Kwaito Evolution

Something strange is happening on the Kwaito sphere, everytime it seems as though Kwaito is dying it re invents itself and rises up much more powerful than before, shinier and fresher than before like a snake shedding its skin in winter. Strange thing is that it does it without the permition of its carriers, its seems to have a life of its own.

The first evolution

The first evolution came when as usual Kwaito was dying,boring and monotonous about the time when a new radio station called Yfm was being founded. Kwaito was invaded by its parent, house music. The main Dj behind this was Dj fresh who came from Botwana as a student and relaunched the House music scene in South Africa in a Major way using Yfm as a platform releasing Fresh House flavor Volume tracklist compilations made of of mainly overseas acts.

This caused a major defection of kwaito followers to house. I remember a fellow student at the then Technikon Witwatersrand now UJ passionately and solemnly saying " Keyaytlohela kwaito seketlo mamela House" (Im leaving kwaito for House). Everyone went crazy over it, after all people were discovering the real roots of kwaito as if kwaito was there to tantalise their taste buds for the real thing.

The strangest twist at what I noticed as the first death of Kwaito was that it was resurected by a group called trompies who took a local House track called strawberry gum gum(pronounced goom goom as in the the sound of the base and drum) produced by a guy from Botswana called skizo and chanted over in in a typical kwaito fashion with a female vioce singing behind typical of the foundations of Kwaito. It was an instant Hit causing a frenzy and crazy over it that track caused goose bumps as it played. I personally think the youth was subconsciously ecstatically celebrating the resurrection of kwaito.

The twist in the tail was that kwaito legend Oskar Mdlongwa who himself came from Zimbabwe was also working at YFM and was not far from the thick of things. His loyalty to house music surfaced, had a local house show and released his Oskido-Church House Grooves. They were not the only ones, Yfm became the breeding ground of local house Djs making and playing compilations at events such as Dj Sbu, and Dj cleo etc while  fresh continued discovering local house Dejays such as Euphonic and ken from his drive time radio slot competitons and YFM inviting big acts like Little Luois Vega at a venue called electric workshop in Newtown Johannesburg South Africa.

The second ressurection of Kwaito I must say was unawares caused by the local House revolution rooted in YFM and significantly when they invited Little Louis Vega. This caused a craze like never before and a local evolution of House where local Dejays the BIG 5 formed an association. I remember them discussing Louis Vega perfomance and comparing it to the local scene as if they were taking Notes. what was weird was how for the first time the realised that the local South African Black audince was driven crazy by his comparatively fast  paced tempo as dejay Oscar explicitly expressed his observation on that secondly Oscar noted Louis Vega bough loads of cd's from a local rural traditional Zulu genre called maschandi which was laced with heavy traditional Zulu accented rich base lines. This caused oscar to appreciate started making local House and feating trational Zulu acts such as Ihashi Elimhlophe.

What they didnt notice is that by redoing an elevated version of local House they were re laying the foundation for inventing Kwaito unawares because the roots of Kwaito were those of Local artists emulating House acts and comming up with their own flavour and culture. Kwaito was never intentionally invented it was always an expression of a local culture in a frame of time.

Up until this time there were musically rich House acts who never regarded themselves as Kwaito musicians and many more mushrooming like a skin rash they called themselves house dejays. The revolution of the bedroom studio even made things worse accelerating music production like a plague. With just a pentium 4 and bootlegged software such as fruity loops or qbase local house producers multiplied like a rash.

The Third resurrection of Kwaito.

While Johanessburgers called themselves House dejays local acts in Durban adapted much faster made local house beat with typical kwaito chants characterised by a fast beat. This was typically called Durban Kwaito and has a flavour like none other. In the meantime die hard Kwaito producers who stuck to the slow late 80's and 90's tempo died a hard kwaito death.

