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Who is DJ Snake, music visionary and Lady Gaga’s producer?
When DJ Snake released the music video for his track Disco Maghreb in 2022, the world’s most listened-to French artist racked up over 23 million views and became the number one on YouTube. A well-deserved success for this epic short film directed with the help of Romain Gavras, paying tribute to the artist’s Algerian roots. Here’s everything you need to know about Lady Gaga’s genius producer.
By Violaine Schütz.
Published on 15 June 2022. Updated on 15 June 2026.
Music as a brigde between generations and locations
There is a tradition of music videos that you cannot tell whether they are short films or, in this case, musical promotional videos. Among them, one can list the epic videos created by M.I.A., The Blaze and PNL. Now DJ Snake will have to be added to this prestigious list. Indeed, the most listened-to French artist in the world, who worked with Lady Gaga and Kanye West, released a music video that has more to do with a short film than a typical YouTube product. It reached over 23 million views in a few days after its release on the music platform.
Titled Disco Maghreb, the track and video pay tribute to DJ Snake’s Algerian roots. The artist was born in Paris to a French father and an Algerian mother. On Twitter, the 40-year-old producer explained that he imagined Disco Maghreb “as a bridge between different generations and origins, linking North Africa, the Arab world and beyond”, as “a love letter to my people.” In a press release, he shared that he wanted to witness “the energy of globalized youth, traditional dances, and the spirit of jubilation on screen. At the same time, [the video] captures the angst and desire for freedom manifested by a hyperconnected generation of young women and men from the Middle East, North Africa, and everywhere else”.
Disco Maghreb, a tribute to Algeria and Raï music
The video for Disco Maghreb (2022) was shot in Oran and Algiers in the working-class neighborhood of Climat de France, known for its heavy colonial history. French director Elias Belkeddar teamed up with filmmaker and videographer Romain Gavras — who collaborated with M.I.A., Jay-Z, Kanye West — as creative supervisor. Oscillating between tradition and modernity, this short film plunges us into an Algerian music shop, before taking us on a trip to a lively wedding, steep rocks, a camel race or even on the road. There, young Algerian men wearing Nike TN sneakers and Adidas flip-flops ride mopeds.
Raï music is at the heart of this hit. The track mixes electronic and oriental sounds in the manner of the French duo Acid Arab, or the Syrian singer Omar Souleyman. The title, Disco Maghreb, refers to the Oran-based record company and shop of the same name run by the legendary Boualem Disco Maghreb. This latter contributed to the popularity of Raï in the 1980s by producing “Cheb” artists. At the end of DJ Snake’s music video, Cheb Khaled‘s voice resonates in what remains the most poetic part of the video.
The cover of DJ Snake’s single rewrites the codes of Raï cassette tapes from the 1980s and 1990s. An aesthetic and human approach that is very appealing. Already shared by actor Omar Sy and singer Elli Medeiros on their respective social media platforms, Disco Maghreb seems to have already become a unifying visual and musical work in the blink of an eye.
Disco Maghreb (2022) and Nomad (2025) by DJ Snake are available now.
