Africa (Toto song)

"Africa"
Song
B-side	"Good For You" (US), "We Made It"

"Africa" is a song by rock band Toto. The song was included on their 1982 album Toto IV, and reached number one on the Billboard Hot 100 chart in February 1983 and number three on the UK Singles Chart the same month. The song was written by the band's keyboardist David Paich and drummer Jeff Porcaro. David Paich sings both verses of the song while Bobby Kimball sings lead briefly during the chorus and at the end. Steve Lukather, Bobby and Paich all sing backup as well.

One of Toto's most recognisable songs, "Africa" was almost omitted from the Toto IV record prior to its release. Having spent a great amount of time producing it, the band became so tired of the song that they didn’t want it on the album. The song itself was very different from anything the band had done before, and some members felt that it didn’t sound like Toto.

“I didn’t think it was very good,” said Steve Lukather (Classic Rock Revisited, 2003). “That tells you what can happen when we pick our own singles!”

David Paich, who co-wrote the song with Jeff Porcaro, said that it “could have been the beginning of a solo project [for me] because it was so different. I thought I’d save it…[because] world music wasn’t around then.”

Background

The initial idea for the song came from David Paich, playing on his piano. Jeff explains the idea behind the song: "... 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."

David Paich says the following: "At the beginning of the '80s I watched a late night documentary on TV about all the terrible death and suffering of the people in Africa. It both moved and appalled me and the pictures just wouldn't leave my head. I tried to imagine how I'd feel about if I was there and what I'd do."

Musically the song took quite some time to assemble, as David and Jeff explain:

"On 'Africa' you hear a combination of marimba with GS 1. The kalimba is all done with the GS 1; it's six tracks of GS 1 playing different rhythms. I wrote the song on CS-80, so that plays the main part of the entire tune."

Jeff Porcaro reminisces about how the song's drum track took shape:

"I was about 11 when the New York's World Fair took place, and I went to the African pavilion with my family. I saw the real thing; I don't know what tribe, but there were these drummers playing, and my mind was blown. The thing that blew my mind was everybody was playing one part. As a little kid in Connecticut, I would see these Puerto Rican and Cuban cats jamming in the park. It was the first time I witnessed someone playing one beat and not straying from it, like a religious experience, where it gets loud, and everyone goes into a trance. I have always dug those kind of orchestras, whether it be a band or all drummers. But I just love a band of guys saying one thing. That's why I loved marching band, and I said, 'Gee, someday there's going to be a little drum orchestra where everybody plays one thing, and you don't stray from it. You do it until you drop. You're banished from that land if you move from that one part.'

"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. Lenny started playing a conga pattern. 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. We made another mark four bars before those two bars. Lenny and I went back out; I had a cowbell, Lenny had a shaker. They gave us two new tracks, and they gave us the cue when they saw the first mark go by. Lenny and I started playing to get into the groove, so by the time the that fifth bar came – which was the first bar of the two bars we marked as the cool bars we liked – we were locked, and we overdubbed shaker and cowbell.

"So there was bass drum, snare drum, hi-hat, two congas, a cowbell, and a shaker. We went back in, cut the tape, and made a one-bar tape loop that went 'round and 'round and 'round. The Linn machine was available to us. 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! So we had an analog groove. We took that tape, transferred it onto another 24-track for six minutes, and David Paich and I went out in the studio. The song started, and I was sitting there with a complete drumset, and Paich was playing. When he got to the fill before the chorus, I started playing the chorus, and when the verse or the intro came back, I stopped playing. Then we had piano and drums on tape. You have to realize that there are some odd bars in 'Africa', so when you have a one-bar loop going, all of a sudden, sometimes Lenny's figure would turn around. So Lenny went in and played the song again, but this time he changed his pattern a little for the turn-arounds, for the fills, for the bridge, for the solo. We kept the original part and the new one. Then we had to do bongos, jingle sticks, and big shakers doing quarter notes, maybe stacking two tracks of sleigh bells, two tracks of big jingle sticks, and two tracks of tambourine all down to one track. I was trying to get the sounds I would hear Milt Holland or Emil Richards have, or the sounds I would hear in a 'National Geographic' special, or the ones I heard at the New York World's Fair."

"Africa" was played on all of Toto's tours from its release until the band's breakup in 2008. It was sung by David Paich at the 2009 Millennium Development Goals Awards Ceremony.

Music video

The music video was directed by Steve Barron. The story is of a researcher in a library (portrayed by band member David Paich), looking for clues to a book called Africa. Many scenes include the band performing atop a stack of hardcover books.

