The AI Afro Soul version of Stromae’s 2013 hit, Papaoutai, is going viral.
The song is performing well on YouTube with 9,831,697 views since it was uploaded on 9 January.
Created by streamer Mikeeysmind, the French song is very true to the essence of the original. The Afro Soul version is slower and is a bigger production than the original, with a strong male vocalist supported by the sound of a large choir and an orchestra.
On Spotify, the song has over 25,2 million streams. It is quickly gaining popularity on social media platforms, with content creators using it as background music for different types of videos.
The original Papaoutai was no slouch in its time, performing very well with over a billion views on YouTube.
Stromae wrote the song having been inspired by the absence of his father, an architect who was killed in the Rwandan genocide when Stromae was nine years old, in addition to not really being a big part of his life before his death. It is about the pain of an absent father from a child’s point of view.
The name is a slang version of the question “Papa, ou et-tu?”, which means “Dad, where are you?”
Stromae (Maestro mixed up) is a 40-year-old Belgian/Rwandan singer and rapper. His real name is Paul Van Haver.
