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Aug 04, 2015 By Christopher Roberts Petite Noir

As we previously reported, Petite Noir (aka half-Congolese, half-Angolan, Cape Town-residing artist Yannick Ilunga) recently announced his debut album, La Vie Est Belle / Life Is Beautiful, which is due out September 11 via Domino. When it was announced he shared the video for “Down,” now we have one for “Best.”

Travys Owen directed the simply stunning clip, with art direction by Rochelle Nembhard. Owen explained the video, which examines modern day Africa, in a press release: “We wanted to make four distinct ‘tribes’ of people. This allowed us to create the visual journey that Yannick is on, running through all of these different landscapes, and allowed us to create these rich scenes which were very different from each other. The four main elements in the video are Fire, Malachite (earth/rock), Water, and Gold. The video is about Yannick’s journey through all of these landscapes meeting all of these different tribes.”

Nembhard added: “I wanted to break all boundaries in how we portrayed the continent and her people. The video showcases the beauty of the continent, the richness in her landscapes, the sacredness of her culture, the immense diversity of her tribes and the natural inherent beauty and style of her people.”

La Vie Est Belle / Life Is Beautiful follows The King of Anxiety EP, released by Domino back in January. It was recorded at Box Ten Studios in London with Oli Bayston (who also records as Boxed In) and Leon Brichard (Ibibio).

Petite Noir also has an upcoming appearance at the Afropunk Festival in Brooklyn on August 23. Check out the “Best” video below, followed by his tour dates. Also read our recent Pleased to Meet You interview with Petite Noir.

Petite Noir Tour Dates:

Sun August 23 || Brooklyn, New York || AfroPunk Festival
Tues September 15 || London, UK || Lexington
Wed September 16 || Glasgow, UK || Stereo
Thu September 17 || Manchester, UK || Deaf Institute
Sat September 19 || Nurnburg, Festival, Germany || Melt!
Mon September 21 || Paris, France || Badaboum
Tues September 22 || Brussels, Belgium || Botanique/Witloofbar
Thu September 24 || Amsterdam, Netherlands || Melkweg
Fri September 25 || Hamburg, Festival, Germany || Reeperbahn Festival