I knew Papa Wemba had success in America as a "World musician", but SNL is a huge milestone! That's a whole audience of folks unaware of African music and they loved his performance.





He's lucky to have performed then, because musical guests were expected to participate in the comedic sketches as well since 90s lol





I wish Koffi Olomide signed with Sony back in 1998, because it could give him the exposure that Sonodisc couldn't.

Wow...papa wemba on snl i didnt know about this at all 
im glad koffi didnt sign with sony he probably would've gotten more exposure but they would've robbed him of his royalties

Sadly he didn't took full advantage of it, in his carrier he did have more opportunities but didn't use its. If this was Koffi or Fally even Innos they will use it.

I remember someone told me about this a while back but I didn’t really pay attention to it.
I’m glad Koffi didn’t sign with Sony otherwise we wouldn’t have got Attentat, FDF, Effrakata, ADE.

I knew Papa Wemba had success in America as a "World musician", but SNL is a huge milestone! That's a whole audience of folks unaware of African music and they loved his performance.





He's lucky to have performed then, because musical guests were expected to participate in the comedic sketches as well since 90s lol





I wish Koffi Olomide signed with Sony back in 1998, because it could give him the exposure that Sonodisc couldn't.

About performing sketches, that would have been very interesting.... Was Papa Wemba properly fluent in English? I know he use to sing in English for some songs, but was he a free-flowing speaker? I feel for some of this sketches, you would also have to have  good comedic timing?

He didn’t know how to speak English, when they were interviewing him, often and Japanse woman or Peter Gabriel would translate when in would react in French. Once he said in an interview that his mother always adviced him to learn English, but him not listening and later on he  started regretting when he started to do world music.

If Koffi or Fally did half of the things Papa Wemba did in the 'world music" scene, I don't think people would've been able to drink a glass of water in our country . LOL.

I remember someone told me about this a while back but I didn’t really pay attention to it.
I’m glad Koffi didn’t sign with Sony otherwise we wouldn’t have got Attentat, FDF, Effrakata, ADE.

Yep. We would've missed great albums.

And Koffi does not have the versatility Wemba had. They will have turned him into a corny RnB singer.

These big labels never knew what to do with African artists. They will just take your show money with a 360 slave deal.

The Real World was an indie label. That's why Wemba was able to create real music, not some poppish bubble gum music. 

But I'm still glad that Papa Wemba got out of his world music phase by the mid-90's so he could give us Foridole and Fula Ngenge. I'll take those two over any 'world album'.

Sadly he didn't took full advantage of it, in his carrier he did have more opportunities but didn't use its.

I think this is debatable. Wemba caught some flack for that Emotions album from other At home Congolese. But the Congolese in diaspora loved that album. His arrest in Bruxelles may have been a contributing factor to his world career ending prematurely but honestly, it may have been blessing in disguise because he was forced to focus on his Congolese bands due to travel restrictions from that arrest. Peter Gabriel made plenty of money off of Wemba, unlike Tabu Ley who only gave him a greatest hits live album years prior.

These big labels never knew what to do with African artists. They will just take your show money with a 360 slave deal.

The Real World was an indie label. That's why Wemba was able to create real music, not some poppish bubble gum music. 

What’s disappointing about these release even Putumayo’s experiment with Sam Mangwana, it watered down the music. Sebenes began to lack. Thank God for the emergence of Ndombolo although 20 years later, we’re going through that drought again