Bubblegum Club

Tag: rapper

  • Turn Up The Volume and Queer The Dancefloor

    Turn Up The Volume and Queer The Dancefloor

    A few years ago, I wrote about what I called the Somzification of the South African queer identity. The idea is premised on Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie’s idea of the danger of the single story, the notion that we risk erasing essential identifiers of people’s lives or people themselves if we relax into telling a one-dimensional side of their story. The idea that being gay in this country is to be like Somizi.

    This isn’t Somizi’s fault by any stretch of the imagination. As matter of fact, South African queer people have a lot to thank him for. Normalisation is a term that’s often frowned upon in queer circles, but for the purposes of this argument, it’s important to say that Somizi’s high profile, unashamed existence made it so that there was at least some semblance of a departure point in black homes across the nation. A black child can say “gay” and their mother, father, sister or brother would have at least one lens through which they could engage with the conversation.

    But there was also 3Sum, the original queer vocal group who became famous overnight for their flamboyant presentation and their art. And there was also the nation’s biggest soapie, Generations, which inspired articles like one from the City Press titled “Storm over TV gay kiss” in 2009 when its newly introduced gay couple, Jason and Senzo locked lips for the first time.

    What was necessary as an introductory phase by those forebears has now inspired a multiplicity of identities under the LGBTIQ+ umbrella. There are so many, I’ve resolved to calling them the Alphabet community or simply the queers. The beauty in this is that it’s meant that the current generation are tackling identity in ways unique to their individual stories — and through music.

    They call themselves, Mr Allofit, Gyre, DJ Phatstoki and Tiger Maremela — and this isn’t even an exhaustive list. If you will ignore the complexities around the term, we can get away with calling it a born free generation of queer artists finding their place in the national canon of musical artists. Their freedom wasn’t free of course. It was earned by the resistance of their forebears.

    This kind of freedom is what DJ Phatstoki sees whenever they play a set at Pussy Party. “You get on the dancefloor and people are really dancing like how they wanna do it. The energy feels different,” they say. The Pussy Party gig came about after Fela Gucci of FAKA put in a word for her with Colleen Balchin of Broaden a New Sound. Phatstoki had begun making a name for themselves by uploading mixes to SoundCloud. After months of contemplation and convincing from Phatstoki’s close friend, Colleen finally reached out to her.

    “I’ll forever be thankful to uGucci because I was doing that ‘no one really cares thing’, feeling really unimportant and just putting it online assuming that when I have six listens I can count, okay, it’s probably my brother, my sister,” they remember. “Sometimes as a young black queer person, you don’t have the strength to kick the door open that hard.” And the door opened all the way for them to the point where Phatstoki now helps organise Pussy Party along with Colleen, and she’s Sho Madjozi’s DJ.

    At any given Pussy Party event, you’re likely to find Tiger Maremela enjoying the extents of their freedom on the dancefloor. The Internet artist’s work diagnoses the net’s ability to create a go-to space for queer, and particularly trans bodies, to feel free. They recently brought this to life with the Soundscapes of a War Zone live performance at the Hive in Braamfontein. By combining music, memefication and portraiture, the vast space of the Hive felt like its own social media timeline; the movement of bodies as pieces of content all free to be the most actualised versions of themselves.

    “A lot of the lingo and phrases that we use often and things that have gained popularity are really inspired by queer culture or by stan culture, by black queer Internet culture. It’s definitely had an influence,” Tiger explains. Phatstoki knows the value of this culture that’s been created online. “A tweet of something you’ve been thinking [about] for years has got 17k retweets — it’s like I’m not alone.”

    For Tiger, “the problem is all these voices aren’t being amplified and that’s part of the work” that their Internet art answers to. “So that’s why lists like [this cover story] are important because they amplify people that potentially have the answers of how do we fix this.”

    Gyre sees the Internet as a valuable resource to keep themselves educated on those who came before them, which ultimately feeds into their work. “I like to do it in my imagery and the way I portray myself in performance. It’s informed by so many different people.” Some of those people include 3Sum and Somizi, but for this rapper, the definition of queer has long been an identifier for various bodies.

    “In my head I’m thinking which gay artists am I looking back at and I’m like well [they don’t] need to be gay,” Gyre explains. “There’s LGBTQI+. People that I look up to are Brenda Fassie and Lebo Mathosa and the world will never bring it up, but we all know that they were queer.”

