This week marks the 25th anniversary of the release of Quartier Latin’s group album Force de Frappe. I’m not sure whether it was released on 1 December 2000 or slightly before or after, but I based myself on the interview Koffi Olomidé gave during the soundcheck for Quartier Latin’s 14th anniversary concert on 8 December 2000. In the interview, he made that day, he said that Force de Frappe had already been released in Paris about a week earlier and that the CDs and cassettes would follow later in Kinshasa.



Force de Frappe itself is seen as one of Quartier Latin’s best albums. Songs like Dulcinée and Eternellement are today considered as classsics. Force de Frappe confirmed Quartier Latin’s strength/maturity, which first received some criticism upon the release of Attentat, where people claimed them to be weak compared to the team that left to form Quartier Latin Academia. The album showcased the talents of Fally Ipupa, Lola Muana, Jordan Kusa, Jipson Butukondolo & Ridens Makosso and that of the experienced old guard as well; Felly Tyson, Champion Djikapela, Fiston Mamale, Eric Tutsi and Binda Bass.

Background;
After the huge success of Bercy, Koffi Olomidé announced next to his project to perform at Parc des Princes in summer 2001, also Quartier Latin’s next group-album Force de Frappe.
However, at the same time, there were questions if Koffi would stay with his label, Sono, as Force de Frappe was the last album of his contract.

In the same period, Koffi started shooting videos for the second part of the Attentat-clips. Singer JF Ifonge then quietly left Quartier Latin. Not long after that singer Savanet Depitcho left as well, just after giving their second concert of the tour in Laussane (Switserland). Depitcho’s departure fell like a boom, because he was back then the main-star in the singing section. Shortly after the departure, singer Cesar Loboko got presented at his sister’s restaurant Bobystone as a new Quartier Latin-member coming from Europe. But he would leave before even having rehearsed with the guys and the upcoming days it became clear that Savanet Depitcho, JF Ifonge and Cesar Loboko formed a band AGB Quartier Latin. The creation of their group created alot of buzz,  as Savanet Depitcho and JF Ifonge used to make alot of tv-appearances for Quartier Latin in Kinshasa.

Meanwhile, Koffi was being portrayed negatively by the Afro-French and Cameroonian press for failing to show up at major concerts that had been scheduled in Cameroon after his shows in Lausanne, Brussels and London, and for allegedly scamming the concert promoter. The shows were rescheduled, but he again did not appear, claiming he had received death threats. A complaint was filed against him in France for fraud, but the procedure did not progress. During this period, other band members such as Eric Tutsi, Deba O’Neil and Clovis Nguma Silawuka also deserted during the tour.

The following month, a cassette produced by Ricardo Elumbu was released in which JF Ifonge and Depitcho, announced the creation of AGB Quartier Latin, explained the reasons of their departures from Quartier Latin and heavily attacked Koffi. Suzuki joined them and also spoke negatively about Koffi. The cassette created alot of polemique at that time.








To set the record straight, the late Nseka Kudifelela, Champion Djikapela, Mamale Tupac and Fally Ipupa responded to the statements made by JF Ifonge, Savanet Depitcho and Suzuki Luzubu in a video included as a bonus on the second volume of the Attentat clips. In the same bonus video, Koffi appeared with one of his new cars, stating that Force de Frappe would be released in October or November 2000. Meanwhile, Quartier Latin continued its European tour. Around the same time, singer Montana Kamenga, formerly of Big Stars, joined Quartier Latin. His arrival angered producer Jean-Pierre Saah, because Montana had just released his new album Millenial.

Quartier Latin began recording Force de Frappe in June 2000. But the group remained unstable. Singer Mustapha Nkori decided to run away, which gave newcomer Montana Kamenga the opportunity to record vocals by replacing Mustapha’s parts. Eric Tutsi also returned after having run away and recorded the song “Dulcinée”, which would become the biggest hit of the album.
In August 2000, the recordings of Force de Frappe and the European tour both came to an end. There were projects to let Koffi perform at Stade des Martyrs, but even before planning the show, Dindo Yogo passed away. After the Europe-tour, went on African Tour (Benin, Togo, Ivory Coast, etc.), which lasted two months. Before starting with the African tour, news broke that Bouro Mpela had returned to Quartier Latin. The news made public say that it would soon mean the end of Academia.

The tour was not fully completed, as several African countries were still on the schedule, but since Koffi had not seen his wife and family in Kinshasa for eight months, he decided to pause the tour. Due to the unrest after Werrason’s concert at Stade des Martyrs (February 2000), the stadium admin temporarily suspended concerts there. As an alternative, Koffi was offered a show at Esplanade du Palais du Peuple, but since a well-known pastor had scheduled an event on the same date, Koffi withdrew to avoid problems, since that Pentecostal pastors at the time always used to criticize secular artists.
Quartier Latin finally returned to Kinshasa at the end of October 2000 and gave concerts at Cinemax and the Grand Hôtel de Kinshasa. The highlight was the Mercedes-Benz cars that Koffi gifted to the members of Quartier Latin as thanks for their work at Bercy.


