The Stirrings of an Afro-Futurist Renaissance, Or Just Good Music

This trio named their album “82″ cause, well…they were all born in 1982.  They brainstormed for hours to decide on their band name, and they came up with Just A Band cause, well…they are definitely NOT just a band.  They’re a polymath band of (spiritual) brothers, whose disco-r&b-house, blessed by the spirit of Phil Collins, is inseminating the Internet with its Afro-futurist power.

This group of college pals cemented their friendship sharing musical obsessions (Bill aka Blinky: P-Funk and Kanye; Dan: Phoenix and Madlib; Jim: Norah Jones), and finally bounced their way into a home-made studio.  I’m sure you can guess the story from there: They put together an album, directed their own blaxploitation music video, which set a world-historical milestone when it became the first video to go viral out of Kenya.

Judging from their songs and music videos, Nairobi is full of laughing, creative young people who get together at somebody’s house on a Tuesday night and scream laughing, make out in closets, and if they’re not too drunk, lay down some tracks in a bedroom studio. Could Nairobi 2011 be like Paris in the ’20s, Greenwich Village after WWII, Mexico during the age of Diego Rivera?

The point is — I want to go to there.

For now, I’ll have to satisfy myself with Just A Band’s latest album, available for sale on Bandcamp.  Definitely download their free track, “Ha-He.” Well, do that after watching its music video, so you know why #Makmende was seriously trending in July 2010:

Just A Band (Kenya) – “Ha-He” with Makmende from Akwaaba Music on Vimeo.