    With Gyre’s Queernomics mixtape, the framing of the queer identity was pushed to its limits. A track like “Ikunzimalanga” defies common perceptions of masculinity by Gyre taking on the title of a queer Shaka Zulu. “Black Jesus” does a similar subversion of binaries while tracks like “Eat My Ass” and “Premium Bottom” are spliced in to add the gender fluid dimension needed to close the loop.

    It’s no wonder they’ve found so many collaborative opportunities with Mr Allofit. The androgynous rapper’s own mixtape, 5 to Mainstream,problematises the idea of gender altogether by aggressively driving the listener towards a utopian world where, as they say, “music has no gender.”

    Consider “Eat Da Beat”. These niggas look at me from the back / Think I’m a chick / Hit the front, homie it’s lit / Got a dick. Though it gets them “trending” (their term for catching attention from onlookers) while thrifting in downtown Joburg, they understand the time and place we’re in.

    “It’s a born free season. We’re people who are non-conformist, people who are born in not much of a struggle — we have different problems in this era,” Mr. Allofit says, “A lot more people are being free. A lot more people are doing their own kind of freedom.”

    The collective efforts of all four artists is shaping room for access and understanding that queer identities exist within a wide spectrum. Phatstoki can both play and sit at the decision-making table of Pussy Party and be Sho Madjozi’s DJ. Tiger Maremela can question the warzone that is their lived experience via Internet art and live performance. Gyre doesn’t have to fear claiming the Zulu nation’s proudest figure of masculinity. And Mr Allofit has the confidence to preach their androgyny manifesto no matter where they go.

    For these artists, the hope is to ultimately make work in a world where their sexuality isn’t the primary focal point but that the story creates the buy-in. “Can we not make it about our sexuality? Can we not start competing with everyone [of other non-queer sexual identities]? Can we not be introduced as a separate category?” Mr Allofit asks. Gyre isn’t too concerned though: “I believe existence is resistance so I don’t need to do much to disrupt the space. I exist and I disrupt the space.”

    There’s hope. At least we have Pussy Party, and Tiger’s Internet art and Gyre and Mr Allofit’s discography on Apple Music. And then there’s FAKA who just soundtracked Versace’s SS18 show, and Nakhane who got a shout out from Elton John and is selling out shows across Europe. The landscape is shifting and there are more options than when we just had Somizi and 3Sum. To me that sounds like a true born free South African music landscape.

    Credits:

    Photography and styling: Jamal Nxedlana

    Makeup: Kristina Nichol

    Hair by Nikiwe Dlova

    Photography and styling assistant: Lebogang Ramfate

    Fashion sourced from Marianne Fassler archives.

     

  • Tyler Mitchell’s Candid Lens and Raw Depictions of Youth sets him apart as a young creative

    Tyler Mitchell’s Candid Lens and Raw Depictions of Youth sets him apart as a young creative

    A photographic and filmic dexterity finding its nucleus in real life experience. Candid portraits that remain in cognitive thought. A stylistic virtue that comes across as haphazard play.

    Tyler Mitchell is a filmmaker and photographer from Atlanta currently based in Brooklyn, New York. A recent film graduate from NYU, his venture into photography was prompted by a skater friend’s introduction to a Canon 7D.

    With his work coming full circle his lens has been graced by the presence of Jaden Smith and Kevin Abstract. Collaborating with Abstract has quickly set him apart as a filmmaker to watch. Filming the rapper with pink hair in a brooding gaze, Tyler used an underground club as the backdrop for ‘Hell/Heroina‘ released in 2014 and made a satirical music video titled ‘Dirt‘ for Brockhampton that was led by Abstract.

    A career-defining moment in the young creative’s life was the release of his photography book, El Paquete (his first self-published book). In Havana, Cuba, Tyler aimed to remove himself from that which is familiar to him. The end product of the 30 rolls of film used and developed is an arresting body of work taking the shape of a publication. Within its pages is reflected the raw energy and youth of an area on the verge of digital advancement. El Paquete gained traction from publications such as Dazed and i-D and quickly skyrocketed the young talent’s photographic work, cementing him as a prominent creative within the photographic landscape. Since then, Tyler has exhibited at the 2018 Aperture Summer Open in New York.

    Tyler’s work reflects rawness and honesty. His practice cannot be boxed into a specific set of aesthetic values as he plays with both shadow and shadow-less representations, saturated and desaturated stylings. What remains true in his work is its candid, easy-going nature that wraps around your mind as you see individuals depicted in intimate gazes and pensive thought. The young creative’s craft is advanced and his career is soaring at a considerably young age and seeing where his work takes him next will be a blast I’m sure.

