While "Bongo Flava" is clearly related to American hip hop, it is also clearly distinguished from its Western counterpart. As the bongoflava.net website puts it, "these guys don't need to copy their brothers in America, but have a sure clear sense of who they are and what sound it is they're making". The sound "has its roots in the rap, R&B and hip hop coming from America but from the beginning these styles have been pulled apart and put back together with African hands".Recently with the increase in popularity of Afrobeats in East Africa,most Bongo flava songs have adopted the sound especially the 3+2 or 2+3 drum pattern of afrobeats but retaining the arabesque melodies of taarab thus resulting to reduction of hiphop influence in the genre.