Bubblegum Club

Tag: new age kwaito

  • Bhubesii- Kobyashi EP

    This release is a psychedelic fun ride through the urban centre of South Africa, from the streets of Soweto to the enclave of Maboneng. Bhubesii raps from the perspective of his Kobayashi alter ego, a stylish trickster on a mission for a good time. The music aims to reinterpret classic kwaito for 2016, with Bhubesii saying that ‘it has a very township wave feel about it. Kobayashi is a new wave tariyana.’ The boisterous title track looks back to the infectious work of Arthur, Mandoza and M’du. But Bhubesii is clearly working in his own lane. For a start, he is a lot more lyrically focused than his minimalist progenitors.  He adopts an impressive amount of languages and idioms, dropping witty punchlines and outrageous boasts.

    The eager embrace of local influences and style set him apart from an often derivative SA hip hop scene. It’s no secret that even talented artists may often expend energy trying to keep up with what’s happening in the US. In the most egregious cases, people will adopt entire fake accents, which isn’t fooling anyone. More subtly, there is pressure to emulate production styles and sonic tricks. Constantly chasing the next big thing is a fool’s errand though, as it always leaves musicians on the back foot.

    So Bhubesii uses the recent South African past to find his own voice.  Tracks like ‘Chankura’ and ‘Zulu Jedi’ mutate and stretch in constant motion. It conveys the sense of a weekend with endless possibilities, spanning the hot spots and dank dives of Gauteng.  Bhubesii also put extra attention into curating his image, with a laudable eye for detail. The cover for the single version of ‘Kobayashi’, has him as a futuristic seer, bringing life to a blighted wasteland. For this EP he has  gone for a witty piece of cover art. In place of the tough guy mask which rappers have adopted in the past, his face is covered by an explosion of flowers. It’s a nicely unexpected touch, which expresses the exuberance of his music.

  • Suup Zulu- Living In The Future Past

    Sibusiso Tshona, aka Suup Zulu, is a young rapper and producer from the township of Alexandra. Over the last year, he has been steadily winning attention with a diverse body of solo tracks, like his debut Uyezwa and various collaborations.

    His production style is simultaneously  contemporary, while also casting an ear back to South Africa’s musical past. Zulu’s growing library of work, catalogued on his Soundcloud page, is  defined by its hypnotic style. Beats are piled on, while disembodied vocal choirs and keyboards spring to life. His vocals cut in like lasers through a dense fog of smoke. It captures the woozy feeling of being in some dank nightclub basement at 3am- both falling asleep and totally wired. Bleary eyed, unsure of what’s real but wanting to keep going anyway.  This mysterious aspect of his works perhaps comes from his exceptionally deep feeling for history. In a short interview he did with The Alex News last year he listed his influences as both the contemporary urban reality of Alex and the Zulu tradition of oral storytelling.  Titles like Gomora Kingdom Comes and Bayete highlight the influence of choral and gospel music on contemporary pop. King Kong Nkalakatha directly connects the 50’s jazz musical with early 2000’s kwaito, bridging half a century of township style.

    His work also highlights how South African musicians have  linked hip hop and electronic music into a compelling local hybrid. It’s only been more recently that US rappers have made this fusion. On Life of Pablo, Kayne built Fade entirely out of vintage house samples, while Danny Brown’s upcoming The Atrocity Exhibition will be released on Warp records, better known as the home of Aphex Twin and Autreche. Supp Zulu shows that this blending has long been a facet of local music. But rather than being some abstract intellectual exercise, his songs are as hazy and alluring as a Highveld sunset.

    https://soundcloud.com/user-197919125/sets/umfana-ka-gogo-the-mixtape

  • Okmalumkoolkat Announces Australia Tour Dates

    10603460_1063572280327805_8463003275543686714_nFutureMfana is headed Down Under! The International Pantsula is on a roll, after a December tour of Europe, uMalume has just announced a quintuplet tour of Australia. The tour kicks of on January 15th and closes on January 24th at the Sydney Music Festival, where he will perform alongside another super talented South African; Black Coffee. OKMKK is joined on road by his frequent collaboraters, Cid Rim and the Clonius, who accompanied him on his Euro Tour as well. Listen to OKMKK’s most recent mixtape, 100kmacassette below.