Kuduro: Techno from Angola to the World

by David Font-Navarrete

From factmagazine.co.uk:

"Angola’s Kuduro music is spearheading a new ghetto-born movement set to rip-up dancefloors across the world ... This is the raw, uncompromising sound of the streets of Luanda, Angola. Meaning ‘hard ass’ or ‘stiff bottom’, it combines traditional Angolan Kilapanga, Semba and Zouk with Western house and techno."

You've got to hear this. That's it. Here are some links to get us all started:

The aforementioned "Bottoms Up" article on Kuduro by Toby Rogers (words) and Ana Gilbert (photos) from Fact Magazine: http://www.factmagazine.co.uk/da/49990

Some ferocious mixes from the mighty Blentwell.com: http://www.blentwell.com/tags.php/kuduro. On "Diplo - Mad Decent Podcast - It Came from Africa", you hear one of Diplo's Angolan friends breaking down the basics of Kuduro in parts of the mix ... makes your ass shake while it skools you! Nice.

The amazing Ghetto Bassquake blog by Vamanos (aka DJ Steppa?) with amazing links to mixes, Kuduro, Baile Funk and other lesser-known genres and subgenres of ass-shakin' sound: http://ghettobassquake.blogspot.com

If you search for "kuduro" on Google, it starts to get a little weird when you get results like "あたりがKUDUROなどのアフリカン", then it starts to sink in that this internet/globalization business might be faster and more serious than you imagined ... And, yeah, you can bet DJ Thick will be rocking some Kuduro in DC at the next AfroFunk Forum event.

Enjoy the sounds!