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Friday Madness: Maskarado “Tabacanawa”

In Luanda, most of the top house music producers don’t really talk, or even know each other. I was a bit sad to realize that all of the big names mostly evolve on their own, partnerships are incredibly rare, DJ Djeff and DJ Silyvi being the most notorious.

But one guy brings it all together, because he doesn’t compete with anybody, but rather completes everybody’s music: the one and only Maskarado. A cat I had the pleasure of meeting on my trip to Luanda in 2009, when he was already spitting rhymes on top of house beats. This was before Elegom Bounsa, which not only put Maskarado on the map in a big way, it put domestic Angolan house music on the map in Luanda.

Today house music is huge in Angola, but still defined by very specific boundaries. Maskarado seems to continue his mission to bring down these barriers, he distills his kuduro style rapping on all kinds of uptempo beats, and Tabacanawa is a fine example of that sound. Bruno and Nelson Rudebeatz of house crew Homeboyz, are lucky to be around: Nelson almost passed a couple of months ago. Seems his close encounter with death only made his determination stronger: I am completely and entirely sold by this beat!

Maskarado – Double Holiday Freebies!

Monami has been playing in loops for weeks now around here, so it’s exciting to share two additions to the Monami story: remixes by Los Carlos and Atropolis. Los Carlos is a regular on this site, most notably for his kuduro remix of Elegom Bounsa. Atropolis, of the Dutty Artz crew, also sent us his own take on Monami, better than words:

Maskarado – Monami – acapella

We won’t call this one a remix contest, instead we want to shift towards a permanent musical lab: we will regularly post stems, vocals, instrumental parts, drum loops, for you to work with. All creative commons, you can do anything you like with it, as long as it’s not commercial. If you do have commercial endeavors, then contact us and let’s work it out. If it sounds good we’ll probably want to release it!

If you’re not familiar with Maskarado, check him out here and here. We are sharing his acapella, which you can download right here. BPM is 125, go crazy!