Masego
Yamê

For those looking for the sound of tomorrow, Masego is probably a good name to follow. Ever since he rose to prominence almost ten years ago with the release of his first tracks, Masego, who is an American singer, rapper and composer with Jamaican roots, has been gifted with the ability to blend genres and pounce upon emerging trends. Forever in tune with his times and yet simultaneously ahead of the curve, the past decade or so has seen him continuously sharpening his style, patiently producing original pieces and EPs and creating several hits along the way (including the famous Tadow with French multi-instrumentalist FKJ), before he released his eponymous debut album in 2023, which is a tour de force. Never before had the style he created — TrapHouseJazz, a blend both retro and futuristic of three genres that he fuses together — been so powerful. This new album is one dreamy, hypnotic groove after the other, brimming with unforgettable gems and so eloquent about its epoch while also managing to show the way forward. In the meantime, Masego's appearance at the Théâtre Antique, his only scheduled concert in France this year, is a date to mark in bold on the calendar.

Young vocalist, keyboard player and composer Yamê is often introduced as a new social media sensation, but it would be wrong to reduce him to one viral moment in the past few months. Lighting up the stage at the Transmusicales festival in Rennes was no coincidence. The son of singer and guitarist Ngoup’Emanty has forged an ambitious blend of popular but in appearance unrelated genres that he has mastered: from Chanson française to trap and jazz. He overlays all this with unusual vocals that move you the second you hear them and that are reminiscent of classical singing or rap. Yamê is an accomplished Franco-Cameroonian pianist (he learnt his craft from jams in Parisian jazz clubs) whose list of models is uncommonly long and varied — from singer Matthew Bellamy, the leader of English band Muse, to Charles Aznavour and Booba, the rapper. Both his lyrics — a medley of swaggering prose and the uncertainties of youth — and his uniquely variegated music make Yamê (which means ‘The Verb’ in Mbo, his ancestor's language) one of only a handful of artists able to transcend labels and move all generations and for whom substance and style are equally rich.