http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lK_u-AAIYUM Today is Senegal's independence day. Carlou D transformed himself from the rapper he was in Didier Awadi's band Positive Black Soul to the singer-songwriter (supporting for Youssou N'Dour) he is these days, and did so in style. Although we're still waiting for his new album 'Audiovisa' to come out, this song, 'Ligueye', should be on it.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RnrHhRLFPqo One of the human rights activists featuring in the 2009 documentary Cameroon: Coming Out of the Nkuta is Alice Nkom. The film sketches the daily struggle of young gays and lesbians in Cameroon. Nkom was in The Netherlands this week to talk about their fight. For a longer talk by Nkom (in French), here she is speaking at conference late last year: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MHLw6wb9sBo

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S4EriPgiXV0 I like this video for Sayon Bamba's song 'L'excisée' (from her album Dougna). Born in Guinea she resides in Brussels these days. A message doesn't come much clearer than this.

"The Zimbabwe Alliance is a funder/advocate partnership to promote a vibrant civil society and a successful democratic transformation in Zimbabwe. The alliance is non partisan and does not accept corporate funds." Nothing here we are not in support of, so we figured we'd share this promotional video for the Zimbabwe Alliance, recorded by Nomadic Wax's Magee McIlvaine. http://vimeo.com/20987027

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kNynEnPMagA Remember the Belgian-Congolese project Héritage? It took them a while to record a video for one of the featuring songs. The two singers on this track are Stefy Rika and Nina Miskina. You'll recognize the infamous Africa Museum's diorama in the first part. It gets interesting halfway through.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gb18FWbL0mw In memory of Cameroonian artist Goddy Leye (1965-2011).

If you can’t make it to Stockholm next week, visiting The Hague might be a good alternative. The Movies That Matter Festival has also planned some promising premieres (and I'm relying more on the trailers than on the film festival's site descriptions). Three films I hope to see there are. First up, Surprising Europe, a “documentary about a disappointed immigrant, who wants to show his fellow-countrymen the true face of Europe.” More on the film's website. The Mobile Cinema "... follows the mobile cinema crew members as they travel through inhospitable areas of Congo, to screen their much-awarded Fighting the Silence and change people’s attitude towards rape." http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Caorb7NF_2s And a documentary about rapper Sister Fa: Sarabah

Subjected to female genital mutilation as a child, the Queen of Hip Hop now campaigns to protect Senegalese girls from a similar fate. In the film, she returns to her native village to try to put an end to this centuries-old tradition through music and education.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xPPX4cnEIUQ A full list of the featuring films can be found here. -- Tom Devriendt

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5_O62AItxTs Not the official video for BLK JKS's Zol!"

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=06S7oMLvl2w French-Congolese musician Abd Al Malik's star is rising fast in Francophone Europe. Behind his, say, rather straightforward song titles are some revealing lyrics, so we don't mind his songs here being played on the radio over and over again. Above is last year's hit Ma Jolie. Last month he released another great single, Mon Amour, taken from his album Château Rouge. Earbugs, both of them.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5syTnWDcl-8 Although it was only launched a year ago, Cape Town-based Badilisha Poetry Radio is rapidly building itself an impressive on-line database of weekly podcasts featuring new voices and poetic genres. "(Their) intention is to platform who and what Africa has to say to itself and the rest of the world." Hosted by Malika Ndlovu (introducing the radio in the video above), they are "constantly seeking new poets to showcase and would therefore welcome recommendations of Pan-African poets that are not yet featured." Visit their website.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jEe96sQsRg4&hd=1 You know we like the Dutch magazine ZAM. The promised English edition is (almost) here. As a sneak peek, they're giving us this 'digital introduction'. 

Rob Boffard writing in The Guardian:

Hip-hop in South Africa faces the same problems all music faces – how do you reach as wide an audience as possible? But it has additional posers unique to this country – can you rap in any of South Africa's 11 languages and still be relevant to all your listeners? And how much can you rely on American hip-hop before losing your own identity? But this is a genre bursting with talent, and South African rap artists are finding ways around the difficulties their situation throws at them ... Corporate interest helped South African hip-hop beat one of its biggest problems. Globally, few genres have taken to the internet like hip-hop, and it's now a vital tool for any artist. But in South Africa? Not a chance. Of the country's 49m people, only around 6m have access to the web. And in the predominantly black townships, which represent hip-hop's core market, internet access is almost unheard of. When it comes to publicising and distributing music, there's rarely a workable online option.

Is that so?

I received my copy of this year's Commonwealth Prize winner Aminatta Forna's The Memory of Love in the mail the other day. Not that I don't like its cover (or the book), but this is just silly. And here's why: Some of us (in Canada, Great Britain, South Africa and India) also know 2008 Commonwealth Prize winner Lawrence Hill's novel as The Book of Negroes and sure, this is the Australian edition's cover, but still...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NC9kJbnoPtI Anyone who makes songs about politicians eating all the money--what else do they do?--gets our vote. South African rock-reggae band, Tidal Waves (see also our earlier post) will be touring in the U.S. the next two weeks. Only in the American South, apparently, but don't miss them if you're around and you're in for some rock-n-reggae. The tour schedule.

By Lebon Ziavoula, a member of Congo-Brazzaville photographers collective, Generation Elili. Via Afrique in Visu.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LsowLHE6f0Y We've plugged Fredy Massamba before. 'Ntoto' is taken from his album Ethnophony.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eZg18qsycBk It's late already, but it is still March 6: Ghana Independence Day. Dutch rapper Kno'Ledge Cesare pays tribute in this video shot in Accra.

Pioneer Unit's on fire. Yet another release by the Cape Town label, this time a collection of 'lost tapes' by Lesotho-born musician Konfab, who describes himself as a "presently disadvantaged, previously dissed and damaged, seriously pissed-off, with anger mismanaged, half-foreign, urbanised darkie." This is one of the featuring collaborations (with AIAC favourite JAAK): [bandcamp track=3741264537  bgcol=FFFFFF linkcol=4285BB size=short] (Picture by Ann-Sophie Leens.)

http://vimeo.com/20554580 Images by anthropologist Yasmin Moll. For more work by Moll, watch Fashioning Faith or read her recent contributions to The Revealer.