Album Spotlight: Afroto - ‘Afdal Aghani 2024’

After a five-month hiatus from making music, Egyptian rapper Afroto knew his comeback had to be impactful. With that in mind, the rapper set out to record his first full-length LP, in which he looked both to his past and present for inspiration. Drawing from early 2000s aesthetics, he designed a Windows XP-inspired cover as a tribute to his upbringing, recalling the days he spent at his local cyber café, immersed in playlists like ‘Cocktail 2013’ and ‘Best Hits of 2015’. These memories shaped not just the cover but the name of his album, ‘Afdal Aghani 2024’.

On the album, Afroto dabbles across with Brazilian funk, shaabi trap, sentimental ballads and more in order to create a record that constantly shifts gears. “I wanted people to feel like the album didn’t stay in one place for too long,” Afroto explains, marking this as his most versatile project to date.

In this conversation, Afroto opens up about how his recent marriage and time away from the industry prompted him to change his creative process. Experimenting for the first time with self-recorded vocals, Afroto found this setup drastically altered his songwriting. Instead of writing lyrics beforehand, he recorded the entire album “on mic,” letting his thoughts flow freely and refining the themes as he went along.

Afroto also shares his commitment to pushing Egypt’s music scene forward by championing genres unique to the region, like mahraganat and shaabi trap, over Western rap subgenres. He believes the originality and authenticity of these sounds are what makes them stand out and are essential for the future of Egyptian music.

Watch the full interview here: