The 10 Best Kenyan Music Albums Since 2000…The Stuff For Classics
A classic album is known for more than just its timeliness. It is more than just one hit single carrying the rest of the songs.
It is more than just successful sales. A classic album is a beautiful work of art. With the quality and intimacy woven through all the songs you are hardly tempted to press forward. Its emotive content ensures you remember where you were when it first came out. Its musical quality sets new standards for its freshness and influence reverberates long after the album is released and allows it to cut across the demography. Ladies and gentlemen, here is the definitive list of Kenya’s top ten Albums since 2000.
10. Necessary Noize 2- Necessary Noize
This is the album that won NN2 the fame and the acclaim. Mixing hip hop and RnB as well as Reggae effortlessly, it dominated airwaves and never lost its freshness. Nazizi and Wyre have gone to achieve bigger things in their careers but this album as a duo is the epitome of everything we love about them, simple yet deep and social conscious. It was filled with hit after hit from Kenyan Boy Kenyan Girl, Nataka Toa, Tension and the prayerful Bless My Room in one of the most hits studded albums.
09. Kidi Oba e Toke- Tony Nyadundo
He may no longer be the force that brought/ redefined/popularized Ohangla music, but when Tony Nyadundo released his second album Kidi Oba e Toke, he was literally alone at the top. Not just as an Ohangla singer but in the country. The album’s success showed that traditional music could sell nationwide and every club and DJ has played the songs in this album with hits like the titular, Kidi Oba e Toke as well as Ndoa Ya Machozi and the magical Dala Gi Mama Nyiri Beyo. You do not need a dozen or more songs when each of your songs does 10 or more minutes. Even now, the sound of the mouth organ and the accompanying strings and drums is irresistible.
08. Nairobizm
This is one of the albums that cut a unique in a then pretty congested hip hop scene. It came after the first album Nairobbery had placed the group on the national conscience. However, in this album the duo of Abbas Kubbaf and Bamboo were more mature, more experimental and all packed punch lines to last you in through for days. It is the album that set the dissing game on fire with ‘Kapuka This’ and made it enetertaining to listen to an HIV/AIDS prevention song in ‘Tumesikia’ while you can nod to ‘Nyama’ on any slow day and laugh to it. The interchanging styles through the song and the Tim Ennovator Rimbui produced beats were and are still unique up to now.
07. 82- Just A Band
I guess if one of your albums songs gets the whole country to trend and sets the record of becoming the first viral video then the album deserves classic status. Well, Just a Band’s second album had more than just one riding factor. In this album the group moved from just making experimental Afro-Fusion music for a specific audience to music that could cut across all classes. They may not receive their deserved love but their 82’ album got them recognition and national attention as they set the ground for funky music that could resonate with the average rural person. From the record setting Ha-he to the danceable ‘Huff and Puff’ to the dreamy ‘Migingo Express’ every tune in this album is journey to music haven.
06. Yahweh- Esther Wahome
This is the album that set records in terms of sales breezing past the five hundred thousand mark as everyone was still understanding the new phenomenon that became a platinum selling album. As the album trended it was not uncommon to find five of its song on a chart list. The run our success hit was Kuna Dawa and it is still the definition of a successful cross over hit having moved from the church confines to become a huge club banger.
05. Mista Abbas-Abbas Kubaff
Abbas Kubaff has been one of the consistent artists in Kenya as far as regular album production is concerned. His two albums Angabanga and Mista Abbas are no doubt some of the best works the living legend has and while the former sure can make a case for inclusion, it is the latter that will always be a bona fide resident of any list compiled on the best albums. It is without a doubt his Magnus Opus of all currently existing works. From the hood anthem Kariobangi South, the soulful ‘Lala Salama’ to the surprisingly wisdom filled ‘Murume’, Abbas packs up so much tight lines and underlines his standing as the best word player around with puns and metaphors to match his bravado.
04. Exponential Album- Juliani
Each of Juliani’s album is an act of musical perfection. The lyrics well thought out, the whole album carrying a single idea with each song part of a story. Thus picking one from the three albums he has so far is pretty tricky especially between Mtaa Mentality and Exponential Poteial. However, Juliani’s third album has a greater crossover appeal than the first two. From the Utawala Anthem to the prayerful Jehova, the inspirational One Day, this was a classic as soon as it came out. There are no controversial songs just straight dope songs with the blend of inspiration, social conscious and worship.
03. Nimefika-E-sir
There is little that has not been said about this album or the artist who made it. If it is great to leave when at the top, no one will then ever top E-sir and his passing, talent, effort and passion have all contributed to taking this album to the stuff of legends. When E-sir announced Nimefika, no one doubted it and once the songs are done in the album, from the meditative Hamnitishi, the club banger Boomba train the silky Lyrical Tongue Twister through to the groovy MosMos, you know you have something special. Nimefika is an album of pure quality that rocks anytime any place and it is the ultimate crossover album.
02. Kilio Cha Haki
When 38 of the best artists in the country got together to form an album, it turned out to be a 22 hit epic that hits hard than a migraine. The magic of the album is the easiness in which it draws you in but you have to replay each song since one listen is never enough. It is the essence of all the groups that defined street rap. Over a decade and this is probably the best Hip-Hop album you will ever here from the larger Eastern Africa region. The reality is stark, the stories real and told with such a skill it becomes a complete album and way ahead of its time then and by current standards, still far way. When you start from Fanya Tena and slowly make your way through the worldwide popular All Over The world through to Johny Boy’s sorrowful Mama We and the passion filled rap of a young Wenyeji Troupe down to the outro, this is an African Classic.
- Sawa Sawa- Eric Wainaina
It may not have won him the Kisima Awards that his second album did but it still remains one of the best selling albums in Kenya. Eric Wainaina first album is a work of inspiration, it takes you on a musical adventure from the radical and protest song Nchi ya Kitu Kidogo to the spell binding Kenya’s unofficial national anthem Daima and in between you get to have fun in the folk song adaptation ‘Ritwa Riaku’.
In another country the three albums woub be subjects of study and archived as treasures but this is Kenya so get your copy and enjoy the definition of Kenyan music.
