Anitta and Shakira released their first collaboration this week, which will be part of the Brazilian artist’s next album, ‘EQUILIBRIVM’. Broadly inspired by the rhythms of Rio funk, ‘Choka Choka’, unfortunately, is totally forgettable.
It’s difficult for a song that’s slightly over two minutes long to become repetitive, but that’s the case with ‘Choka Choka’. It also doesn’t make you want the song to last longer. This is due to verses and choruses that do not present many variations in lyrics or melody and that, individually, are not very interesting either. Yes, the bridge, minimalist in percussion, is more convincing, but it is so brief that it ends up being an anecdote within the song.
Anitta sings about a “fast-paced” woman who “doesn’t behave” and who “doesn’t care what anyone thinks anymore.” It’s one of those things where “you say ‘hello’ and she says ‘bye’.” That is to say, a walking cliché. Shakira, on the other hand, sings about a “wolf” who is “upbeat” and makes a reference to her own song: “She’s a wolf and she’s a woman / She doesn’t settle until she gets what she wants.”
The most curious thing about the song is that the only one who sings in Spanish at any point in the song is Anitta. All of Shakira’s interventions, however, are in Portuguese. Even when they intersperse verses in the same verse, Shakira does not utter a single word in Spanish. Now that’s a breath of fresh air.