Covers

The song has been covered in 1982 by Key of Dreams, Italo Disco style.

The Shadows did an instrumental of the song in 1983.

Singer-songwriters Howie Day and Virginia Coalition and Umphrey's McGee perform versions of "Africa" in their live shows, and the song has been a popular cover for a cappella groups. Tukuleur, a group from Africa, recorded a German-language hip hop version of the song titled Afrika.

SubAudible Hum covered this song for Triple J's Like a Version.

Belgian-born Canadian singer Lara Fabian used this song on her Nue Tour in 2001 as an interlude performance to her Nue album track "Rio" with one of her backup singers singing lead on the verses.

German band Pyogenesis covered their song in their full length album, Mono, ... or will it ever be.

Phonte Coleman, member of the rap group Little Brother covered the song for his 80's cover album, Zo and Tigallo Love the 80's.

Chris de Burgh covered it on his 2008 covers album Footsteps.

Lowry recorded a cover of the song for Engine Room Recordings' compilation album Guilt by Association Vol. 2, which was released in November of 2008.

Wellington International Ukulele Orchestra recorded a cover the song on their 2009 release, The Dreaming EP.

Olivia Lufkin did a slow cover of the song on her Sea Me single.

Straight No Chaser did an a capella cover of the song in the late 1990's for a bonus track on their album, "Holiday Spirits." They rerecorded the song as an Amazon.com exclusive track for their 2010 album, "With A Twist."

Jeffster! performed the song in the episode of Chuck "Chuck versus The Best Friend".

Christian rock band Relient K has performed the song at some of their live shows in 2010.

Sampled on

"Africa" has been used as a sample in several songs. These include:

Artist	Song
Nas	New World
Ja Rule	Murder Reigns
Xzibit	Heart of Man
JoJo	Anything
Cryzp	Africa
Marcus Levin	Take Me Away
Brazen	Toto
Karl Wolf	Africa
Wordz	Restless
The Glitterboys	Africa
Dice Raw & The Money Makin' Jam Boys feat. Truck North	Meaning Of Life
Ryan Leslie	How It Was Supposed To Be

Popular culture

• The American Dad! episode "Camp Refoogee" features the song briefly. Also in "Bullocks to Stan" at the cleaners, Stan is seen murmuring this song, changing the famous "I bless the rains down in Africa" line to "I crash the planes down in Africa."
• SingStar features the song on the SingStar Rock Ballads solos edition.
• The song is featured on the soundtrack to Grand Theft Auto: Vice City where it is featured on Vice City's love ballad radio station, Emotion 98.3.
• The Scrubs episode "My Way Home" featured this song at the beginning of the episode. J.D. is also singing along with this song in the bath.
• It is the official song of the Great Midwest Trivia Contest held at Lawrence University.
• It is the signature song of the Obertones, Oberlin College's premiere all-male a cappella group.
• A snippet of this song was repeatedly featured on the Triple M radio show Get This; and always when the word "Africa" was spoken.
• A snippet of this song and the video was used in a SONY cassette tape commercial.
• In an Achewood comic strip, Ray Smuckles is seen dancing, presumably to the song.
• The A-capella group Straight No Chaser included a rendition of the song in their version of the "12 Days of Christmas" They also have performed the original song.
• In the Season 2 episode of Chuck titled "Chuck Versus the Best Friend," Jeff Barnes and Lester Patel's band "Jeffster!" performs this song at the Burbank Buy More as an audition for the role of wedding band for Ellie Bartowski and Devon Woodcomb.
• On March 27, 2009, the chorus was sung by the 4 Poofs and a Piano on the British talk show, Friday Night with Jonathan Ross.
• The song can be heard in a advertisement for Resident Evil 5, a video game which takes place in Africa.
• In the webcomic Questionable Content, a mini-arc involving Faye and Angus McPhee involves a kiss sparked when the two reveal that their favorite Toto song is Africa.
• In the closing credits of season two premier of Community, three characters sing an anthropology rap before breaking into a chorus of "Africa".

Personnel

Steve Lukather - backing vocals, guitar
Bobby Kimball - backing vocals
David Hungate - bass
Jeff Porcaro - drums, percussion
Steve Porcaro - synthesizer
David Paich - keyboards, lead vocals
Lenny Castro - congas, percussion

External links

• Billboard Chart Listing - Allmusic.com
• Mix Magazine's "Classic Tracks" article