In the stunning music video for Malian singer Fatoumata Diawara's recent single “Nterini” (which means “my love or my confidant”), Afrofuturistic visuals meet high fashion, the visual heritage of the Dogon people, and a human rights subtext in Ethiopia's picturesque Danakil Desert. Directed by photographer and Ethiopian artist Aïda Muluneh, the slick and affecting video is prefaced with some somber statistics: "In a world of seven billion people, one billion are migrants. This is the story of one man's journey."
The song's production finds an apt balance between the comforting acoustics of the West African musical tradition that her muse has left behind and the electronic-scored modernity that he pursues. Diawara's vocals straddle hope and melancholy, mirroring the stoicism and perseverance he will need to survive and thrive in his new surroundings. The Malian lyrics, however, paint a simple and poignant portrait of her personal loss: 'My love has gone far away and may never come back/ He has left his family and friends behind and gone away / He may never come back / What am I to do?/ He was my friend and my confidant.' You can think of it as a cross between Gillian Welch's "One More Dollar" and the spiritually-minded electronica of Madonna's era.
It may not pound your eardrums or veer into melodrama, but the nuanced song makes an effective bid for the heart, soul, and psyche. It is not surprising that Diawara has been spotlighted in , , and - her upcoming sophomore album Fenfo (May 25th) certainly deserves the widest possible audience.
