Thandiswa radiates before Miriam Makeba.
© Carl Collison, South Africa
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The road that I follow
Leads me on my way
Got my eyes
on tomorrow
And my feet
on today.
Miriam
Makeba,
South African singer (1932-)
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A recipe for kwaito
Let’s begin with the basic ingredients: South
African disco music, hip-hop, rhythm & blues, reggae and a mega-dose of American
and British house music. Mix it all up, add loads of local spice and attitude and
you’ve got kwaito. Mostly, but not always, the lyrics are chanted or rapped–not sung–over
a slowed-down bass heavy, electronically programmed beat.
As pioneering DJs like Oscar “Warona” Mdlongwa, explain, in the late 80s, “we started
remixing international house tracks to give them a local feeling. We added a bit
of piano, slowing the tempo down and putting in percussion and African melodies”.
“Lyrically we were inspired by people like Brenda Fassie and Chicco Twala,” says
another founding father, Arthur Mafokate. Brenda and Chicco were the rising stars
of the older “Bubblegum” disco music. “They were representing us and talking about
what was happening in the ghettos, and they spoke in a mixture of English, Zulu,
Sesotho and Iscamtho (slang).”
Kwaito is steeped in the ghetto, often reeking with a roughneck attitude. But don’t
be fooled into thinking that these stars are cheap imitations of U.S. gangsta rappers.
These musicians are far too street-wise to glorify violence in crime-ridden South
Africa. Nor is there a need to inflame race relations after the victory over apartheid.
For today’s youth, the struggle lies in securing a better economic life.
In fact, kwaito producers were the first in the country to launch their own black-owned
record labels. The major companies are now trying to cut in on the scene with their
own kwaito rosters but most of the big names are sitting tight with the original
labels. The genre is a major money-spinner, with leading groups like Bongo Maffin,
TKZee and Boom Shaka releasing albums that clock over 50,000 in sales. If there’s
a sound that represents young South Africa right now, it’s kwaito. M.M.
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South Africa’s legendary
Miriam Makeba raps with a young upstart
 Miriam
Makeba is a living legend, whose music inspired millions in the struggle against
apartheid. Forced into exile for 30 years, Makeba performed for the likes of the
Ethiopian Emperor Haile Selassie, JFK, Fidel Castro and the Pope. Yet on this sunny
South African morning, “Mama Africa” opens her door in Johannesburg to a jittery
journalist and a young upstart, Thandiswa, the lead singer of the kwaito group Bongo
Maffin. Kwaito is a local brew of hip-hop, house and reggae music. Bongo Maffin’s
fame dates back to their 1997 hit version of Makeba’s classic song, “Pata-Pata”.
“She’s young enough to be my granddaughter! What are we going to discuss?” cries
the 68-year-old great-grandmother Makeba. But as soon as Thandiswa walks in, they
embrace.
How did you feel when you first heard Bongo Maffin’s version of “Pata-Pata” in
1997?
Miriam: I was very pleased because when I came back home [from exile], some
people said, “Ah, they’re the oldies!” And here are these very young people, singing
my songs. It also made me happy to see youth still so attached to African music,
especially considering the influence of what they hear on the radio. Honestly, when
you listen to these stations, you don’t know if you’re in Africa or California. Not
just because of the musical content…
Thandiswa: Also from the tone and attitude of the DJs.
Thandiswa, how would you describe kwaito?
Thandiswa: It’s about the energy of the time, post-independence youth expressing
their freedom and excitement about everything being so brand new. Listen to the music
and you’ll find it’s dance-oriented but there is also a very positive vibe in its
energy and message.
Miriam: It’s South Africa’s counterpart to rap. Kwaito has its own way of
spreading a positive message. In our society, we have always passed messages and
expressed ourselves through song. This is why the former government was so scared
of musicians…
Thandiswa, do you feel that young people have a negative attitude towards the
old-school musicians?
Thandiswa: It’s not about negative attitudes, but we didn’t grow up in the
same situation of struggle against apartheid. The only time I remember being stuck
in a situation of revolution was in 1985/86 [a state of emergency was declared as
massive student riots erupted]. A lot of young people know all about the struggle
but they weren’t directly involved.