Shortly afterwards, musicians such as Ramazani and Christian Na Nzenze from the group Nouvelle Écriture de l’An 2000 joined, as well as John Scot and Ile de Cambodge from Delta Force. The arrival of Ramazani and Christian Na Nzenze created some buzz, as it marked the end of the band Nouvelle Ecriture de l’An 2000 and the bandleader Bendoson being left on his own. Different newspapers wrote articles that Koffi destablized Bendoson’s band.  Not long after that, rumours were spread that the soloist Daniel of Zaïko had joined Quartier Latin and different newspapers confirming it. This made some Zaiko members insult Koffi on tv and the head of censorship commission inviting Koffi and Nyoka Longo, but both guys denying that they had problems with each other and Daniel later making clear that he was still part of Zaiko.

To prepare the fans for the upcoming show at Parc des Princes, a cassette titled Destination Parc des Princes was released shortly before the launch of Force de Frappe. It featured footage of the dancers in Kinshasa, the cars that the Quartier Latin members received, as well as concerts recorded at Stade de l’Amitié in Cotonou (Benin) and Village-Bercy in Kinshasa.

Release and reception

The album Force de Frappe immediately stormed to the top of the music charts in Kinshasa. Singers such as Fally Ipupa, Jordan Kusa and Jipson Butukondolo went around various TV channels to promote their songs. Toward the end of 2001, the song “Eternellement” finished as the third biggest song of the year, behind JB Mpiana’s Sans te Toucher and Werrason’s Blandine.Jipson Butukondolo also saw his song “Mopretre Lendila” reach #1 at one point on the iconic radio station Africa N°1. The Quartier Latin members often encountered confrontations at TV and radio studios with their rivals from Nouvelle Écriture, who had released their album À La Une around the same period.

There was also polemique, as many in the public interpreted Koffi’s line in “Dulcinée” as an attack on Academia;  “Tolobaki ba’kweya… hein, ba kweyi te? Ekwey’ moto ekwey’ ebendi… hein, sima ba mpalangi te, sima ba telengani te?”. Similarly, how Koffi’s line in the start of “Mopretre Lendila” — “Elili ya likwangola ezokisaka nango moto te” — was perceived as an attack at Papa Wemba’s famous logo, which had become the cover of À La Une.

Two months after the release of Force de Frappe, the album’s videoclips got released and sold extremely well, becoming one of the best sold cassettes of 2001.

While on the CD version Koffi announced his upcoming show at Parc des Princes for summer 2001, on the cassette he announced his next album for June 2001, stating:
 “Effrakata ou Panique Générale”, as he was still hesitating between the two titles.


Unfortunately, there was also a setback during this period. Koffi was said to have violated the curfew and was arrested by a Zimbabwean soldier, who allegedly struck him with his baton. At that time, Zimbabwean troops were stationed in Kinshasa and across Congo because of the war the country was going through. The news spread quickly throughout Kinshasa and different newspapers such as Visa2000, which were anti-Koffi, mocked the incident and published caricatures about it


Aftermath;
The success of Force de Frappe earned Koffi several contracts across African countries, including Kenya for a series of concerts. His notoriety led to invitations to be guest at Magic System’s concert at the Zénith de Paris on 14 April 2001, and at Africando’s concert in May 2001 at the same venue. With Africando, he had recorded the song Mopao the previous year, which was used in the intro and outro of the Force de Frappe VHS videoclips. During the same period, Deo Brando from Zaiko joined Quartier Latin, as did Michaux Chamberton from Anti Choc, who arrived from Europe.





During the period surrounding the release of Force de Frappe, Koffi gave several press conferences in Paris, London, and Brussels for his upcoming show at Parc des Princes. A date (29 July) had already been set and a poster had even been designed. The concept was a festival-style event with Koffi as the main artist, similar to Abeti Masikini’s 1988 show at the Zénith de Paris, given that it would be difficult to fill 50,000 seats on his own. Featured guest artists/bands included Youssou N’Dour, MC Solaar, Magic System, Extra Musica, Amy Koïta and Meiway. However, after several months, it became clear that the Parc des Princes project was not realizable and was pushed back to summer 2002. Due to the success of Force de Frappe and the momentum from the Bercy concert, the promoters who had hosted him at Bercy, planned a double concert at the Zénith de Paris for 14 and 15 July, though the Sunday show ending up by getting cancelled. Shortly before the tour, a cassette titled Les Coulisses de la Grande École was released, showing the singers preparing for the Effrakata album and the Zénith concert.






