Happy Friday everyone from NPR Music and All Songs Considered. I'm Steven Thompson.

I'm here with the Music Director and Director of Content at Vocalo Radio 91 in Chicago,

Ayana Contreras. Hi, how are you doing? Doing great. We've got one of the hosts of NPR's

Alt Latino and no relation to Ayana Felix Contreras. What's happening team? It is great to have you

and also from NPR Music Sheldon Pierce. Hello, hello. Great to have you all here. We

are talking about the best albums out today starting with Bernaboy. Bernaboy's new album is called

I Told Them and this song is Big 7.

Bernaboy, self-described Afro-of-Ugionist, has been at the forefront of West African pop,

state side breakthrough. But he's also advanced to sound as much as any other artist. His 2019

album African Giant was not only politically charged call for pan-Africanism but a deeply considered

rethinking of the music often referred to as Afro beats. In its wake, he has sort of ushered in

what felt like an evolution in the form. So I told them as the title implies is about just desserts.

It's about looking back and pointing at the trail that he's blazed. With hindsight, it's clear.

Bernaboy was right about a lot of things. Afro pops place in the zeitgeist, his own place in

its vanguard, and how little sonic distance you have to travel to get to from one point to another

along the diaspora. To that end, this album sort of funnily, distinctly feels his least African song.

They say if it ain't broke, don't fix it. So just as his last albums lead single Love,

Demi, Flip, Tony Braxton, I told them Flip's brand.

The song features the rapper 21 Savage and the album also stops spotlights, the UK star

Dave, the platinum with no features ledger, Jay Cole. The album on the whole, it's less traditional

and less rhythmic. Sounds like city boys and she don't even stand as Bernaboy songs right away,

but I think this might be the truest ever to his Afro fusionist ideal. He really almost gets to

...