One of the swiftest ways to confirm the global commercial success of an art phenomenon; music, dance, movie, or literature is through the adaptations/appreciation of said phenomenon by cultures that on paper should be considered out of reach.
Afrobeats is a prime case study of the aforementioned, as the umbrella music genre, primarily made in West Africa has had a worldwide breakthrough in a rather unprecedented fashion.
The global impact of Afrobeats is irresistibly fierce and has taken the globe by a geostorm as markets being accorded a semblance of relevance are now adapting the sonic style into their artistic vault – with one of the most notable being the Latino/Hispanic ‘Reggaeton’ market.
As far as sonic formations and history goes, African music isn’t alien to Reggaeton. In fact, what constitutes Reggaeton is mainly black-American community-influenced ( but that’s a tale for another day).
The year is 2023 and who would have foreseen a time when predominantly Spanish-speaking singers who hail from far across Northern, and Southern America as well as European countries such as Spain would be belting passionately over urban African pop beats and even moving further as to infusing some of the rhyme schemes and melodies? Not this writer for sure.
There is a growing community of Spanish singers and rappers who otherwise significantly record Reggaeton music but are now crossing into the worlds of Afrobeats by alchemizing the sonic elements of Afro-pop with Reggaeton in a bid to create a rich and beautiful tapestry of music.
An example of such an artist is Daniel Heredera Vidal better known in the Reggaeton/Spanish hip-hop world as ‘Rels B’. Rels B is regarded as one of the newest forces to reckon with in Spanish hip-hop by multiple publications.
The 30-year-old baby-faced rapper is however proving to be an out-of-the-box player in a burgeoning music industry that favors the versatile as his recent deployment into the Afrobeats spectrum will suffice.
Songs like “Como Dormiste?” and RVFV’s (another Spanish rapper) “Mi Luz” (feat Rels B) vividly taps into the victorious African instrumentation that has found fame amongst foreign listeners and ultimately points to the fact that Afrobeats is as global as global gets.
