Friday marks the launch of Mafikizolo’s new album, Kwela, at a Durban club, ahead of the Metro FM Music Awards on Saturday November 15. The new album is twice as good as their previous album, Sibongile. The band has received five Metro awards nominations.
Kwela maintains Mafikizolo’s style of marabi, Afro-pop and 1950s sounds, taking fans on a trip down memory lane to the Sophiatown of yesteryear.
The album pays tribute to South Africa’s struggle heroes, such as Walter Sisulu, Oliver Tambo and Nelson Mandela, and the suffering they endured under the dompas laws.
“This album is a follow-up to Sibongile. It’s a growth from Sibon-gile. As an artist one must learn and grow,” says lead singer Nhlanhla Sibongile Mafu, who is wearing her trademark sunglasses.
I met the trio — Mafu, Theo Kgosinkwe and Tebogo Madingoane — at Sony Music .
Many well-known artists are featured on the album. The first track, Kwela, features Hugh Masekela and another, Mnt’ Omnyama, features Stoan Seate of Bongo Maffin. Don Laka produced Mlanjeni (River) and Udakwa Njalo features Sibongile Khumalo’s son, Tshepo Mngoma.
Mafikizolo have already shot a video of Udakwa Njalo, at Munsieville, outside Krugersdorp — the same place where they shot Sibongile, which sold more than 300 000 units and saw them scoop the best group and best Afro pop album at the South African Music Awards (Sama). They also received a special award at the Metro FM Cell C Awards.
Mzekezeke scooped the coveted Sama artist of the year and song of the year awards for his song S’Guqa Ngamadolo. This was a disappointment for Mafikizolo, who had hoped that the danceable wedding anthem Ndihamba Nawe would be selected as song of the year.
Because of the late release of the latest album the group might not enjoy good sales. Sibongile was released in October last year.
“Our first and second album didn’t do well. We were new and people were not ready for that type of music. With Lotto we tried to loosen up a bit and tried to make it more of a party song,” says Madingoane.
It was on the Lotto album that Mafikizolo tried an Afro-pop song, Majika, for the first time. “After the success of Majika, we decided to try Afro-pop in our next album, Sibongile. It was just an experiment, but surprisingly the song did well.”
The group admits they were under a lot of pressure to match Sibongile‘s unprecedented success on the new album. “In life, there’s a session to everything. It was our session [Sibongile], no matter who released the album at the time,” says Kgosinkwe.
“In this album we have done our best. It might even do better, so far we are happy with it.”
The album has Afro-jazz, Afro-house and also a gospel song, Ndixolele, on a house tip.
The success of Sibongile has seen Mafikizolo setting the sky as their limit. Their overseas performances include Miami, United States, and London, United Kingdom. If all goes well the group will be touring Australia in March next year. They have also toured a number of Southern African countries.
Their theme this year will be the spirit of giving. “We are not returning the favour, we are just saying thank you. We will be making financial contribution to children’s welfare from our portion of income.
“We will also devote our time to charities as part of our social responsibility,” says Kgosinkwe, who wrote most of the songs. Madingoane is a composer and a rapper. Mafu is lead singer and also a composer. Their music is for the young and old, rural and urban.
After five albums together, none of the group is thinking of going solo. The group says the Sophie Mgcina saga is now “gone and forgotten, and sealed peacefully”.
Mgcina was the originator of Mafikizolo’s song Ndihamba Nawe but the group failed to credit her.
And the point is
It is hard to believe that four years have passed since Metro FM launched its music awards. The feat is incredible for two reasons. First, when the then station manager Romeo Khumalo launched the awards he declared an intention to increase local music content to 50%.
Everyone at the Park Hyatt in Rosebank knew that it would not happen. More importantly, after three years of following the awards it is time the listeners who voted in these awards ask the question: What is the point of the awards?
As is to be expected with any new initiative, some things get made up as you go along. Last year the awards came too late for listeners who were voting to capture the sudden burst of Mafikizolo. So a “Cell C award” was created to acknowledge them. This year Mafikizolo have done as expected and received five nominations. But there is no special award this year, not even for new kids in hip-hop H20, who have had to make do with two nominations for Best Group and Best Hip-Hop Album on the basis of their single, It’s Wonderful. Truth is, Metro has never sought to use the awards to interrogate the aesthetic of local music and push the borders for listeners. Over the years the awards have grown to include categories in R&B, best club DJ and, this year, hip-hop. Yet Metro has done very little, if anything, to develop house music and hip-hop in its current wave. Instead it has left it to outfits like Rage Productions, Yfm and Y magazine to test the audiences and assume the risk of losing listeners or readers, and only once a trend is established does it latch on and use its national platform to spread it.
In the end, the awards merely capture what listeners felt at the time of voting. The rest is hype without substance. — Thebe Mabanga