Africa (Toto song)

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"Africa"
File:Toto - Africa.jpg
US 7-inch (180 mm) shaped picture disc edition
Single by Toto
from the album Toto IV
B-side
  • "Good for You"
  • "We Made It"
Released
  • June 25, 1982 (UK)[1]
  • October 1982 (US)
Recorded October 18, 1981 (1981-10-18)
Studio Sunset Sound (Hollywood)[2]
Genre Soft rock[3][4]
Length
  • 4:55 (album version)
  • 4:21 (radio and video edit)
Label Columbia
Songwriter(s)
Producer(s) Toto
Script error: The function "ucfirst" does not exist. singles chronology
"Make Believe"
(1982)		 "Africa"
(1982)		 "I Won't Hold You Back"
(1982)
Music video
"Africa" on YouTube
Audio sample

"Africa" is a song by American rock band Toto, the tenth and final track on their fourth studio album Toto IV (1982). It was released as a single in the US through Columbia Records in October 1982, the album's third single overall and second in Europe. The song was written by band members David Paich and Jeff Porcaro, produced by the band, and mixed by Grammy-winning engineer Elliot Scheiner.

Critics praised its composition and Toto's performances. The song reached number one on the United States' Billboard Hot 100 chart, the band's only Billboard number one, and number one on the Canadian charts. It also peaked in the top ten in the United Kingdom, Ireland, Netherlands, Australia, New Zealand, and Switzerland.

The song was accompanied by a music video, which premiered in 1983, and was directed by Steve Barron, who collaborated previously with the group for "Rosanna". The video features Toto in a library, as they perform and showcase various aspects of African culture. While popular in the 1980s and 1990s, with the song being certified gold by the RIAA in 1991, "Africa" saw a resurgence in popularity via social media during the mid- to late 2010s,[5][6][7] including a fan-requested cover by American rock band Weezer which peaked at number 51 on the Billboard Hot 100.[8] It has since been certified six times platinum.[9]

Background

The initial idea and lyrics for the song came from David Paich. Paich was playing around with a new keyboard, the CS-80,[10] and found the brassy sound that became the opening riff. He completed the melody and lyrics for the chorus in about ten minutes, much to Paich's surprise. "I sang the chorus out as you hear it. It was like God channeling it. I thought, 'I'm talented, but I'm not that talented. Something just happened here!'"[11] Paich reckons that he refined the lyrics for six months before showing the song to the rest of the band.[11]

In 2015, Paich explained that the song is about a man's love of a continent, Africa, rather than just a personal romance.[12] He based the lyrics on a late night documentary with depictions of African plight and suffering. The viewing experience made a lasting impact on Paich: "It both moved and appalled me, and the pictures just wouldn't leave my head. I tried to imagine how I'd feel about it if I was there and what I'd do."[13] Jeff Porcaro elaborates further, explaining: "A white boy is trying to write a song on Africa, but since he's never been there, he can only tell what he's seen on TV or remembers in the past."[14]

Some additional lyrics relate to a person flying in to meet a lonely missionary, as Paich described in 2018.[15] As a child, Paich attended a Catholic school; several of his teachers had done missionary work in Africa. Their missionary work became the inspiration behind the line: "I bless the rains down in Africa." Paich, who at the time had never set foot in Africa, based the song's landscape descriptions from an article in National Geographic.[15]

During an appearance on the radio station KROQ-FM, Steve Porcaro and Steve Lukather described the song as "dumb" and "an experiment" and some of the lyrics as "goofy" that were just placeholders, particularly the line about the Serengeti.[16] Engineer Al Schmitt stated that "Africa" was the second song written for Toto IV and had been worked on extensively in the studio.[11] According to Steve Porcaro, it was the last song they recorded and barely made the cut.[16] At one point, Jeff Porcaro considered saving "Africa" for a solo album because some members did not think the song sounded like Toto.[17] The band was more focused on the album's lead single "Rosanna".[16]

Composition

Musically, the song took some time to assemble. Steve Porcaro, the band's synth player, introduced Paich to the Yamaha CS-80, a polyphonic analog synthesizer, and instructed him to write a song specifically with the keyboard in mind. Paich gravitated towards a brassy flute sound, which he found to be a unique alternative to the piano.[10] Porcaro programmed six tracks of a Yamaha GS 1 digital piano to emulate the sound of a kalimba.[10] Each track featured a one-three note gamelan phrase with different musical parameters.[10] Steve Porcaro's brother, Jeff, played his parts live without a click track.

