{"id":86575,"date":"2021-09-06T14:42:36","date_gmt":"2021-09-06T12:42:36","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/pan-african-music.com\/?p=86575"},"modified":"2021-10-20T19:04:57","modified_gmt":"2021-10-20T17:04:57","slug":"m-anifest-la-vida","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/pan-african-music.com\/en\/m-anifest-la-vida\/","title":{"rendered":"M.anifest drops \u201cLa Vida\u201d visuals ahead of new album"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

The Ghanaian \u201cgod MC\u201d gears up to release his fifth studio album and seventh project overall, Madina To The Universe (MTTU),<\/em> later this autumn. PAM spoke with M.anifest about his new release. <\/h4>\n\n\n\n

Produced by Ghanaian musician \u00d8bed and mixed by Beninois producer Rvdical The Kid, \u201cLa Vida\u201d is a carefree romantic song. The video, crafted by South African director Adriaan Louw, features M.anifest<\/a> in a vintage Ghanaian setting where, on the beach or at the bar, he can truly express the recklessness he feels with his partner. Speaking about the inspiration behind the song, the \u201cgod MC\u201d says, \u201cit is a song I wrote with a mischievous grin. I imagined freeing myself and getting up to no good with a woman I dig with both of us having no care in the world about people, opinions, or rules. It almost felt like I was living vicariously through some of my own memories<\/em>.\u201d About the music video, he adds, \u201cwe shot it in Madina, which is the neighbourhood in Ghana I grew up in, and the essence was to tap into childhood memories and evoke a feeling of nostalgia<\/em>.\u201d The relationship to his home country is an omnipresent theme in the rapper\u2019s work. In recent months, he has recounted typical Ghanaian tales on singles like \u201cWe No Dey Hear<\/a>\u201d or \u201cWe Dey Manage<\/a>,\u201d and has worked<\/a> with his fellow countryman and producer, Juls. \u201cIt is a bit of a toxic relationship<\/em>,\u201d he tells us. \u201cThis country can make you proud and ashamed on the same day. But I am a Ghanaian and so what Ghana is, and will be, is my responsibility as well. So I speak about Ghana as an act of love. Whether it\u2019s nostalgia, critique, or praise<\/em>.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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A rap icon on the continent, with six acclaimed projects spanning over a decade and countless awards over his career, M.anifest is one of the most solid figures in the African rap scene. His fifth studio album Madina To The Universe<\/em> \u2013 stylised as MTTU <\/em>\u2013 arrives in 2021 to further cement his status. What will we learn about him after four intimate albums? \u201cThat I am a unicorn masquerading as a human maybe<\/em>?\u201d, he jests. \u201cJokes aside, I think I speak with a more vulnerable but confident voice on this album. I also low-key centered a lot of songs on conversations: conversations with my mom, stories about conversations with strangers, conversations with lovers,etc<\/em>.\u201d MTTU<\/em> will arrive at an opportune moment: Ghanaian hip-hop is boiling, and the entire world is looking at the drill hardcore rappers from Kumasi (renamed Kumerica<\/a>). Far from seeing this phenomenon as a threat to his own rap, which often dabbles in storytelling and social criticism, M.anifest seems quite enthusiastic about the future of rap in Ghana. \u201cI love it all! It\u2019s so fierce and vibely<\/em>,\u201d he says.\u201cI love how they broke through with no co-signs. Asakaa also emerging from outside the capital is an important thing to happen in our scene. Ghana is not Accra. It\u2019s an entire country (of 30 million plus beings) that can excel more creatively when different energies from different regions thrive. Asakaa to the world<\/em>!\u201d And Madina to the Universe. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Listen to “La Vida” in our Pan African Rap playlist on Spotify<\/a> and Deezer<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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The Ghanaian \u201cgod MC\u201d gears up to release his fifth studio album and seventh project overall, Madina To The Universe (MTTU), later this autumn. PAM spoke with M.anifest about his new release.  Produced by Ghanaian […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":48,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3944],"tags":[6080,23741],"location":[7994],"yst_prominent_words":[11236,8403,8407,8414,8447,8933,8402,8543,8438,8449],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/pan-african-music.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/86575"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/pan-african-music.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/pan-african-music.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pan-african-music.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/48"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pan-african-music.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=86575"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/pan-african-music.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/86575\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/pan-african-music.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=86575"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pan-african-music.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=86575"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pan-african-music.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=86575"},{"taxonomy":"location","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pan-african-music.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/location?post=86575"},{"taxonomy":"yst_prominent_words","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pan-african-music.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/yst_prominent_words?post=86575"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}