SIDA video

This footage comes from a night (ca. 1999) at Chez Rose, a maquis on the road to Bassam where Zieti set up our little amps and a couple microphones to perform original songs to the unsuspecting patrons and passersby.

Much of the early camerawork is done by Aime, who can also be seen driving back to Port Bouet towards the end of the clip. Aime is a master mechanic and long-haul driver (who never blinks!), and would take care of things for Zieti whenever an experienced hand was necessary to navigate Abidjan’s many ins-and-outs.

The lovely young woman featured throughout is Laurent’s girlfriend, who demonstrates an expert mapouka onstage after the show. The song is entitled “SIDA,” and the nightclub setting works well with its theme of avoiding HIV/AIDS by wearing a condom and not acting like dogs mating in the streets (hence the dog image).

As on the album, Laurent ends the song by presenting a common conspiracy theory of why AIDs doesn’t really exist (multinational corporate greed), but then saying even if you truly hold that point of view, why not protect yourself anyway?  Indeed.