    For more of his work visit his website.

     

  • Richi Rich is bringing Alex to the World

    Richi Rich is bringing Alex to the World

    Soweto-born, but raised in South Africa’s oldest township, Alexandra, the young rapper known as Richi Rich has been active as a rapper since 2010 when he was part of YunGunz crew alongside Suup Zulu and Hip Nautic Sean. “We all were different, so we all chose to go our individual ways and do different stuff, but we were still going to support each other,” explains Richi Rich.

    As a solo artist Richi Rich has released three mixtapes and an EP, most recently dropping the ‘NORTHGOMORA MIXTAPE’. With Alexandra, or Alex as it’s called, on the border of ‘the North’ aka Sandton, the title alludes to the two worlds which Richi occupies. “I’ve been to the North, I’ve been to Alex. I’m where the suburbs and the hood meet.”

    Having found hip-hop at an early age, Richi Rich describes himself as an influencer in his circle of friends, introducing them to sounds such as G-Unit when it first came out. In terms of influences on his sound he holds The Notorious B.I.G. and Okmalumkoolkat in high regard. “When I saw Okmalumkoolkat and the ‘Sebenza’ song that changed the whole perspective of music for me. (To) actually create South African hip-hop. People in America don’t want to hear what they do. They want to hear something new, something from South Africa, something from Africa. So I feel like we should push that.”

    For Richi Rich creating something new isn’t just about the music he makes but everything that surrounds it too, from the fashion to the slang. It’s a lifestyle. “We’ve created something new. It’s not like we took something from someone and just carried on doing it. Everything is new. Because we’re young people. We’re trying to grow into becoming superstars, we’ve evolved like crazy.”

    While Richi Rich is focused on originality, he acknowledges the influence Alex has had on him and his aesthetic. “The influence comes from Alex. What we say, how we live, what we do and how we dress, most of the influence comes from where we come from. Being in the hood you learn a whole lot of stuff. Life lessons. People giving you advice.”

    Ultimately, Richi Rich is trying to show people a side of Alex they might not be familiar with. “I feel like that’s what makes me special. I don’t believe in everybody sounding the same. Like Youngsta, you can tell that he’s from Cape Town. That makes him special. It makes him more interesting; you want to listen to him more, you want to learn more about Cape Town, where he comes from. So I feel like it does make me special. Me being from Alex and bringing Alex to the world.”

    Richi Rich hopes that people enjoy his music, but also learn something from it too. “When you listen to my music I want you to learn something. Not just come out of it like that’s good. When you’re finished with my mixtape I want it to be that you’ve learnt something from Richi. I want you to take knowledge from me, what I’ve learnt in the hood.”

  • Taxan – About That ‘Kite Life’

    Taxan – About That ‘Kite Life’

    Hip Hop is often seen as a music of aggression and raw materialism, but the culture has always had a more abstract, psychedelic side. When I was a teenager, artists like Kool Keith, MF Doom or even Outkast transported their fans to other realms of consciousness. And in the last decade the music has only become more surreal, with the rise of icons like Young Thug and the wild experimentation being conducted on the internet. Just look at a recent hit like Trippie Redd’s ‘Dark Knight Dummo‘, a lysergic sprawl of weird beats and the chorus “I don’t know what planet I’m on”.

    Other planets are a key interest of Joburg based rapper Taxan Greezy, whose nom de plume speaks to his fascination with celestial beings. The cover art for his new single ‘Kite Life’, even features an iconic little green man. The track (produced by deKiller’Clown) features the rapper, who also records under the name ET, dropping excited wordplay over fragmented beats. ‘Kite Life’ is a song which appears to hover on the verge of chaos, but soon reveals its internal logic. For Taxan “everything is placed randomly but comes together perfectly”. And the collaboration with deKiller’Clown is another chance to spotlight the work of their collective, Indiegoat Clan.

    Taxan’s main focus is on pushing this experimental moment in hip hop forward, promising to “never stick to one subgenre or make music for current trends” while “trying to send a good message and switch it up”. The song tells a story of self-realisation: “we should always follow our hearts, don’t let anyone clip your wings and when they do remind them you are still high like a kite! Don’t follow any structures or systems created by society. Create your own ideology of what’s perfect for you. Lastly, don’t do anything for the hype or the likes. ‘Cause it’s momentary but kite life is a frequency that lasts forever. Basically it means stops letting fear of society hold you back, flourish”.

