MIKANO - Melting Balloons
Available on March 6th
https://bit.ly/2vFn5Sp

P.R. - Federica Furlotti   / federica.furlotti@kartelmusicgroup.com
+44 (0)7825 59614


Rising French-Cameroonian hip hop artist MIKANO, unveils the cinematic visuals for ‘When It Rains Glitter’, taken from his debut mixtape ‘Melting Balloons’, due for release on 6th March.

The two-part video, directed by visionary, up-and-coming Parisian director and photographer Lokmane, contemplates the nature of human life, which as Mikano explains is “full of highs and lows, beautiful surprises, deceptions, tears of joy and sadness. I think this song pictures that well". Each part features six shots in which the cinematography evolves around the characters’ arc, playing with both utopian and dystopian fiction, Lokmane directs the video like an art gallery in which the viewers can walk through the different scenes as if they were paintings with different colour palettes telling the story. 

Part one starts with a poetic vision of life, featuring shots depicting an imagined community possessing highly desirable and nearly perfect daily lives, with the narrative filmmaking focusing on their feelings of love and happiness, abruptly ending with a dystopic shot symbolizing the fatality of life and an uncertain future for the Utopia society.

This final scene serves as an introduction to the darker second part of the video, in which each scene is soaked in saturated neon-colours. As the scenes progress towards a bleak dystopian future, we notice how Lokmane is showing us a different interpretation of the story in the first part. It’s a powerful metaphor about life, one to which everyone can relate, because as Mikano says “growing up can be scary”. 

Growing up in cities as diverse as Abu Dhabi, Cairo and Amsterdam, Mikano is the perfect example of a Third Culture Kid whose music has been dramatically influenced by his rootless past. This only added to his fascination with cultural music genres: “when I settled down in Paris, I began to compose and write, inspired by the music that I experienced at each stage of my life and my travels”, adds the rapper, “singing in English isn’t a commercial choice, is the language I spoke growing up and the one I built my flow on.”

Inspired by artists from different genres such as Agnès Obel, Frank Ocean and Alabama Shakes, Mikano’s first two EPs ‘No Devices Found’ and ‘Blind Man Dreams’, have seen support from some of the most prestigious French music publications including Tsugi and Rolling Stone. Whilst his more recent singles, ‘Silhouette’ and The Fader and Hypebeast- supported ‘It’s Alright’ - wrote like the rest of the mixtape with the help of his friend and wonderkid Parisian producer Svtvs – served as the first introduction to Mikano’s music world.

Mikano represents a new wave of French rap, one in which the imagination and aesthetic of Generation Z create a visionary new blend of hip hop, less focused on gritty suburban realism and politics than the old school. With France being the second biggest market for hip-hop, French rappers already shifting more units than their USA counterparts and Paris being last year’s most successful city for the genre, it is time for a French, English speaking rapper to find international success.

HRCLS Records