Almost ten years after the release of his first album, LIFE, the Nigerian Burna Boy has achieved his goal, having now become one of the biggest pop stars to come out of the African continent. On Love, Damini — his fourth album in four years — he takes a moment to reflect on how far he’s come, resulting in an album that’s much smoother and smoother thanAfrican Giant (2019) and TWice as TallGrammy for best album in the “Global Music” category in 2021. A little too soft, even: if Burna Boy excels when the rhythmic influences of Africa percolate in his mixture of pop and dancehall (on the famous Whiskey, Science and Cloak & Daggerduet with the English rapper J Hus), the homogeneity of the tone and the productions end up getting boring, while we would have liked more rough songs like Kilometer. Even the collaborations bring little diversity in tone: Ladysmith Black Mambazo delights with its two appearances, Popcaan brings smiles, but Ed Sheeran, J. Balvin and Khalid are redundant. In Osheaga on July 30.
Click here for an excerpt.
To see in video