The group from South Africa is represented by four brothers: Johnny, Jesse, Daniel and Dylan. The family band plays music in the genre of alternative rock. Their last names are Kongos.
They laugh that they are in no way related to the Congo River, or the South African tribe of that name, or the Kongo armadillo from Japan, or even the Kongo pizza. They're just four white brothers.
The history of the creation of the Kongos group
The Kongos brothers spent their childhood and youth in Great Britain and South Africa. They graduated from high school in Johannesburg. There is nothing surprising in the fact that they became musicians, because they were born in the family of the famous singer John Kongos in the 1970s.
At one time, their father recorded several albums that occupied leading positions in the charts and were sold in significant numbers. Two of his hits have been incredibly popular for a long time: He's Gonna Step on You Again and Tokoloshe Man.
The boys began to learn music at the age of 2-3 years. At first, their parents taught them to play the piano, then invited music teachers began to come to the house. In 1996, the Kongos family moved to the USA, to the state of Arizona.
By that time, the brothers not only played various instruments, but also composed music themselves.
In Arizona, Johnny and Jesse entered the largest public educational and research university in America in the jazz department and successfully graduated from it. Dylan and Daniel studied music on their own, learning to play the guitar.
Soon the young people decided to combine their musical talents into a family group. As a result, an interesting team was formed, where Johnny played accordion and keyboards, Jesse was in charge of drums and percussion, and Daniel and Dylan were guitarists. The vocal parts performed everything.
Features of the band's music
The Kongos brothers play positive groovy rock, which can be quite appropriate both on stage and in a simple pub. The group has two original features - the presence of an accordion and the occasional use of a quitro.
This is a special genre, considered a subspecies of house, with the participation of South African rappers. This style was developed in the 1990s immediately after Nelson Mandela won the presidential election. He was given the playful name "wind of change" ("wind of change").
The name of the group comes not only from the names of the brothers. They decided to show respect to their father, a talented singer and musician. John Theodore Kongus is a highly respected cultural figure in South Africa.
Kongos group career
The music world sees the birth of new stars every day. Some of them quickly become famous and also instantly lose their status, and there are those who leave their noticeable mark.
We can safely say that the second applies to these guys. For the first time the group appeared before the public in 2007, presenting their first album, which received the same name.
After a successful debut, there were several more years of hard work, which ended in 2012 with the release of the Lunatic disc. This collection of compositions first aroused interest in South Africa.
Local radio stations immediately became interested in the song I'm Only Joking, and the composition Come with Me Now was an incredible success and subsequently elevated the brothers to the pinnacle of fame. She, as time has shown, withstood many tests that fall to the lot of musical groups.
A year later, the group decided to release an album in America, where the same two songs took the top of all the charts. The single Come with Me Now even achieved "platinum heights".
On the National Geographic, NBC Sports and other channels, it sounded more than once in the form of a soundtrack, was chosen as the theme music for some sports TV shows, was used in the action movie The Expendables 3, delighted the audience in the new Top Gear show The Grand Tour, etc.
This song stayed at the top of well-known charts for a long time, and the number of views of the video on YouTube exceeded 100 million.
Band at its peak
After a resounding success, the Kongos went on a tour of America and Europe, which lasted a year and a half (from 2014 to 2015).
During this time, the band not only gave concerts, but also wrote the next album, Egomaniac, consisting of 13 songs created in the same style as in the previous collection. Since the songs were composed by all the brothers, they came up with an interesting thing in this album - whoever wrote the song sings it.
The musicians reported that the new disc addresses the problem of selfishness and ignorance. Allegedly in show business, these problems are very noticeable in others, and self-critical people see them in themselves. The brothers say that every person needs someone next to them who will help them descend from heaven to earth.
Kongos group now
At the moment, the family quartet lives in the USA in the city of Phoenix (Arizona). Having gained worldwide fame, the brothers did not become "arrogant". They often visited South Africa, their small homeland, with pleasure. Concerts in Johannesburg are a great success, and local radio stations are happy to present their songs.
The band continues to work on new songs and tour. Their new studio album "1929: PART 1" was recently released.
