Africa

David Paich wrote "Africa" after playing with a new keyboard, the Yamaha CS-80, on which he found the brassy sound that became the opening riff. He completed the chorus melody and lyrics in about ten minutes, a speed that surprised him, then spent six months refining the words before showing the song to the rest of Toto. He drew on a late night documentary about African plight and suffering that had moved and appalled him, and on memories of teachers at his Catholic school who had done missionary work in Africa. Having never set foot on the continent, he took the descriptions of its scenery from a National Geographic article.

The song became the tenth and final track on Toto IV, released in 1982, and emerged as a single through Columbia Records in the United States in October of that year. It topped the Billboard Hot 100, outperforming the album's lead single "Rosanna", which had peaked at number 2. The band had grown tired of the track during its long gestation in the studio and even considered cutting it, and Paich briefly thought about saving it for a solo record. Steve Lukather joked he would run naked down Hollywood Boulevard if it became a hit.

Steve Porcaro programmed the kalimba riff on a Yamaha GS-1, recording it six times with different rhythms and layering the results, while Jeff Porcaro played his drums live without a click track alongside Lenny Castro on conga. The music video, directed by Steve Barron, premiered in 1983 and reached one billion YouTube views in June 2024.