With the new freedom in 1994 [the first free elections], we started “eating” everything
given to us, including stuff from America… Many in the “kwaito generation” began
living in town, disconnected from their grandmothers, parents and cousins.
Miriam: It’s as if kids today don’t realise just how little time has passed
since Mandela was in prison. Around the time of the second national elections in
1999, I heard some young people saying, ‘I’m not going to vote because Mandela didn’t
do this and that and he promised he would.’ I had a serious talk with them: ‘What
did you say? You’re living in towns and attending multiracial schools. There was
a time when your parents and grandparents were being taught under a tree and that
is something you cannot forget.’
Miriam: I’d like to ask you a question, Thandiswa. I’m on a committee to try
to find ways of improving HIV/AIDS education. How can we get the message of prevention
to sink into the minds of this generation?
Thandiswa: I don’t know, Mama. People know about the disease, people know
people who are dying because of it, but the message isn’t clicking.
People are having sex at such a young age. The highest infection rate is among women
between the ages of 15 and 25. At 15, girls can’t make rational decisions about using
a condom, or not going with a lot of boys…
This is why many of the Aids campaigns are using kwaito to push the message through
to the young kids. [Thandiswa and a number of other kwaito stars are spokespeople
for an anti-Aids campaign called, “Love Life”.]
Miriam: And the boys are not so nice. They force their way… When I go on tour,
I’m bombarded with questions like, “What about all the rapes in South Africa?” You
feel embarrassed, hurt and, as a woman, you could kill someone…
Thandiswa, Miriam’s music is known all over the world. Are you aiming to do the
same with Bongo Maffin?
Thandiswa: Yah definitely! We would like to become an international band.
Miriam: I hope it happens because one day the Mama Makebas will be gone. During
a UK music festival in April, another major kwaito group,TKZee, was singing outside
while I was playing indoors. It’s nice to see the different generations together…
It shows we’re not standing still.
Rebel without a pause?
Jeroen de Kloet, Ph.D.
student at the Amsterdam School of Social Science Research.
‘Bad boy’ Cui Jian, China’s first long-haired rock icon, has pulled off another musical
coup by becoming the first artist to adapt hip-hop to the mainland. His hoarse voice
has long signified anger, confusion and pain, especially during the 1989 student
revolt when his hit single, “Nothing to my Name”, became a veritable anthem. Despite
the government’s attempts to silence his voice by routinely banning his concerts,
Cui Jian carries on with the rapper’s staccato precision.
Cui Jian fired the first hip-hop salvo with the single “Get Over That Day”, which
appeared on a compilation album entitled Born on the First of July featuring rock
bands from Hong Kong, Taiwan and Mainland China reflecting on the handover of Hong
Kong to Chinese rule in 1997. While other groups celebrated “Chineseness”, Cui Jian
questioned the wisdom of the state and its people: “If love suddenly blossoms between
my sister [Hong Kong] and me [Chinese youth], how are you [the mother] going to deal
with it?” Clearly put, what if mainland youth falls for Hong Kong’s capitalist culture
and rejects the political status quo?
Musicians, record companies, journalists and academics often construct rap as the
countercultural sound of the 1990s. Of course, this aura of rebellion neatly hides
the sexism and materialism so often displayed in the music. But in the case of Cui
Jian, rap works. His most recent album, an eclectic mix of rap and rock that has
sold over 400,000 copies (not including pirated versions), questions the nationalism
and materialist Zeitgeist of post-1989 China.
To interpret Cui Jian as a political rebel fits in a little too neatly with the West’s
prevalent view of China as an overtly politicized space. The desire to see dominant
ideologies subverted indirectly celebrates liberal Western society. However, perhaps
Cui Jian has become more of a rebel against the people than for the people. As China’s
new generation starts feasting on the fruits of economic reforms, Cui Jian confides:
“This is a time when people don’t believe in anything. The new generation just wants
to have fun, to be cool, to have good [sex] and to have money …” Will Cui Jian be
upstaged in the “New China”, where people care more about economics than politics?
No matter, the rebel raps on:
We are so focused on making money that everything will be forgotten (…)
Ha! If you ask me what the next generation will be like;
I’ll give you a straight answer: why should I care?*
*“Idiots” from the album,
The Power of the Powerless, 1998 |
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