THE NOISEY CAMPAIGN TO GET "AZONTO" TO NUMBER ONE

Throughout the past two years there has been one song that has been with us through the good times and the bad, from Friday night when we’re pilled up to the nines, lurching our flabby, wobbling frames upon anyone who isn’t repulsed by us, to Monday morning when we’re just desperate for something to soothe our weary minds and vacant souls.

That song is “Azonto” by Fuse ODG. Here it is.

Azonto is an expressive dancing style from Ghana that found diasporic popularity in the last years with the uptake of afrobeats in the UK and the success of artists like Don Jazzy and P Square. Fuse ODG, raised in Britain and of Ghanaian decent, decided to create an anthem of the dance, fusing afrobeats sounds with UK funky beats. The result is the most joyous summer dance song of all time, a song that shone good vibes in the darkest corners of Broken Britain.

(You can read Dan Hancox’s excellent piece about the rise of afrobeats on our sister site Thump, here)

Since it’s release exactly two years ago, Fuse has done pretty well, getting signed to a proper label and having a big hit with Wyclef Jean. As a result it’s getting a big re-release and has been playlisted on Radio 1.

Here are five reasons we need to all club together and spend 79p on it this week so it can go to number one (or, let’s be realistic, chart in the top 40).

Fearne Cotton, with her spectacularly great taste in music, has helped such brilliant acts as The 1975, Birdy, and Macklemore reach the top of the charts. But for some reason, urban tastemaker Fearne hasn’t warmed to Azonto. In fact she loudly groans every time she has to play it. It's really charming to hear bang on about how it sounds like a naff holiday song before she waxes lyrical about what a great live band Kodaline are. Hilariously, on today’s show, the Radio 1 Breakfast team had edited every song she was going to play so that halfway through it started playing "Azonto". Of course, Fearne, being a great sport with a fun sense of humour, took this really well and didn’t start having a fuck-off hissy fit, screaming “THIS ISN’T A JOKE, NO ONE INTERRUPTS TOM ODELL ON MY SHOW” like a massive baby.

We’re not allowed to release midweek data before Wednesday afternoon, but let’s just say that Azonto is currently in no danger of troubling the top 20. It needs you to go and buy it. Let’s be honest, Fuse ODG is hardly going to be an album artist.

What absolute gash.

The video above was the one from the original release, but when the label decided to re-release it they cut the rap from lulzy Nicki Minaj wannabe Tiffany and reshot the video with more ghastly white people. They also completely missed the point of what the Azonto is – a style of dancing that allows you to represent your own background, occupation and style through footwork and arm gestures – and just made a stupid repeatable dance move that people can learn easily. Welp.

Noisey: So “Azonto” is out soon, and I know it’s a re-release and everything but I feel like this is the song we need, and also the song we deserve.

Fuse: Yeah now’s the time for justice man! It’s out on October 29th, but you can preorder it now and it’s already doing really well.

How can we be of service to you and make Azonto a massive success?

Just let people know the release date, tell your friends. Got to let everyone know. Tell a friend. Tell a friend. It’s on you guys.

It’s currently on the Radio 1 C-list. How can we get it onto the B?

Nah man, it’s on the B-list already! We got to push it up to A. Push it up to the A! No homo.

None taken. So if you spend as much time on Nigerian music message boards as I do, you’ll know that recently there’s been this big thing about who came up with the Azonto dance, have you been following that?

It’s not the sort of thing that one person invented, it’s rooted in the whole culture. Everyone just played their part in making it popular but I don’t think anyone originated it.

I wanted to ask, what happened to that poor girl who was doing the rap on the original, did you have to let her down gently?

She’s cool with it man, it was just this thing that Radio 1 and mainstream stations wanted to reduce the amount of the Ghanaian language on the song for radio plays. To be honest I thought it was fine, but yeah we had to do an edit.

Do you think that with your album coming out, this could be the start of a few more afro beats guys coming through to a mainstream crowd?

Yeah, I definitely see that happening, for artists with a vision like mine to cross over and speak to different cultures. I think the doors are opening for people to come through and share their music. It’s open man, let’s all go!

SO THERE YOU GO.

GO AND BUY IT. GO AND BUY IT. GO AND BUY IT.

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