Damso's "BĒYĀH": a final album between killer punchlines and new territories
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Rapper Damso at Paris Fashion Week, September 25, 2024. LAURENT VU/SIPA
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Review Settling scores with Booba, duet with artificial intelligence, Kompa attempt… Damso takes a grotesque bow with this album presented as the sixth and final studio chapter of his rap career.
"When I'm bored, I make an EP, I end up Man of the Year." Damso isn't wrong. Since bursting onto the scene in 2016 with "Batterie faible," the Kinshasa native has been steadily reaching for the top. Signed to Universal Music France, discovered by Booba, and endorsed by the 92i collective, the rapper quickly realized that the empire of flow is conquered with perfectly timed punchlines and poisonous ego trips. So, he delivered his uppercuts, sometimes violent, sexist, misogynistic, always intellectual.
Yet, in recent months, his microphone has changed shoulders. He put his career on hold to "go camping." Before unveiling a surprise compilation of "Vieux sons" in the summer of 2024, then a few months later, with "J'ai menti," a therapeutic assessment of his emotional neuroses. A catch-all project, self-centered to the point of suffocation, which sometimes borders on self-parody. It's wobbly, it's chaotic, it's wild—it's…
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