WOMAD

Daara J

From Senegal

It’s no exaggeration, not a hint of hyperbole, to declare that hip-hop is the most popular music in West Africa. In the Senegalese capital of Dakar alone, there are several thousand hip-hop combos plying their trade. Daara J are the city’s most internationally recognised hip-hop group, the trio whose album Boomerang won itself a stream of rich acclaim across the UK and the rest of Europe a few summers back. Refusing to bow to any American-authored blueprint of hip-hop, the chaps also draw from reggae, contemporary R&B and even salsa for performances that prick consciences as well as inducing their audiences to move and groove as one. Their sense of history’s pretty sharp too. “Africa is the true ancestor of rap,” they told The Independent. “Rap was born in Africa and had to travel on the slave ships to grow in the plantations of America before coming back to Africa.” Prepare yourself for the most danceable history lesson you’ve ever had.