Angélique Kidjo Insists That We Find Joy, Resilience, and Unity on Star Guest-Filled ‘HOPE!!’

Right now, this dour world needs a heavy “feel good” dose of Angélique Kidjo’s infectious joy, her get-up-and-dance attitude, and her ability to bridge cultures. The Benin (West Africa) artist that the former Newport Jazz Festival Artistic Director, Christian McBride, described as an entertainer tantamount to James Brown and Prince, gives it her all on this double album,HOPE!! 

This is an album loaded with high-profile guests making a big statement, and it doesn’t matter that some songs are not sung in English. Genre is as fluid as a Kidjo performance. AfroBeat, Afro-pop, and highlife meet American R&B and jazz like congenial, like-minded strangers shaking hands or sharing a warm embrace.

Few, if any, can bring the unbridled joy that Kidjo does by forming one ‘big tent’ with a wide range of artists and cementing a partnership with Pharrell, who produced three of the songs. The list may make your eyes glaze over, but just gleaning the featured artists by track, it includes, besides Pharrell, vocalists Quavo, Ayra Starr, PJ Morton, IZA, Dadju, and more. We will highlight them by track. The expansive project was recorded in Paris and Los Anglers over the past three years.

This is the way many mega stars make records now: inviting a who’s who across musical genres, even though they could likely make just as effective a record with their own bands. This was true for Mavis Staples’Sad and Beautiful World, too. The guests, in that sense, become more symbolic, suggesting unity across a broader spectrum. Cynics term this a marketing ploy, which is true when applied to regular ‘stars,’ those at a level below the likes of Staples and Kidjo.

These sometimes heavy, sometimes elastic grooves begin with Pharrell and Quavo singing with Kidjo on the brassy  “Bando,” a slang word for an abandoned house, simply put, an ode to street life. The snappy, percolating “For Me” nods to self-celebration of one’s accomplishments in the face of challenge. Charlie Wilson from the Gap Band contributes harmonies.  “No Stopping Us,” the third with Pharrell, was born out of a conversation between Pharrell and Kidjo on social change. Kidjo sings with Shungudzo Kuyimba, but the remaining accompaniment is guitars, not the horns that grace many of the tracks.

The rousing single, “Fall on Me,” features PJ Morton on vocals, backed by guitar, percussion, and violin.  The thick-as-steel groove of “Oyaya” owes to multiple contributors: Nigerian producer Shizzi, French jazz musician/composer Phillippe Saissse, guitarist Nile Rodgers, a blaring four-piece horn section, keys, marimba, programming, and backing vocals from Brazilian superstar IZA. That Kidjo’s voice can thrive amongst such elaborate accompaniment is a testament to her vigor and vitality.

Kidjo does reach for the African voices. The pulsating “I’m on Fire” features the Lagos-based neo-High Life duo The Cavemen with Kokoroko’s trumpeter Sheila Maurice-Grey, the latter also appearing on the highly percussive “Nadi Balance with Congolese legend Fally Ipupa. Kidjo and Tanzanian Diamond Platnumz (Nasibu Abdul Juma Issaack) collaborate on writing and sing a duet on “Kakua,’ with only programming as accompaniment.  Although the 17-time Oscar nominee wrote “Sunlight to My Soul,” Kidjo enlists the Soweto Gospel Choir, recorded in Johannesburg, for backing vocals. “Superwoman” brims with the jubilant chanting we associate with African music as Kidjo sings over a Franco-Congolese track by Dadju, one of several recorded in Paris.

While the album is dedicated to Kidjo’s late mother, Yvonne, who instilled community and charitable service in her daughter, who ‘walks the talk,’ the last track is especially dedicated to her mom, because it was her mom’s favorite song. “Malaika” delivers indelible emotional closure to the record as Derrick Hodge arranged the symphonic backing, while French singer Florent Pagny harmonizes with KIdjo. 

Ultimately, HOPE!! works because Angélique Kidjo never loses herself in the scale of it all.