I was pleased to see that Guillaume took my bait in the last post about kuduro gone-a-global. He answered some key questions, enough worth putting the comment upfront:
So Kuduro has definitly crossed over in France as “dance of the summer” and it’s been a process in the making for the last 2 years. Check this entry for a link to a facebook video that shows white hair old people square dancing on Dança do Tchiriri: http://masalacism.blogspot.com/2009/07/i-kept-saying-that-kuduro-crossed-over.html
All right, now Kuduro’s fashion in France is actually not coming from Angolan, but Cap Verdien people. They are leading the scene in France and are providing most of the hype on the movement. After that, there’s a weird (same old) ideology of distinction of “we are the true ones, we are the originators, you guys just do shit” kind of vibe floating around from Angolan towards Cap Verdien. Galiano would not say that publicly but I know he kinda took this ideology as his own. I can’t go in details here, but they are the one pushing the sound now and the last few years.
Also Radioclit has absolutly NOTHING to do with this. Seriously, zero. Same with Buraka. This is grassroot success based on the fact that the Cap Verdien community in Paris and it’s suburbs is a big enough to make other communities follow. It’s also because it’s a dance as much as it’s a music and therefore it’s very fashionable in the club for 17 years old. Nothing to do with blogging or international hipsterism.
Finally, Coupé mix with Kuduro is already there. Check out: Normal Nada - Decale kuduro or also Dj Vielo’s Decale Cap Vert. This is just the beginning. All of this is based on the fact that white people dance clubs and carribean/african clubs are still very seperated in France. Or at least, there’s a strong network of carribean/african clubs throughout France. And like every where else, there playing the latest trend, which happens to be Kuduro now in France. And for the last few years, I’ve seen the name popping on the regular on the big fluo posters of the local african club in my medium/small size hometown of Orleans. Which never happened before.
Looking fwd to the rest of this discussion
Most importantly he confirms that kuduro is broadly popular, propelled by support among France’s vast multicultural immigrant scene (Cape Verdean especially). I had suspected as much from the plethora of YouTube videos, but sometimes that on-the-ground observation cinches it. I think this kind of grassroots feel — people actually dancing to it, clubs playing it, the beat thumping out of car stereos — is more exciting and more interesting than if it were exclusive to le blogosphère. Especially when it affords interaction with other styles, like coupé décalé — see again Guillaume’s suggested artists.
But where he links back to his post, and the video of old white folks clumsily dancing the tchiriri, is where things get très interesting. That’s beyond the marginalized masses in the banlieue — that’s percolating to the museum of dance music, wedding hits. It in turn reminds me of wayne&wax’s thoughts on chacarron (aka mumbling reggaeton) (old blogspot w&w at that). He compared it to the macarena, and in later posts thought it would be the ideal reggaeton entrée to the masses: something families can sing along to between innings at baseball games, etc.
Could tchiriri be headed for similar meme status? If YouTube is any kind of bellweather, I still don’t see any dancing babies or WoW tchiriri. That, at least, remains one arena in which funk has a viral spread kuduro lacks.
