Artistes of Cameroonian,photo d'archive
The directors, together with the artists’ readiness to do music videos, constitute what has changed every music industry in the world today.
In Cameroon unlike other countries, not every rapper in front of the camera gives a performance. An artist’s facial expressions or attitude is the first thing the public notices whenever watching a music video, even before the cuts and color correction.
STANLEY ENOW
For the past years, Stanley Enow has imposed himself as the “king kong” of Cameroon rap music topping the charts with good songs, national and international collabos and above all, amazing videos.
Stanley Enow is the most stubborn, arrogant, and fearless video artist in Cameroon – when it comes to the camera. He uses the camera as if it were an automatic weapon. When the directors says “Action” to Stanley, his reaction is similar to what we get when a Bamenda man unleashes the “Nkoh” masquerade.
He has the kind of video attitude every hip hop music video director would love: his actions, hand gestures, movements in front of the camera etc, such that a director will only need to capture his performance truthfully to make a powerful video with no extra cuts and editing. Case of “We Are Hip-Hop”
JOVI
Rap music in Pidgin English in Cameroon was more or less quite obscure until the coming of Jovi aka the Mboko God, the Big Vulture; with his award winning single “Don 4 Kwat” whose video and beats are yet to slip off people’s minds even after several years. This single alone greatly contributed to bringing hip-hop video clips in Cameroon to the lime light.
Already referred to by many as the Kenderick Lamar of Cameroon, “Jovi’s attitude in a video can persuade a little child to take his drug even at mid-night” a fan said. Always at the verge of spitting “punchlines” and reawakening the country, directors love working with him because his facial expressions are always on point with the kind of message he sends out, instead of paying more attention to the set design of his videos.
80% of Jovi’s clips have shown him not smiling for 10 seconds. Definitely therefore, there is one thing that Jovi and Stanley share in common: the knowledge of video attitude as professionals in the field, case of “Zele”.
DEX WILLY
In 2014, he left the USA back to Cameroon and same year, he dropped two crazy hip-hop videos “Les Lions Sont Fache” and “Merci Papa” visualized by the unbeatable beats, Shamak Alharamadji.
Since then, the Francophone rapper Dex Willy, who also raps in English, has been repeatedly proving and showing his attitude in all his recent videos and in some which he stares as a guest artist.
“Les Lions Sont Fasche” may be an old video but the character and editing still place the video among the top 10 best video clips in Cameroon. Dex Willy played very well with the space given to him in front of the camera and also in different scenes of the video.
Dex Willy is thus among the leading rap artists in Cameroon, just like Stanley Enow, case of “Les Lions Sont Fache” “Les Lions Sont Fache” is no longer on YouTube so it’s been replaced with “Merci Papa” still by Dex Willy.
TENOR
War Machine and Big Dreams Entertainment artist, Tenor, has smothly worked his way to the urban chart list today not only because of his signing in the big labels in Cameroon like Big Dreams Entertainment and War Machine, but simply because of his originality on the mic, his style of getting to the audience and the expensive brandings strategy by his labels.
With more than three videos online on YouTube, Tenor has from his first video to his most recent, Nathalie, inspired from the Nathalie Koah and Eto’o saga, Tenor has been serving music video directors with some good video attitude.
Tenor is currently the youngest upcoming afro-rap and trap artist in Cameroon. Tenor’s displacements in “Nathalie” could be compared to those of Stanley Enow in “Njamanjama Cow” and those of Dex Willy in “Les Lion Sons Fasher”. Case of “Nathalie“.
ASKIA
Askia is definitely full of punch-line. She calls herself the rap queen, and is probably right because she is among the first three contemporary female home based rappers.
Having blood affiliation in both Cameroon and Nigeria, Askia since her debut video in Cameron, Tat’ Obaseh, directed by Mysta Adrenaline, has been on the lime light amongst the likes of Ciana, Tilla, Lady B, Inna Money and others.
As the most pronounced female rapper today in Cameroon, she, like her male friends in the list like Stanley Enow, Jovi, Dex Willy and Tenor, uses space and Camera with pride and charisma in her video clips.
Askia does not only stand and raps, she’s got the attitude of the male rappers, facial expressions of the beautiful girl that she is, mouth pouting, body movement and composure.
Her last video “No Worry Me”, with more than 20 thousand views on Youtube, earned her the 5th top best Cameroon rapper with video attitude. Case of “No Worry Me”
The above names are the first five top best artists with video attitude, not necessarily the first five best rappers; even though some of them feature in the list “A” rappers in Cameroon.