During this period, Koffi had personal issues with several band members (Ridens Makosso, Mamale, Champion, Eric Tutsi, and CNN). To express his dissatisfaction, he left them all behind in Kinshasa when the European tour began. Only Champion managed to join the team at the last minute. A few months earlier, Champion had also lost his role as chef d’orchestre, a position that had been reassigned to Felly Tyson.
The Zénith de Paris concert was a major success and an American tour followed with the performance at Lincoln Center Metropolitan Opera as the highlight. After the trip to US, they started with an European tour and the start of the recordings for Effrakata. Shortly before the release of Effrakata, Koffi also performed at Forest National in Brussels, but unfortunately, that show was not successful.

Classic classic album there isn't a single bad song on this album. My favourite songs always change but I have to go with Cotisation, Pragmatisme and Eternellement at the moment.

Mfumu looking back I think Dulcinee was the song that might've replaced Mustapha's song because that's the only song where you don't hear Mustapha in the chorus so it must've been recorded after Mustapha left and Eric returned. We'll most likely never fund out why Mustapha left or if he really did have a song in the album because he's not in the right state to even be interviewed.

You were right about one thing the group was unstable because so many people left during that tour.  I wonder if Depitcho, Deba O'Neil and JF didn't leave would the album be a double disc? if they didn't leave the album would've probably had 11 singers because Montana joined and Prince Cesar Loboko would've remained in the group if Depitcho and Jf didn't leave. Bouro was unlucky that he joined the group as the recording finished otherwise we would've heard him on the album, and Ocean was lucky that Killimandjaro refused koffi's offer to join the group because Koffi would've erased Ocean's vocals and replaced them with Kilimandjaro's.

I don't understand why Koffi just didn't change the date and perform another date in front of Palais du peuple, that's the one thing I regret is he never performed there. He could've done it after releasing Attentat as well.

classic album,the only which did "annoy" me a little bit like with attentat,is that it was harder to figure out when its tyson and when its ridens,just like attentat unlike loi or even droit de veto where you could easily sense when its ya poly or tyson or lebou
thinking about it it looks like tyson tried to adapt to every soloist he played with because the way he played was different from an album to another

Man I love the story behind Force de Frappe. It’s a classic I really wish albums had the same stories behind them these days. Also did QL AGB ever produce an album? Also some of these guys have gone missing except with resurgence of CNN with his two very good singles Bercy and one with Naza.

Man I love the story behind Force de Frappe. It’s a classic I really wish albums had the same stories behind them these days. Also did QL AGB ever produce an album? Also some of these guys have gone missing except with resurgence of CNN with his two very good singles Bercy and one with Naza.

Quartier Latin AGB was short-lived, rivalries over women and leadership killed the group before they had a chance to release anything. People often forget that the trio had worked together 6-7 years ago as Wenge Aile Paris before the group split in two for similar reasons.

 Even if they could sort those issues out, the biggest hurdle towards success was the music. As much credit as I give them for their skills at dancing and aura, only Savanet is the proven vocalist. I can't imagine listening to 10-12 tracks of these guys doing vocals after another and choruses.





Unless it's like 50 seconds of vocals and the rest is sebene, there's literally no way lol

I wonder if the duo Kerozene - Brigade would have existed if Ocean returned to Kinshasa. John Scott was quickly sidelined, but I think him not having participated to a QL or Koffi album, making it easier to do it and Koffi prefering Kerozene above him.



I don't see late Ocean as a big atalaku, but his cri's were cathy and he formed a great duo with CNN. His cri about the EC final between Italy and France, where Trezeguet made the golden goal, always makes me nostalgic about that time. The rule of the golden goal needs to return, to bring the tensions back in soccer matches. That must have been a great moments for QL-members that went for the first time to Europe, being among the first African artists to perform at Bercy, witnessing how France won the EC and getting your first girlsfriends from Europe

I wonder if the duo Kerozene - Brigade would have existed if Ocean returned to Kinshasa. John Scott was quickly sidelined, but I think him not having participated to a QL or Koffi album, making it easier to do it and Koffi prefering Kerozene above him.



I don't see late Ocean as a big atalaku, but his cri's were cathy and he formed a great duo with CNN. His cri about the EC final between Italy and France, where Trezeguet made the golden goal, always makes me nostalgic about that time. The rule of the golden goal needs to return, to bring the tensions back in soccer matches. That must have been a great moments for QL-members that went for the first time to Europe, being among the first African artists to perform at Bercy, witnessing how France won the EC and getting your first girlsfriends from Europe

I remember the post-Bercy interviews when Quartier Latin were singing Caméléon acapella, did you see the lady hugging Mamale as he sang his part? She was gorgeous! With aura from the success of Bercy and the clips for Attentat arriving shortly thereafter, it's no surprise some of those guys became fathers for the first time by the end of the tour 😉 lol