“What is the international sound all of you are talking about sef?”, Shina finally asked from the corner of the room, where his face had just been buried behind the large iMac blocking him off the rest of the office. An argument about the idea of Wizkid marketing ‘international sound’ had ensued earlier and the question seemed to quiet our newsroom session.

But only for a brief moment.

“The international sound is what is popular on the Billboard charts” Debola interjects, he’s always the first to speak out on matters like this. He references how the global mainstream has always inspired the Afropop sound, as evidently seen with Drake’s influence with dancehall and mid tempo instrumentation (“One Dance”, More Life EP etc). A counter argument from Fisayo quickly lists mere changes in instrumentals rather than radical shift in sound. I let the question linger on my mind, before deciding to pitch the team a story about the battle for the survival of traditional African genres, but the question remained unanswered.

However, the thinking is pretty simple. On this current incursion of African music on a global mainframe, celebrity brags amongst other social media chatter have questioned what personifies an ‘international artist’. While there are different scales to measure what it means to be an ‘international artist’ brand-wise (major-label contracts, collaborations, digital streams etc), the sound aspect of it is nought. This is especially important because since the digital age enabled direct access to popular African music globally, there have been clear indications that songs that retain some African authenticity while blending with sounds from the global mainstream are favoured over songs that lean further out. Otherwise, how does one explain the success of Davido’s “Fall” and “IF”, or RunTown’s “Mad Over You” 2.0, “For Life”, or even Tekno’s 2016 smash, “Pana”. Despite bearing mark of traditional high-life, these songs have thrived exceedingly with a global audience without heavy major-label promotion or pandering to bubblegum radio EDM like some so-called ‘international artists’.

It may be foolhardy to assume the international sound a myth, but this argument was rightfully concluded earlier by Fisayo’s point about change of instruments not sounds, King Sunny Ade is a prime example. On the cusp of King Sunny Ade’s international stint with Island Records, he met French composer Martin Meissonnier who would go on to help KSA mould his sound. King Sunny Ade recalls though instruments were altered to be representative of global mainstream sounds, the tones were retained in their authentic notes. While this means the KSA’s international Afrojuju artistry incorporated more electronics, songs were still entirely conceptualised from their original Afro-inspired arrangements.

Beyond crispier production, if anything must be used to qualify music as an ‘international’ African sound, the Africaness must be sustained. A popular global mainstream sound like dancehall for example, should therefore not be used to qualify what stands as an ‘international’ Afropop sound.

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