    Taxan also has a music video for the song in the works, with an upcoming solo tape named Chronicles of Xannith to follow. With their free thinking approach, both he and the Indiegoat Clan are poised to fly to the highest reaches of SA rap.

  • Converse One Star // For those who live by their own rules

    Converse One Star // For those who live by their own rules

    Converse fans are well aware that the Chuck Taylor All Star is the brand’s iconic silhouette. However, for those who appreciate the anti-hero, the Converse One Star encapsulates the spirit of those who operate against the rhythm, living fearlessly on the edge. Launched in 1974, and built for the basketball court, the sneakers were pulled from the market a year later. When brought back to the shelves in the 90s, the sneakers were associated with grunge and skater sentiments – becoming a statement for those communicating anti-fashion. The One Star has had waves of appearances and has evolved since its inception, with subculture quickly latching onto its ability to capture their aura of defiance. Those who wear the One Star embrace its history and understand that it speaks to their own journey – never asking for approval, and acting in their own way.

    In celebration of the One Star resurgence this and its latest look as part of Converse’s Spring 2018 collection, Converse shines the light on four South African creatives who choose to live by their own rules.

    Moonchild Sanelly – Musician

    What does Converse mean to you?

    Street culture.

    How did you have to fight for your place in the SA music industry?

    By not listening to anyone who had an opinion about what I believe in and staying true to myself. By not being pressured by material things and never-ending bills. Fear is not in my vocabulary. I am a fighter!

    How important is it to find an individual, authentic voice as a musician?

    Image is everything. Taking it seriously is a part of your brand responsibility.

    How do you continue to push boundaries as an artist?

    By being unapologetically myself because I am me! And there’s nothing like me.

    Seth Pimentel – illustrator

    How do you construct your illustrative practice to operate outside of the box?

    I wish I honestly knew. I guess things just happen. I’d go on the rant about being overwhelmed by the creative process and feeling what I create, to the point where I embody it. But that’s just a mundane answer. I don’t think I can do this question justice.

    What drives your unapologetic approach to image creation?

    I guess my own desire to remain myself in the chaos of everything. The older I’m getting the less ashamed I’m starting to feel about my proclivities.

    What are the ways that you have built a creative signature as an artist?

    I really don’t know. I guess this weird sense of consistency. It’s easy to get devoured by the relentless waves of other styles and approaches. But I guess sticking to yourself, finding inspiration from other artists, learning from them, and then creating from what you’ve learnt helps you find yourself. Damn, that was a cliche´ answer.

    Do you see yourself as an anti-hero?

    Yeah, well I never really belonged anywhere. Felt like this my whole life. Still do. I guess I kinda like to think that I epitomize the idea of a Pariah. One of my favourite musicians Aesop Rock has a line that goes “Stepped inside a club like a statue crying blood. Dance floor scattered, staff asked me why I’d come.” A good summary of what it was like as a teenager. Weird how things go now.

    Lorenzo Plaatjies – illustrator

    How do you defy the norm?

    I think I defy the norm through my work –  I’m an artist. But I don’t own an isle or a studio. I don’t use paper, unless I’m printing. Neither do I touch a pencil, to be honest. I work with what’s in my pocket on the go. I work on my phone. Creating paintings wherever I am: on a bus, on the sidewalk, with the homies, wherever. I don’t let norms and stereotypes define how I execute or create.

    How do you translate this attitude into you work?

    I translate it more into the way I work than my work itself. My work is about wonder and beauty, but I don’t let traditional methods or how the status quo do things limit me. I’m not afraid to do things differently.

    How do you feel Converse resonates with you and your practice?

    I think Converse and I resonate well. Converse is a brand I always felt pioneered new waves in creativity, and I’m here to do the same. A Converse One Star sneaker almost suits any fit – it’s adaptable, and I feel the same about myself.

    How do you push yourself to take your practice further?

    I always push myself because I feel nothing I create is ever enough and I hope it stays that way. I’m constantly chasing new goals and an almost frightening vision.

    Siya Ngena – Rapper and one half of Champagne69

    What drove you to step into the SA music scene?

    It really happened by chance. William and I were working on a mockumentary of Braamfontein culture and we started to work on the score and we later put that out and it garnered a lot more attention than we expected, and we took it seriously from then on.

