South African music hit some highs and sank to some lows in 1997. Our reviewers do a round-up of the local music scene
Maria McCloy Kwaito/D’gong
Kwaito/d’gong fans know how to get down and go crazy on dance floors — and there were a few songs that reached national anthem status in clubs and at bashes this year.
Trompies’s Magasman — which takes its instrumental from a track on Skhizo’s album Strawberry Goom Goom — features Boom Shaka’s Lebo and barely needs sales figures to confirm it as the song of the year.
Other major hits were the Mdu-produced album Intwenjani by newcomer Mawillies, which has clocked sales of more than 150 000, and Arthur’s Oyo Oyi album, which has sold 125 000 copies.
The straight three-word-lyric hot dance tracks of the established sound of Arthur and Mdu — who released the highly popular Ipompe in 1996 and Always da Case this year — are going to keep clocking high sales, but we also saw a move away from that type of sound, to creative music that is hard to define as”local house”.
Examples would be Bongo Maffin’s popular reworking of Miriam Makeba’s Pata Pata that was danceable but definitely not a house track. Neither was their slow jam cover of Hotel California, which — like Skeem’s Iskathi — wasn’t a straight dance track. These songs sound more like a weaving together of musical strands — including kwaito, hip-hop, R’n’B and ragga. TKZee’s single Palafala came out on a danceable tip yet was fresh and didn’t play into the mindless trend of a three-word song calling out over an uncomplicated beat.
This was definitely the year of the remix, with Trompies bringing out Trap and Los and Arthur doing VuvuZela dance remixes. Unfortunately most albums, whether good or bad, tend to have remixes and instrumentals. Are they produced for the sake of creativity or to save money on studio time and fill albums riding on one or two great songs? It would be an interesting and more creative idea to hand a song to a producer from a different stable or genre to make a truly remixed remix.
That’s why it was cool to see a trend developing for singles — turn on Boom Shaka, D’Low, Ishmael, TKZee, Zulu and Thebe — to test the market ahead of releasing full albums in 1998.
It’s to Boom Shaka’s credit that they managed to bring out an EP at all, between the drama of severing ties with Kalawa Jazmee Records. The vocals on Ain’t No Stopping Us — the album they produced with Christos — were muffled and the product (like Abashante’s second album Settlin’ the Score), was generally disappointing.
This was also a year in which kids were inspired by South African classics. Aside from Bongo Maffin’s Pata Pata, Dee Dee reworked Letta Mbuli’s Nomalizo, O’Da Meesta came out with a 1990s version of a traditional tune called Zumba and TKZee used a traditional Sesotho song chorus on Masimbela.
Acts like Soul’d Out, Ntokozo, Jennifer Jones, Verbal Assasins, LUV and Zulu attempted to fashion an local R’n’B sound and move away from producing easy-sell dance songs. Judging by these releases, finding a producer who can create something local that doesnt sound like a weak version of the American R’n’B, will be difficult.
Local music needs better marketing. Rap’s popularity means it would make sense for record companies to sign local rap acts, but the key is clever marketing of a genre that is not as popular as kwaito when it comes to local releases. The case of this year’s first South African hip-hop compilation The Muthaload and Prophets of da City’s and Brasse van die Kaap fading into oblivion shouldn’t be happening.