With its new podcast “Backstory”, Spotify explores history through rap

In French-speaking rap, references to history are not lacking. From Medina to Meryl, via Dosseh and Disiz, the words of the artists have something to tell of our time, but also of those past. After years of digging into this idea in his head, author and producer Gloire Savula Mbongo decided to make it a podcast, called “Backstory”, a Spotify original production with Binge Audio. A year and a half of work later, the pilot episode with rapper Disiz finally saw the light of day on Tuesday.

For Spotify, which already produces its own content such as “Six-seater sofa” by Léna Situations, the idea made sense. “We produce documentaries, fiction, but never content related to music. It wasn’t logical,” admits Claire Hazan, in charge of Spotify’s podcast and original production strategy in France and Benelux. The pitch of this new podcast? “Musical artists come to shed light on the historical references” evoked in their texts.

From Gold to Medina

The idea emerged in the head of Gloire Savula Mbongo for a few years already. From college more precisely. In her music lessons, Gloire Savula Mbongo understands the link between “the great story” and music. At the time, his teacher showed them, for example, the lyrics of the group Gold and its references to the war in Lebanon. “But your pink sand walls have lost their luster. Under the dark shadows of the soldiers. City of light, what have they done to you? “. In this title released in 1986, City of Lightthe group paid homage to Beirut, ravaged by the civil war.

A few years later and with added street cred, the “Backstory” podcast wants to explore historical, sociological and literary facts through lyrics and especially the eyes of artists. The idea here is to show that through each career and each personal trajectory of a rapper, there is a “red thread” linked to history. In the pilot episode with Disiz, it will for example be a question of non-violent movements and those of personalities such as Malcolm X, Angela Davis, Gandhi, Tolstoy or even Martin Luther King.

The young public in the viewfinder

Every two weeks, each episode – of around thirty minutes – will be punctuated by the internal work of the podcast team, made up of Gloire but also of its loyal allies, journalist Sofian Choumane and academic Emmanuelle Carinos. All the episodes indeed begin with vocals exchanged in the same WhatsApp conversation where the three enthusiasts exchange their various discoveries of historical references in rap. Once listed in this group of friends, the historical references are commented on by the artist.

For Gloire, the goal is above all to open history to everyone, “not necessarily the one we find in our school books”. The whole thing is not to rewrite history, but to explain it through the work of an artist recognized by his public. “For the choice of artists, we wanted to turn to those listened to by the younger generation and I wondered which ones my little brother might like”, explains Gloire Savula Mbongo.

“A fun front door”

A good thing for Spotify, which also aims to expand its audience to younger people. “With “Backstory”, we want to offer the youngest a playful and enlightened gateway to knowledge often considered too “academic”. A large proportion of our users are between 18 and 25 years old, rap and pop fans, and Spotify is therefore the perfect platform to offer this approach which combines music and culture, knowledge and entertainment,” says Claire Hazan.

In the future, the author and director Gloire Savula Mbongo even confides his desire to open his podcast to more pop artists who would also have a look at a story of their own.

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