Durban Kwaito took over like a Jumpo Jet for 3 years with no competition, monopolised by DjTirra Afrotainment working with his musical team and the BigNuzz trio keeping it typically Kwaito. The irony behind Big Nuz is that they started as a local HipHop act. This was a typical rebirth of Kwaito similar to its birth in Johanessburg made up of house, hiphopers and vocalist with other strong local genre influences.

These guys has no competition even legends like Oscar struggled to keep up and was forced to start discovering and working with acts from Durban such as Professor and Joburg Trompies partnering with the tzozo's and Pepelepe's. Everytime they did that they made a hit. This was the new wave of kwaito dominated by Durban with music videos on the beach comparing to music video on the pool when kwaito first started in the 90's. In the same pool versus beach comparison Durban kwaito dwarfed and dominated the local kwaito industry.

As I speak Durban Kwaito is stagnating mainly because it is dominated by one plater, Dj Tirra and his crew and secondly kwaito alway falls victim to being stigmatized. When a producer or record label finds a hit formula he will stick to it like glue and it will be the only style he masters. When this happens you know its the beginning of the end.

The Joburg resurection (The fourth resurrection)

Meanwhile in Joburg House dejays are slowly floor crossing to Kwaito and making fabulous beats converting rappers to kwaito chanters and undiscovered talented singers to house vocalist mainly groomed in Christian churches. That being said the biggest platform to groom live instrumentalist and vocalist was still Christian churches and many talented Christian youth would do sessions for Kwaito acts.

By that time Big house Djs like Dj Cleo and Dj Sbu groomed by YFM had become dual dejays doing both kwaito and house at the end kwaito won as they too influenced kwaito with new house beat flavour and sound texture while keeping the local feel.

Djay fistas is another Local House Dj who in an attempt to make his own music made a different version of kwaito.

As I type this another legend called Dj Ganyani fro Johanessburg who has been doing house before Kwaito was born kept to the streets while keping it pure house and has recently been responsible for hair raising music has started collaborating with local chanters and kwaito vocalist trio like BigNuz and very recently Busiswa are taking kwaito to another level. It is important to note that both Ganyani and Busiswa who as I speak are smashing charts do not consider themselves Kwaito musicians. Busiswa is is a poet come hiphopper Ganyani a House Dj  but strangely enough their collaboration  has produced a kwaito track at an unprecedented level. How So? Ganyani has started making His own local House after Twenty Years of house dejaying but he wont be able to shake off his Shangan music roots that easily. On his track Xigubhu besides the fact tha the vocals are and lyrics are shangaan you can also feel the Shangan tempo and staccato on the synth though savored with an international texture and style. Busiswa's voice, hiphopish chants, lyrics and local language (in this case Shangan) on a local house track just spell kwaito all over it. Kwaito has be reinvented the same way it was invented.

Another dj is Dejay Kent whom I am blessed to say I know personally considers himself a house dj and producer but unaware by virtue of him producing his own local house has stepped into the Kwaito arena and will soon be drawn into the Kwaito scene. Why do I say this. Its is impossible for a person raised and living in South Africa to emulate overseas music without expressing who he really is. It is impossble to be someone else. He has just launched a CD this weekend and I can wait to analyse it.

Dejay Oscar so far has become the only Dj who have stood the evolutionary test. I strongly believe thats its because Oscar entered the industry as a business person more than a Dejay. The does not fall into the sentimental trap that most musicians become victim to. He knows that identifying trends is important, not only can he identify trends he can identify trend setters as trend carriers, sign them to his label get them to do all the work while having them as featured Artist on his album.

Black Motion another house group that decided to keep it local tribal started chanting on it and produced kwaito.

The thing is local house is like no other house in the world and it ends up becoming Kwaito. Kwaito was as a matter of fact a  local name for overseas house that became a local style fused with many other genres. House music is still the basis of Kwaito and local genres and style the differentiation.

