K’naan’s Wavin Flag is a song that any football fan over a certain age will recognise instantly but many of them will probably be unaware of what the singer has been up to since.
Wavin Flag was wasn’t actually the official song for the 2010 World Cup, that title belongs to Shakira – ‘Waka Waka (This Time for Africa).
Both tunes are equally catchy in their own right and are synonymous with what was an unforgettable tournament.
Wavin Flag, co-written and co-produced by Bruno Mars’ production team, was chosen as Coca-Cola’s promotional anthem for the World Cup and was an international hit for K’naan.
But where is the rapper now 14 years after the song was released?
K’naan kept a relatively low profile once the fame born from the single started to ware off.
The Somali-Canadian published a children’s book called When I Get Older: The Story Behind Wavin’ Flag in 2012.
He also released an album in the same year but it was met with little of the critical acclaim and success that the previous on Troubadour received.
K’naan then apologised for the stylistic changes in the new album, which was called ‘Country, God or the Girl’.
The rapper did little in the public eye in the years that followed, taking up residence in Nairobi, Kenya.
However, he recently bounced back, winning his first ever Grammy for a song called ‘Refugee’, which won in the category for Best Song for Social Change.
K’naan, who rose to international fame with his massive single ‘Wavin’ Flag,’ has always addressed his personal experiences as a refugee in his music.
His family came to North America from Somalia, taking refuge from civil war, when he was a teenager in 1991, arriving first in the U.S. before settling in Toronto.