The awesome power of Toto’s “Africa” in a variety of musical genres

By Gwen Ihnat  |  June 26, 2017 | 7:31pm
Aux Features Music
The awesome power of Toto’s “Africa” in a variety of musical genres
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Toto’s “Africa” is one of the more pleasant ’80s songs to pop up on oldies radio or at the karaoke bar. It even earned a spot on NME’s “50 Most Explosive Choruses” list in 2012. And it turns out the song’s addictive melody works in a variety of different genres, as proved by keyboardist Seth Everman. Nine years ago, Everman racked up millions of YouTube views with a similar experiment with Coldplay’s “Vida La Vida.” This time, he turns his Yamaha MM8 workstation on the legendary Toto song.

For Everman’s rendition(s), he takes the song through a variety of moods, like “depressing piano instrumental” “’90s pop,” “steelpan Jamaican,” even “elevator music.” The result is proof positive that the song plays across the (key)board. Given the success of these videos, Everman will hopefully soon move on to another song—sooner than nine years anyway—but it’s hard to imagine a more versatile track than this one.

 
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