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So when we were doing "Africa" I set up a bass drum, snare drum and a hi-hat, and Lenny Castro set up right in front of me with a conga. We looked at each other and just started playing the basic groove. [...] The backbeat is on 3, so it's a half-time feel, and it's 16th notes on the hi-hat. [...] We played for five minutes on tape, no click, no nothing. We just played. And I was singing the bass line for 'Africa' in my mind, so we had a relative tempo. Lenny and I went into the booth and listened back to the five minutes of that same boring pattern. We picked out the best two bars that we thought were grooving, and we marked those two bars on tape. [...] Maybe it would have taken two minutes to program that in the Linn, and it took about half an hour to do this. But a Linn machine doesn't feel like that!

Jeff Porcaro also acknowledged that he was influenced by the sounds created by fellow Los Angeles session musicians Milt Holland and Emil Richards. He also described the significance of the African pavilion drummers at the 1964 New York World's Fair and a National Geographic Special. To recreate those sounds, he and his father Joe Porcaro made percussion loops on bottle caps and marimba respectively.[11][18]

I was about 11 when the New York World's Fair took place, and I went to the African pavilion with my family. I saw the real thing ... It was the first time I witnessed somebody playing one beat and not straying from it, like a religious experience, where it gets loud, and everyone goes into a trance.

Music video

The music video used the radio edit and was directed by Steve Barron.[19] It features Mike Porcaro on bass, replacing David Hungate, who had already left the band before the video was made. Lenny Castro is also featured in the video on percussion. As of December 2021, the music video has over 773 million views on YouTube.[20][relevant? – discuss]

In the video, a researcher in a library (portrayed by band member David Paich) tries to match a scrap of a picture of a shield to the book from which it was torn out. As he continues his search, a female librarian working at a nearby desk takes occasional notice of him, while a native carrying a shield that matches the picture begins to close in on the library from the surrounding jungle. When the researcher finds a book titled Africa, the native throws a spear at a bookshelf, toppling stacks of books. Africa falls open to the page from which the scrap was torn, but a lantern lands on it and sets it on fire, after which the librarian's eyeglasses are shown falling to the floor. The scenes are intercut with shots of a spinning globe and the band performing atop a stack of giant hardcover books, in which Africa is the topmost.[20]

Legacy

The song was popular upon its release, hitting number one on the Billboard Hot 100 in February 1983, and the song has continued to be a popular soft-rock classic up to the 21st century. The song has been utilized in many internet memes,[21] has appeared in television shows, such as Stranger Things, Family Guy, Chuck, and South Park, and was used by CBS during their 2013 coverage of the funeral of former South African President Nelson Mandela, albeit not without controversy.[22][23] It was also included in the 2002 video game Grand Theft Auto: Vice City as part of the fictional Emotion 98.3 radio station.[24]

In 2012, "Africa" was listed by music magazine NME in 32nd place on its list of "50 Most Explosive Choruses."[25] In January 2019, a sound installation was set up in an undisclosed location in the Namib Desert to play the song on a constant loop. The installation is powered by solar batteries, allowing the song to be played indefinitely.[26] Two years later, the song reached 1 billion plays on the streaming site Spotify. In 2021, it was listed at No. 452 on Rolling Stone's "Top 500 Best Songs of All Time".[27]

