Stromae: Are You Listening Yet?
The 28-year-old Belgian singer/songwriter Stromae is huge in Europe: both singles — “Papaoutai” and “Formidable” — from his new CD, “Racine Carree,” have had enormous popularity on YouTube. Yet despite a career that has included the inevitable collaboration with Kanye West, Stromae is still relatively unknown in the United States. Maybe it’s simply because he sings in French. It isn’t because his music, hip-hop and electronic, isn’t catchy. Stromae’s influences are wide-ranging: with the rapper Orelsan and some musicians from Cap Verde, he just released “Ave Cesaria,” an hommage to Cesaria Evora. Among Stromae’s fans in the U.S. is editrix Anna Wintour: why aren’t she and her fashionable crowd pushing him harder?
