Kid Fonque Refix of Bokani Dyer's 'Ke Nako' is out today

Kid Fonque releases a hypnotic and stretched-out house refix of Bokani Dyer’s scintillating funk track ‘Ke Nako (feat. Sereetsi and the Natives)’ from last year’s Radio Sechaba album.

In Kid Fonque’s expert hands, the track is extended into a 10-minute epic cosmic dance floor journey that perfectly manages to trace a line between the mainstream South African electronic sounds dominating the globe and the nation’s Jazz underground, bubbling below the surface.

In recent years the electronic music coming out of South Africa has blown up. Amapiano, Gqom, Shangaan electro and house beats have been blasting their way through sound systems all around the world. Kid Fonque has been one of the main figures at the centre of this wave. A veteran DJ and producer who has been pushing South African club music for over 20 years through his sets, remixes and productions and his work as director of A&R at dance music giants Defected Records and his own label Stay True Sounds.

The album featured a new version of Dyer’s ‘Ke Nako’ (originally released on the Indaba Is compilation), with fresh vocals and a guitar-led groove that brought out the nascent afrobeat elements. It’s this cut that Kid Fonque reimagines. The original’s wriggling bassline is introduced over atmospheric synth arpeggios and driving electronic House percussion. This becomes the track’s sparse bedrock over which Kid Fonque floats Ke Nako’s soulful, yearning vocals and idiosyncratic funky horn riffs. The refix perfectly merges the virtuosic musicianship of the original with the atmospheric electronics that have become a hallmark of South African dance music in recent years. Kid Fonque finds a way to bring the two movements into perfect synergy in seamless fashion - opening up the jazz to a new club audience.