Edward George on Kuduro – Episode 2: Fight the Power: Kuduro’s Hip Hop Connections

Kuduro is the electronic dance music of a generation born and raised during Angola’s traumatic and protracted civil war. It started life on Angola’s margins, in the clubs and ghettos of the nation’s capital, Luanda, before being co-opted by the government to become the state sanctioned sound of post-war Angola.

In this second episode, broadcaster and music obsessive Edward George follows the development of Kuduro through the early 2000s, exploring how it began to intersect with the nascent Angolan hip hop of the time. Through the influence of studios such as Walter Laton’s Jupson studio and key artists like MC Kappa and Ikonoklasta, this new hybrid form began challenging state authority and causing controversy through its lyrical radicalism. Angolan-Portuguese producer Pedro Coquenão, aka Batida, who was born in Luanda, joins Edward to discuss the development of Kuduro and its relevance for a young generation of Angolans.