In Defense of Westernized Afro-Pop aka Here We Go Again

In preparation for my trip to South Africa, I'm revisiting/discovering a few of the greats in the African musical canon. African artists who log the most time on my itunes are Orchestra Baobab and Fela Kuti; obvious classics, but not at all a bad place on which to found your education, right? Anyway, I like to think I have a DJ's transitional mindset, and when I listen to this stuff I often find myself also craving songs that employ one of the most popular indie rock trends of the latter half of the 2000-2010 decade: incorporating Afro-pop and tropicalia into Western rock.

Vampire Weekend fused the two genres with eerie seamlessness on their debut album and got skewered for it by Julianne Shepherd, a writer whose self-professed punk ethos comes off as something dangerously short of philistinism. But VW aren't the only example; in one of my favorite songs from 2009, Animal Collective's Brother Sport, you can hear a Caribbean influence throughout the acid-eaters' changing time signatures. And I don't disagree that modern indie bands are borrowing from African musical traditions, and I don't feel the least bit guilty for liking and sometimes loving the results. Ms. Shepherd ends her article with hands effectively thrown up in innocent opinion; yet the headline of her piece is boldly critical.

She's clearly capable of skilled composition, albeit journalistic rather than musical in nature, and ostensibly familiar with her subject. All this makes her total failure to understand and appreciate the creative process that much more deplorable. If she can't stomach a Westernized interpretation of 60s and 70s African pop, fine: that's her right and her loss. But to recommend overlooking one of the most fun twists in indie rock--one that I'm sure, for many people, will lead to an exploration of its cultural roots anyway--is just ignorant and reeks of tired politics. Art builds upon art, and as long as we're honest about our influences and bring our own imagination to bear, no one should have to apologize for their inspiration.