The 10 hottest music videos in Kenya

By Mkala Mwaghesha | 5yrs ago | 3 min read

Gospel singer Papa Dennis releases Tornado and within days, Willy Poze follows with Murder, a hot love music video. Then Wyre releases a serious dance hall video Mimi na Ye before Sauti Sol drops Short N Sweet, featuring Nyashinski. Victoria Kimani hits us with Wonka… all in a span of three weeks. You can count more 15 Kenyan hit music videos that have hit YouTube, and nobody seems to be slowing down.

From nostalgic memories, exceptional storytelling, to dance queens capturing the attention of graphic artists, the last few months have seen the video scene get more creative.

Shot at the Railway yard, the Short N Sweet video features some raunchy dancing, with the agile dancers from Sarakasi exhibiting once again why they are the top dogs in town. The choreography is top-notch and the scenes shot and fused with incredible mastery.

At the Choma Na Ngoma Festival by Radio Maisha that went down this past weekend at the Kenyatta International Conventional Centre, the Sarakasi Dancers recreated the dancing in the video, down to the now famous jumpsuit. Being the hottest song in town, this jam was dropped barely a month after their Rewind release.

It all started when Sauti Sol members started posting photos of themselves during their hardship days, when they would pose for photos at Uhuru Park, guitars and duffel bags slung on aspiring shoulders.

On the other hand, Khaligraph Jones was doing the same, taking his online fans through his timeline as an artiste, performing at WAPI and posing in very shady clothes. This was before the tattoos, Belair, Cashy and Range Rovers.

The result was the colourful Rewind, a video that is spectacular for its use of flashback material, taking the viewer through a life and musical journey, and with that, from Kenya’s top artistes, inspiring would-be artistes that grit eventually pays off.

“Success is poisonous, so many people keep hating on us,’ Bien sings, adding: “You know… They never know the story, of us before the glory. And I’ll do it all again.”

In between the two Sauti Sol collabos with Kenya’s rap kings, Juliani and upcoming singer Suzziah dropped a PR-piece, Formula. The social commentary, a topic Juliani has mastery of, has one of the best videos around, the storyline easy to relate to and follow visually. The director picked the rightactors, and the location manager was on point, not dwelling on fancy houses but real-life scenes where the demography of Pulsers who the message was aimed for, hang out and live.

“Pull up to my bumper, eat my chocolate if you want to,” Victoria Kimani sings in the visually creative Wonka. Vicky does not joke when it comes to music, she pushes her boundaries, one day in Durban, another shoot in some China Town. Released last month, Wonka is sultry, sexy vixens wiggling with nature, Vicky admiring her man - a hot hunk with an assuming look.

Talking of overseas, Octopizzo is taking Number Nane to the world. Fresh from bashing the conduct of Cassper Nyovest TGR concert, Octo’s fresh Noma Ni is a really good video, with minimum optical fuss, all attention is on him as he walks around an American City, or just lazing about in his room. Octo is the only artiste in the 254 who does not care about sexy ladies or noisy clubs as the backdrop to his videos. He mostly does them solo.

The lyrics are hard-hitting – he addresses his haters, his fans and the industry in rhymes only he could have conceived. “Noma ni niko maganji”, he raps.

Some of the hottest videos dropped this season;

1. Tena na Tena - Red Acapella x H_Art The Band