Maybe you attended a music show or a concert starring Akon in the last few years, and enjoyed tremendous hits like “Lonely”, “Locked up” or “Ghetto”. The American singer, Senegalese roots, is one of these voices you can recognize very easily amid others: his first solo album, “Trouble”, was released in 2004 and launched his hip-hop career to bring him success far beyond America. “Konvicted” (2006) and “Freedom” (2008) would follow. Nonetheless, the next words we are going to write will perhaps disappoint you a little bit, but Akon himself confessed them: believe him or not, forgive him or blame him for the reasons why he did this, this is up to you.

Akon gave an interview for The Morning Hustle lately where he admitted that his twin brother Abou Thiam used to replace him on the stage to perform at some concerts. Not a lot, but a few ones indeed. Abou being unable to sing the way Akon did, they resorted to…playback. Nobody would notice anything, and the show would go on smoothly. Why did Akon decide to deceive some fans who wanted to see him perform instead of his brother Abou?

Akon asserted that money was the key reason. Not taking this money was impossible to consider at that time, as he said: “Man, all this money I’m leaving…We could not let it go”.

We do not know how many times that reversal happened in the past, but no doubt some fans will feel betrayed, and we can understand that. It is like throwing your money away, and we are not even sure that Akon would have told the truth if T-Pain had remained silent. 

As a reminder, it was T-Pain who first claimed that Akon was using his brother to play his part at some shows. The type of thing that would be impossible in 2022 with everyone hung up on their smartphones.