Zouzou

After a quarter of a century living in France, Gnahoré recently returned to Cote d’Ivoire with two objectives. The first was to give back something to the country she left at 17 by launching a project to raise funds for a home for orphaned children. The second was to record her seventh studio album, Zouzou, as a platform to promote the orphanage. On 2021’s Couleur and even more markedly on 2018’s Miziki, Gnahoré explored a more electronic sound but Zouzou is a pleasingly simple and old-fashioned Afro-pop record. The production, by Dr Wang, one of Abidjan’s top beat-makers, is high-tech but it smartly serves the songs, emphasising the eternal values of Gnahoré’s upbeat earworm melodies and lilting voice rather than smothering them in banging contemporary dance beats. After Salif Keita warned in our July issue that the machines are taking over, Zouzou is a welcome example of how technology can be harnessed to everyone’s benefit.