The Republic of the Congo (or Congo-Brazzaville) is an African nation with close musical ties to its neighbor, the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC, or Congo-Kinshasa). DROC's homegrown pop musics, makossa and soukous, are popular across the border, and musicians from both countries have fluidly travelled throughout the region playing similarly styled music, including Nino Malapet and Jean Serge Essous . Brazzaville had a major music scene until unrest in the late 1990s, and produced popular bands like Bantous de la Capitale .