Ezra Koenig, Blood Orange to appear on Angélique Kidjo’s reimagined Remain in Light
Listen to its first single now.
Photo by Mike Coppola/Getty Images and Rachel Murray/Getty Images for GQ and Noam Galai/Getty Images for Tibet House
Grammy winner Angélique Kidjo has announced a full album of the live performance of her version of Remain in Light, the seminal 1980 Talking Heads album. In an interview with Rolling Stone, she revealed that collaborators on the project include Ezra Koenig, with whom she collaborated before, and Blood Orange, and explained how the Benin native came to transform the album.
"I remember vividly every time the music came in, I said, 'There's something African to it,'" Kidjo told the magazine. "Some of my peers [at jazz school] said, 'Aw, come on. Shut up. This is not African. It's too sophisticated for you.' I'm like, 'OK, whatever you say. 'It might be rock & roll, but there's something African to it.' I'm a very rhythmic person. Music is part of my heartbeat and every part of my body. This had an African touch to it."
The album also features Fela Kuti drummer Tony Allen, legendary bassist Pino Palladino, and Paul Simon's former bassist Abe Laboriel. It's produced by frequent Kanye West-collaborator Jeff Bhasker, and due out June 8 from Kravenworks Records. Watch the video for her take on "Born Under Punches" below.
