Fakeba Communiqué 01 a first look

An exclamation of freedom

Ten communiqués, sent out from a Dakar that doesn't exist yet. That headline is the last line of her own bio. I couldn't find a better one.

15 seconds, cut to Mother Africa because I haven't heard the new tracks yet. It's a look test, not a scene from the real video.

Every video is a broadcast

You called them communiqués, so I took that word seriously. A communiqué is something you send.

So there is a tower on the rocks of the Dakar coast, built like a baobab. She climbs it, switches it on, and the song goes out over the city as a wave of pigment, the same pink and blue powder that is on her covers.

Each of the ten tracks is one transmission. The tower, her look and the colours stay. Where the signal lands, and what it changes there, is new every time.

Africa, Africa, Africa, nagnu dindi frontier yi from her lyric for Mother Africa, which also names where the signal should reach:

GuinéeMaliMozambiqueGhanaBéninGambieSénégal

Six frames from the first one

A baobab-shaped broadcast tower on the Dakar coast at dusk, pirogues on the water — 01The tower. Dishes woven like baskets, pirogues underneath, her sky above.

Two hands switching on a transmitter built from a calabash and a kora — 02Switch on. A transmitter made from a calabash and a kora.

A woman seen from behind on the tower, fist raised over the city — 03Her. Leather, studs, wax print, cowries in the braids.

A ring of pink and blue powder spreading over the rooftops — 04The signal. It pushes the smog off the roofs as it goes.

A border fence in the Sahel turning into powder — 05The frontier. The wave reaches a fence and the fence doesn't survive it.

Five young punks in a Dakar night market looking up at the sky — 06The street hears it. A car rapide stacked with speakers, and the kids it was made for.

Fakeba's portrait from her Bandcamp page

She has her back to us in these on purpose. I didn't want to guess her face. Send me a few good photos and it's really her up on that tower, cowrie and all.

Where the look comes from

The skyThose burning clouds on Jotna, Dakar and Mother Africa. Every frame sits under them.

The powderThe pink dust across Made In Africa became the signal itself.

The blueThe cobalt from Musique is what the city turns once it has heard her.

Ten, one every 45 days

The world is built once

Her character, the tower and the palette get designed in the first video and carry through all ten, so it reads as one universe and not ten separate clips.

You see it before it moves

For each track I send a storyboard first. Nothing gets animated until you and Fakeba have said yes to it.

The song leads

Cuts sit on her rhythm and the pictures follow what she is singing. For that I'd love the Wolof lyrics with a rough translation.