “Bolokas” which is the Wolof-ized version “blocage.” It is accompanied by its own dance which you can hopefully see here.

Music videos

Check out these clips of coupe decale and mbalax videos to get a clue of what I am talking about. And yes, some people actually do dance like that at the club.

Poor, but not Cheap

• OK, so scratch that, apparently US$4 doesn’t get you a coke in Dakar either. This city may be poor but it ain’t cheap. I went out on Friday to Club Alexandra in downtown Dakar, and saw a very good live Cape Verdean band play. I played myself while I was in Boston, I had no idea that Cape Verde—as small as the archipelago is—has such a rich and diverse musical heritage, I should have gone out and heard more Cape Verdean music while I was there. The lounge was crazy expensive though. A cup of coke was more than $4. I don’t want to say how much I spent cause it’s embarrassing, but let’s just say that I have gone out and had a good time in NYC for less dough.
• But it’s not just the club, everything else here is super-expensive compared to other peripheral countries. I am starting to wonder just how the poor majority of Dakarois are able to survive. Shit, if tourists feel the pinch I can only imagine how desperate the people who are actually struggling must feel. After all if I can’t afford to buy as much street food and beer as I planned it isn’t the end of the world, if you can’t pay your rent or afford dinner then you really are fucked.
• Saturday night I went to another bourgeois club, The Casino de Cap-Vert. The cover alone was US$12. It’s near the airport in the richest part of Dakar, so I figured I was partying with the elite. I thought I may even run into the president’s daughter, only to find out that there are even bougier clubs. Shit it’s not bad enough that I was spending someone’s monthly salary in a night, apparently I am not spending real dough until I am spending someone’s yearly salary on cover and drinks. Count me out, though, after this weekend I am done seeing how the rich party. My curiosity is satisfied.
• What did I learn? Like bourgeois people all over the Third World, Senegalese love them some damn European culture. I was forced to endure a set of techno by a French DJ to start off the night. After we were done with our, “Let’s pretend to be in Paris, Milan or Brussels” part of the evening, we moved on to the real shit. The DJ hit up that coupe decale, that mbalax, followed by Cape Verdean funana and zouk, more coupe decale and ended with a set of remixes of the biggest club hits in reggaeton and hip hop of the last two years. So I learned that 5o Cent is truly ubiquitous, and that they will never stop playing Daddy Yankee’s “Gasolina.” In addition, I am astonished by the cosmopolitan and worldly nature of the club culture here. In the course of one evening we heard several genres from several diverse parts of the world in different languages. How often do you get that in a club in NYC, ostensibly a world-class cultural center?
• And yes, they really do love themselves here. I saw more people dancing in front of the mirrors again on Saturday. It hasn’t stopped being funny.
  Cats here really know how to party. They go out mad late. Friday night when I asked at what time we were going out, my host sister replied that not until after midnight. She was serious; we left the house at 1 AM, and didn’t get back until 5 AM. I can’t hang. I spent too many years in Cambridge where by 2 AM you are already walking home after a night out, where you shower at 9:30 PM to make sure you can be at the bar/club/lounge by 11 pm. I was still getting used to NYC time when you start getting ready at 11 pm. Here they told me to take a nap until midnight and then get ready to go. Saturday we didn’t leave the house until 1:30 AM, to return at 6 AM. The club doesn’t even open until midnight. The craziest shit was that as we were leaving the club at 5:30 AM there were people walking in!
• I think my host sisters have set a new record for how long it takes a group of women to get ready to go out. I thought no one could beat my actual sisters, but they have raised the art of “getting ready” to another level. I was completely expecting them to come out as transformed human beings, and was disappointed when they just looked like themselves in make-up and heels. It was cool though, cause while waiting for them I watched a bunch of music videos on Senegalese TV. First there were a bunch of low-budget mbalax music videos, which are just hilarious. They look like they are made with someone’s camcorder in their living room and backyard, but the dancing in so ridiculous that they are great in a kitschy way. They remind me of merengue music videos. Then I watched “Made in USA” which is basically BET’s 106 & Park. They play the latest hits in hip hop and R&B, so that I was able to see the video for the new Rihanna song, the new Mya song, the latest Akon song, etc. Here I thought that I would not be able to hear 50 Cent’s latest remix of “In da Club” but no, you can all rest easy in knowing that I will be kept abreast of all of the latest developments in 50’s career, and that I can see R. Kelly every night tell me how he’s a flirt. Felt just like home. Then the worse part was when they started playing French hip hop videos and I could see how hip hop has spread ignorance world-wide. I saw a video where some French 50 clone, was doing some drug deal and then goes to Rio de Janeiro and has a party with a bunch of women and crystal and then gets arrested by the police (the Feds? Interpol? The French? James Bond? Whose jurisdiction?) sent to jail where he writes his girlfriend a letter. I was horrified.