This is the formula for making a great Kwaito track. Get a local House Dejay to produce a track , a HipHop act in vernacular local language and local vocalist in local vernacular language. By virtue of them keeping it local they instinctively and subconsciously bring in all the local influences making something unique that no one can emulate or put a finger on. Kwaito is a South African Club experience. If the Kwaito was the melting pot of the South African dance music scene House music would be the pot and rap the handle. What you find in the pot is Kwaito.

As former Cabin Crew member for South African Airways I have had the priviledge to witness the prominence of Kwaito in local clubs in Perth Australia and Namibia I have seen kwaito  in a store called vynyl junkies in Soho London. Apparently you can find kwaito clubs in many other parts of the world where you can find a South African immigrant community. The ability to use house as a carrier has made Kwaito palatable to the global audience.

Kwaito doesnt die it simply evolves and metamorphoses.

kwaito revolution

Kwaito is a genre of of revolutionary music that began in black town ships of South Africa around Joburg (johanessburg) in the early eighties influenced mainly by house music and then branched off to become a genre of its own.

My first encounter of kwaito was when I was 11yrs old in 1987 at Mbulelo's (friends) place in Pimville Soweto, infact it was a Chicago house track. I had never heard anything like it before , just instruments playing and a man ocassionaly ,calmly and slowly repeating the same thing in the back ground. I then asked him what it was and he said kwaito.

Kwaito infact was the name we used to describe house music and later used it for our own version of house.

Apparently house music was music largely listened to by a gang called the kwaitos because they were" kwaai", I would not be supprised because personally ancountered it most times being listened to by amaginsa(car thieves) amagrootman (big brothers) and wannabees driving gusheshes(BMW's) and wearing spoties(floppy hats).

Local then unknown artists such as Arthur mafokate, Oskar Mdlonga, Mduduzi masilela, Joe Nina, group such as Trompies, Mashamplane and many others began emulating this music in their home studios and playing them in clubs and that emmulation came out as a different sound.

This sound later grew to absorb other genres including traditional South African music types, hip-hop and basicaly anything that sounded good to the ear.

This music was so influential and became an expression of joy for the newly attained freedom in the early nineties with the release of political prisioners including Nelson Mandela, the unbanning of liberation parties including the ANC and the erradication of apartheid leading to the first democratic elections in 1994.

This was then the begining of the kwaito revolution.


COMPARISONS BETWEEN KWAITO and HIP-HOP.

KWAITO compares to hip-hop is a sence that they are an expression of life in the gheto's/ townships and both have chants in them they are both flexible and can incorporate any genre in them but however kwaito artists clearly differetiate themselves from hiphop and do no see kwaito as hiphop.

Infact in SOUTH AFRICA, South african hip-hop and kwaito are categorised as two different genres that are infact rivalries where kwaito musicians and followers accuse South African hip-hopers as unorigional and AMERICAN IMITATIONS.

Differences between kwaito and are as many as there are similarities ranging from dress codes, lingo and beats to chants and phillosophy respectively.

As a South African born and raised in the kwaito era, my knowledge of kwaito is not based on a distant research from books but on personal experience. In short I did not read about kwaito, I lived it, listened to it, bought it and danced to it from the time it was undeground until now. Before Arthur "vuvuzela" Mafukate sold triple platinum when it was still called township dance by the upmarket white record companies in ivory towers who knew nothing of its origions.

In later blogs I will post photoes to spice up the blog, explain its dynamics that no researcher somewhere in europe or america can explain, infact they will need my experience to add to their knowledge.

THE ECONOMICS

One kwaito producer of note who is a co owner of one of the most renowned kwaito record labels named KALAWA JAZZME Oscar "warona" started as a street vendor selling boerevors( grilled sausage) outside one dance club in Joburg when a dj did not pitch up he voluntered to dj that night and was recomended since.He then started making recordings of his sessions and started selling them (like grilled sausages) and that was the begining of his multimillion rand career as a record label owner and producer.

Carachterised by its guirila marketing tactics kwaito is (as far as im concerned) the first successfull black empowerment schemes in South Africa producing self made millionaires overnight