Tuesday October 29, William Kalubi Mwamba, alias Damso, published a story that caught my attention. He organizes listening sessions throughout France as well as in Brussels. For a week, once a day, the album is played in a room to allow the public to discover his project in preview.
“I lied” is the name of his album. For what ? Initially planned as a short EP to keep his fans waiting before “BĒYĀH” – the last album of his career, expected for May 30, 2025 – the project evolved to become an album with four featurings and a classic album construction, as we can see it in the rest of his discography (we will return to this point later).
In short, in this context, I hastened to reserve a place for the Paris listening session, from 4:30 p.m. to 6 p.m. Without any information at that time. You could say I was lucky, because all the sessions for the day were sold out within minutes of posting the story. As this is only the second series of sessions, after Brussels, I didn't take the trouble to consult the reviews so as to have no expectations, apart from discovering the logical continuation of the Belgian rapper's discography.
So it is November 7, the date on which I go to the Niemeyer space. This building, which serves as the headquarters of the French Communist Party (PCF) and is sometimes called the “Party headquarters”, is located in the 19th arrondissement, at the intersection of Place du Colonel-Fabien and Avenue Mathurin- Moreau, literally a four-minute walk from the editorial office.
So I arrived at 4:30 p.m. in front of the gates, where a small queue had already formed. Most people had already entered the room. They take my phone and give me a headset. I sit down on one of the chairs, where there is a business card: we see Damso's face on it with, on the back, the words: “At the end of this listening, please sign the Guestbook of the Nation. Thank you and #Lifesurnous”. With this room that looks like a flying saucer and this little business card, the atmosphere was set.
In a hubbub, the listeners waited for everyone to enter, sharing among themselves their expectations about the project. Ten minutes later, someone from the rapper's team arrives to ask us to put on the headphones. Without a word, everyone complies, the helmets light up with a very bright green light, and the lights go out, plunging us into darkness. Around forty minutes follow where the pieces follow one another in a very special atmosphere. For fear of judgment, no one dared to make a movement to dance or even move their head, the only dance steps coming from their team, standing, who obviously already knew the project. Out of curiosity, during the outro of a song, I took off my headphones. The music gave way to a deafening silence, where we could hear snippets of songs escaping from headphones whose sound was too loud.
Without spoiling, I was really surprised by the turn Damso took with this project. We find him composing many songs on the album, and the featurings are really interesting. However, for a first listen, I am disconcerted by the diversity of the pieces heard. I will certainly need prolonged listening to form a more constructed opinion, in better conditions. Being alone has undoubtedly influenced my opinion, which will evolve over time. I left the room a little surprised, while the audience seemed generally won over. I find myself faced with a life-size model of the CD with the entire tracklist, which allows me to put a title on the pieces heard. Barely released, I already wanted to tell the whole world about it, which makes me think that after all Damso may have succeeded in his promotion without an interview, simply thanks to word of mouth.