Personnel

Guest musicians


Charts

Certifications and sales

Region Certification Sales/shipments
Australia (ARIA)[45] 10× Platinum 700,000
Canada (Music Canada)[46] Gold 5,000
Denmark (IFPI Denmark)[47] 2× Platinum 20,000
Italy (FIMI)[48] 2× Platinum 100,000
New Zealand (RMNZ)[49] Gold 7,500
United Kingdom (BPI)[50]
Physical single		 Silver 250,000
United Kingdom (BPI)[51]
Digital single		 3× Platinum 1,800,000
United States (RIAA)[52] 6× Platinum 6,000,000

*sales figures based on certification alone
^shipments figures based on certification alone
xunspecified figures based on certification alone
double-daggersales/streaming figures based on certification alone

Weezer cover

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Main article: Africa (Weezer cover)

In December 2017, Twitter user "@WeezerAfrica," run by 14-year-old Cleveland, Ohio resident Mary Klym,[53] tweeted, "@RiversCuomo it's about time you bless the rains down in Africa." The band released a cover of "Rosanna", a different Toto song (also part of the album Toto IV), in order to troll Klym and those clamoring for a version of "Africa".[54]

Weezer finally released "Africa" on May 29, 2018. It was the band's first Hot 100 hit since "(If You're Wondering If I Want You To) I Want You To" in 2009.[55] "Africa" reached number 51 on the Hot 100 and peaked at number one on the Billboard Alternative Songs chart in August 2018, becoming the band's first number-one single since "Pork and Beans" in 2008.[56]

Weezer included the cover on their surprise release of the all-covers "Teal Album" in January 2019.[57]

See also

References

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  9. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  10. ↑ 10.0 10.1 10.2 10.3 Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  11. ↑ 11.0 11.1 11.2 11.3 Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  12. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  13. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  14. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  15. ↑ 15.0 15.1 Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  16. ↑ 16.0 16.1 16.2 Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  17. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  18. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found. Alt URL Archived February 10, 2020, at the Wayback Machine
  19. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  20. ↑ 20.0 20.1 Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  21. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  22. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  23. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  24. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  25. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  26. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  27. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  28. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  29. ↑ "Austriancharts.at – Toto – Africa" (in German). Ö3 Austria Top 40.
  30. ↑ "Ultratop.be – Toto – Africa" (in Dutch). Ultratop 50.
  31. ↑ "Musicline.de – Toto Single-Chartverfolgung" (in German). Media Control Charts. PhonoNet GmbH.
  32. ↑ "The Irish Charts – Search Results – Africa". Irish Singles Chart.
  33. ↑ "Dutchcharts.nl – Toto – Africa" (in Dutch). Single Top 100.
  34. ↑ "Charts.org.nz – Toto – Africa". Top 40 Singles.
  35. ↑ "Swisscharts.com – Toto – Africa". Swiss Singles Chart.
  36. ↑ "Toto: Artist Chart History" Official Charts Company.
  37. ↑ "Toto – Chart history" Billboard Hot 100 for Toto.
  38. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  39. ↑ "Toto – Chart history" Billboard Adult Contemporary for Toto.
  40. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  41. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  42. ↑ "Listy bestsellerów, wyróżnienia :: Związek Producentów Audio-Video". Polish Airplay Top 100.
  43. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  44. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  45. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  46. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  47. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found. Click on næste to go to page 11259 if certification from official website
  48. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found. Select Online in the field Sezione. Enter Toto in the field Filtra. Select 2021 in the field Anno. The certification will load automatically
  49. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  50. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found. Enter Toto in the field Search. Select Artist in the field Search by. Select single in the field By Format. Select Silver in the field By Award. Click Search
  51. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found. Enter Africa in the field Keywords. Select Title in the field Search by. Select single in the field By Format. Select Platinum in the field By Award. Click Search
  52. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found. If necessary, click Advanced, then click Format, then select Single, then click SEARCH
  53. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  54. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  55. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  56. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  57. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.

Further reading

External links

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