This is it, all of it.

Never understood why Extra Musica got rid of the mi-soloist? Shalai and Trop C'est Trop had the best guitar melodys of all their albums...

For me this is best album to ever come from Congo Brazza

Never understood why Extra Musica got rid of the mi-soloist? Shalai and Trop C'est Trop had the best guitar melodys of all their albums...

Agreed, this acoustic clarity of both albums were so great that the mi-solo was just a treat for the ears.

Listening to this album from an original lossless CD on a home sound system is so mesmerizing. Shout out to Cedric Champalou, Roga Roga, Sonor, and Ramatoulaye. Cedric was the prise de son for Etat Major, Shalai, and Trop c’est trop

http://congovibes.com/congolese-music/albums-scan-pt2

I'm also very dissapointed after seeing this. The booklets of Shalai & Etat Major were better. I think that the booklet of Etat Major is the best they ever made. They mentioned the Kora 2000 on the Trop c'est Trop-booklet. I will never forget that humilation. We all from DRC excepted Wenge Maison Mere to win that award as best African Group. On the song Bikkisa Nga Kayembe which didn't make it on the cd, Herman once mentioned that "l'humiliation est le jugement de competence, Extra Musica Kora l'an 2000". That victory made them finally really getting over that long inferiority complex towards Wenge Musica 4x4.

lol, Roga Roga getting the full credits of arrangement and the artistic direction. On the first albums of Extra, they were crediting Durrel Loemba, Espe Bass and Roga, then after the split Espe & Roga and here in the gets the full credit for the arrangement and artisitic direction. But it's ok, he worked hard on this album and give 300%. All his sebenes on this album were excellement, from Zangul Zangul to Moselekete from 12 Balles to N'Julie. He never reached that level again. It once shows that rivalery is very important, because the Merci-album of Extra Musica International pushed them to work very hard and show their supremacy over Clan-Extra, like they did on Shalai as reaction to the Super Helico-album.

I see that Nathalie Geslin is credited as one of the managers under the label of JPS Production. I thought that she was working for Sonodisc, because saw here often being credited on Koffi's albums or was she just indepedent ?

It's a shame that there was never a Trop c'est Trop-concert in Paris.

"He never reached that level again. "

I agree. This album turned out to be perfect, and it is the peak of the career of Extra Musica. Etat Major is close to this, but not that refined like this one. La Main Noire could have been as good as this album, if Roga would have composed more exciting sebens on that album, and would have skipped the Salsa tracks from that album. Because La Main Noire has many very good moments anyway, but overally not as exciting as Trop C'est Trop.

Roga is a lazy guy and is wasting his talent. He is still living from the past fame of Extra Musica. He has the talent and creativeness to do exceptional albums, but Trop C'est Trop is the only one that really turned out to be professional all through. It's a shame, and he should devote more time to composing than playing the boss. He thinks he is big, but he is only big because Extra Musica was big 20 years ago. In this sense I have much more respect to Nyoka Longo and some other musicians, because at least he is trying to do his best every time since the foundation of Zaiko. There were low moments in that band, but you see the fire flaring up again and again.

@bencuri

The circumstances have to be just right for those types of albums to happen. As our friend Mfumu Vata said earlier, Roga Roga was determined to prove that Extra Musica Zangul was "le seul et l’unique" because Extra Musica International was neck and neck with them as far as quality albums as well as concerts.

Extra Musica Nouvel Horizon has taken subtle shots at Roga Roga with their generique, but have largely kept the split largely civil. This is not like previous polemiques where they were sending open shots in interviews and music which hypes the fans as well as musicians to prove a point. We'll see Roga's response...

"He never reached that level again. "

I agree. This album turned out to be perfect, and it is the peak of the career of Extra Musica. Etat Major is close to this, but not that refined like this one. La Main Noire could have been as good as this album, if Roga would have composed more exciting sebens on that album, and would have skipped the Salsa tracks from that album. Because La Main Noire has many very good moments anyway, but overally not as exciting as Trop C'est Trop.

Roga is a lazy guy and is wasting his talent. He is still living from the past fame of Extra Musica. He has the talent and creativeness to do exceptional albums, but Trop C'est Trop is the only one that really turned out to be professional all through. It's a shame, and he should devote more time to composing than playing the boss. He thinks he is big, but he is only big because Extra Musica was big 20 years ago. In this sense I have much more respect to Nyoka Longo and some other musicians, because at least he is trying to do his best every time since the foundation of Zaiko. There were low moments in that band, but you see the fire flaring up again and again.

The reason of La Main Noire having multiple rumba-songs, is because of the huge demand from  people who were part of the elite, who started to interest  in their music. Also La Main Noire was meant to be Roga Roga’s solo album, who planned to start his singing career from that album, having the long dream to perform at Olympia and receive a gold record for it. But the split of Extra Musica, made him give Ramatoulaye, Espe Bass, Herman and Sonor the opportunity to put songs in that album to counter Universal Zangul, saving the songs like Musicien, La Sape & Nzambe Mokonzi. Roga would once show his talents as solist again, but unfortunately it would be the last time, giving Sonor Digital (who already started to play lead in concerts before his arrival on the podium since Trop c’eat Trop) the full blessings.

I liked the sebenes of La Main Noire more than those of Obligatoire. The generic was fire, some sebenes sounded sounded a little bit monotonous (Petit mais Costaud for example which sounded a little bit like a mix of Patience & Fondation Muller ) but they were still good. The sebene of Parfum Mondial sounded totally unique. I think that it would have been better if Roga Roga recruited a new solist after Trop c’est Trop to come with an other sound, in order to avoid monotony, like most Congolese band do. Because you can feel that Roga had some difficulties to come with another style since Etat Major (except Trop c’est Trop, sometimes I wonder if he didn’t use sebenes from a reserve member).

mfumu a lot of the trop c'est trop solos are reworked from creations of saint petro,but like you said he really gave his best

@bencuri

Extra Musica Nouvel Horizon has taken subtle shots at Roga Roga with their generique, but have largely kept the split largely civil. This is not like previous polemiques where they were sending open shots in interviews and music which hypes the fans as well as musicians to prove a point. We'll see Roga's response...

I doubt we could see any improvement due to the split from Roga Roga. Those days when Extra was big has gone, musicians are much more lazy nowdays. And the group Roga Roga will have to work with now is very very different from the one he started with in the middle of the 90's. I find that group was much more ambitious than his group today. Possibly because being a band member was much more tempting back then. Today everyone is heading for going solo.