They like Beethoven as much as Busta Rhymes and kwaito, and TKZee includes the first black member of the Drakensberg Boys’ Choir. Maria McCloy reports
Ask anyone – I mean anyone, from South Africa’s hot producers to popular young artists and DJs to the average kid looking for a good time – what they’re getting down to, and they’ll almost certainly tell you it’s TKZee’s latest single, Palafala.
Sitting around with these slightly hungover guys one Saturday after a hectic night of partying and performing at a packed Insomnia in Illovo the night before, they seem like boys next door – not the next big thing.
You probably wouldn’t expect the combination of a classically-trained former Drakensberg Boys’ Choir member and two guys with a kwaito and rap background to be able to work together, but they were tight friends at school – and their different backgrounds is what makes their music a success.
“Zwai’s got a classical background, but he can listen to Mase, or I can listen to Beethoven’s ninth symphony and still like Busta Rhymes,” comments Kabelo. If you add some kwaito spice to that mix, you’ll get an idea of what TKZee sounds like (that is, if you haven’t heard Palafala or Masimbela).
The songs move far away from standard non- changing dance beats and the same three chanted words. Listen to the layers of chanting, rapping and singing that happens in the songs and you’ll find Palafala begins with the Joni Mitchell sample that Janet Jackson uses in Got Til It’s Gone, and Masimbela’s chorus is made up of a traditional Sesotho song.
It’s not hard to imagine the boys at school at St Stithians. Lean and dreadlocked Zwai (22) is trained in voice and piano and was the first black member of the the Drakensberg Boys’ Choir. Tokollo (21) and Kabelo (21) look like they were into sport and hip-hop while Zwai was already recording a solo album.
Tokollo, son of soccer coach Screamer Tshabalala, used to be a member of Mashamplani, and beefy Kabelo is also down with rap. He recently did his South African-flavoured delivery on the album by new South African R&B group, Soul’d Out.
Zwai earned the highest grade eight voice exam results in the world and won a scholarship to do vocal studies, teaching and performance at the Royal Scottish Academy of Music and Drama.
“He could have a PhD by now, but he left after a year,” says Kabelo. Zwai missed Africa. He wanted to come back and make music, so he hooked up with Kabelo – back from an exchange trip to the United States – and Tokollo ,who had left Mashamplani, and they made an EP called Take It Eezy in 1996.
But it wasn’t a case of instant popularity, even if they did get nominated for best rap album in the 1997 FNB Sama Awards. Though they see themselves as starting the musical fusion of hip-hop, reggae, kwaito and R&B that Bongo Maffin and Skeem also do, their album wasn’t well marketed, and many say it was ahead of its time. Evidently their label BMG saw the potential of the group and kept them on.
Zwai says the songs that were popular at the time had chants that could be remembered easily. Now people are hungry for TKZee’s original ideas and influences melded into something that “gets people dancing, instead of just standing and watching, thinking `What the fuck?’ like on our last release”.
Major kwaito producer Arthur is a fan. “People are tired of the same old thing,” he says. “They’ve got a real kwaito jam with all the kwaito ingredients. After 30 seconds I was dancing when I first heard it.”
Megastar and producer Mdu is the exception to the trend -he doesn’t like the band. But then that’s because of a crack they took at him with the track Masimbela. The single was going to be six tracks about summer fun. But then TKZee heard Lost and Found by Mdu’s group Mashamplani, realised it dissed Tokollo, and the battle lines were drawn. The boys went straight to the studio to record Masimbela – the word combines Mdu’s surname, Masilela, and masimba, which means shit.
The Mashamplani track calls Tokollo a dog with no teeth, recalling an incident last year when Tokollo, S’bu and Pro left Mashamplani, leaving behind Mdu and the dancers who now make up that band. Tokollo claims they were ripped off when it came to performance fees and this is outlined in their song. Such a no-fear approach has endeared TKZee to many: they weren’t scared to be David taking on the Mdu Goliath.
TKZee are certainly not boys dancing to someone else’s tune. Zwai played all the instruments on the single and all three guys produced it – and that’s where the money and control is at.
After appearing on S’bu’s album Amalawyer, Tokollo released Gusheshe which he co- produced with Guffy. Zwai did the musical score for Zak Dakile’s movie Please Help, No Food No Money, and has been composing, producing and recording with the Fort Hare Choir. The artists want to work on an album for old Mashamplani member Pro in the new year.
But what is going to happen when they are too old to be the flavour of the moment?
“This doesn’t end as a group,” Kabelo says. “We’re looking to expand the business. TKZee has a joint venture label, TKZee Records, with BMG, and we’re looking to sign people.”
Tokollo’s experience and the rampant exploitation in the industry means the guys are clued-up enough not to sign contracts without a lawyer. They’re determined not to treat their own artists badly.
They also don’t agree that kwaito is not music and will soon die out. Tokollo makes a comparison with rap when it started in the United States: “Parents never liked it either, said it was full of swearing, but the youth loved it. Now kwaito is like that, but it is South African.”
TKZee sense that success is near, feel that it’s about time. Next year should see the release of an album called Halloween, which will contain the current singles, and there’s talk that on this album they will cross-pollinate their style of music -they call it “guz” – with rock group The Usual and Black Moses of the Soul Brothers.
Better watch out, these boys are good.