COMING TO AFRICA?

It’s strange how Beyoncé and Jay Z always have “world tours” but never come to Africa. It’s even stranger how the draw heavily on African art as inspiration for their visual aesthetic and yet, no shows in any part of Africa. Why draw so heavily from a continent they have continued to avoid touring? Is it because we lack the infrastructure (or so you believe) to host your mega shows? Africa is as rich in infrastructure as it is in cultural inspiration; if the continent could host the World Cup, assemble a VW Golf, have brains that can invent a malaria test that doesn’t require blood and inspire a movie that became a movement (remember Black Panther?), surely we do have the capacity to host their “world tours”.

Let it be clear; I’m not writing this out of anger, rather out of disappointment. For such global superstars with cult-like following and overwhelming cultural influence, it’s really sad that they will draw from Africa and not tour in Africa. A little hypocritical too. I’m a fan of their work as individuals and as a musical couple but miffed that they don’t ever tour the Motherland. I’m not self righteous enough to stake a claim to adding to their ever growing wealth but I do pay my monthly Apple subscription and purchase their music – so guess what Beyoncé; you should probably care about streams because my monthly $4.99 contributes to your net worth.

The world is riddled with problems. Racism, sexism, nepotism and every bad word that is suffixed by -ism (feminism is NOT one of them) plague us from corner to corner. Exclusion, especially by global cultural influencers, shouldn’t be one of them. But then again, perhaps Akon should just build his Wakanda and Paul Kagame should become President of Africa and see how The Carters will refuse to come. Maybe, then, our dollars will be as green as those in other continents.