    How does Converse fit into your personal style?

    The designs and colour vary from one to the other so it adds a distinct but simple flavour to every fit, even if it’s the same fit with a different shoe.

    How important is it for you that what you wear represents your attitude towards life and your music?

    To me it’s a necessity. I always try to find a balance between style and comfort. Music and fashion are parallels and I treat them as such. Right now though, I must add, I’m not even in my final form.

    What are the ways in which you are fearlessly constructing your own voice?

    I’m a big fan of anime and gaming culture, and that inspires my lyrics, aesthetics and overall energy. Some people even say I look like an anime character and I’ll carry that energy with me forever.

  • Jlin- Infinity and Simplicity

    Jlin- Infinity and Simplicity

    Jlin‘s Black Origami was widely hailed as the one of the albums of 2017, with publications from Pitchfork to Mixmag featuring it high on their year-end lists. The second album from the US producer is a blend of visceral thrills and cerebral discipline, with pounding beats running into stretches of beautiful ambience. The album manages to be at once hyperactive and delicate, a creative tension which makes the songs reverberate in your ears for days.

    Intriguingly, the standout, penultimate track ‘Never Created, Never Destroyed’ features guest vocals from Cape Town’s own Dope Saint Jude. Jlin pitches the local rapper’s voice into a memorising loop, conveying a sense of strident power. (And fittingly, this cinematic track was featured on a recent episode of Donald Glover’s Atlanta).

    Jlin is herself from Gary, Indiana, a steel mill town most famous for being the birthplace of Michael Jackson. Her earlier production was bracketed with the Footwork genre, a vibrant style of House pounding out of the nearby city of Chicago. In 2015, she dropped the intense debut album Dark Energy. This futuristic collection was named album of the year by cult UK magazine The Wire and won the admiration of electronic legend Aphex Twin.

    For her sophomore effort, she stripped her music to the core of rhythm and movement, with a laser focus on finding the very heart of experimental dance. As she described it in a press statement, “the simple definition of origami is the art of folding and constructing paper into a beautiful, yet complex design. I chose to title the album Black Origami because, like Dark Energy, I still create from the beauty of darkness and blackness. The willingness to go into the hardest places within myself to create, for me means that I can touch the Infinity“.

    In Japan, the origami discipline sees its practitioners build incredibly sophisticated shapes from simple squares of paper. As her album title suggestively hints, Jlin is bringing the same discipline into experimental electronic music, raising sonic vistas from the raw clay of percussion and synthesiser. Black Origami triumphantly heralds her arrival as a visionary artist.

  • Producer Lay Lay is on the decks

    Producer Lay Lay is on the decks

    Much like the printing press, the internet has democratised knowledge, spreading information that was once only available to a limited number of people all over the globe, simultaneously connecting people to each other. For those with a desire to express themselves through music, there has been no better time than now to learn how to make and share it. A product of this wave of innovation is Cape Town based Lamla Bungane, better known as Lay Lay.

    Starting out as a rapper in primary school, Lay Lay became a producer out of necessity as money was tight, and he and his crew couldn’t afford to buy beats. With production software obtained from a friend and online tutorials showing him the basics, Lay Lay taught himself how to make his own beats and record within a year.

    A member of DAT Clique alongside Dj Fabo, Day Uno, Black Magic and Tony Neetch, Lay Lay has also worked with numerous up-and-coming artists on his first EP ‘Say More’ and on his mixtape ‘Lay Lay On The Dex‘. The 808-laden, trap-heavy release featured the likes of Cozmik, Chingatime and Broke Boy$. 2017 also saw him release his debut album, ‘Fake Love’, which sees him experimenting with more atmospheric sounds.

    Currently working on a follow-up mixtape, ‘Lay Lay On The Dex Volume 2’, Lay Lay will continue to collaborate, with Blaq Slim, Chingatime, Amilca Mezarati and DAT Clique confirmed for the release. His team have also released the music video for DAT Clique’s ‘Police’, from his first mixtape, directed by Motion Billy.

    When it comes to his music Lay Lay describes himself as an artist who is just trying to share his own journey. “I believe everyone has a story to tell. I’m a storyteller, I write about the things that I go through on the daily. The things I face in life.”

    Have a listen to his latest release, ‘Energy’, below.

  • Robin Thirdfloor is More Than a Musician

    I first came across Robin Thirdfloor in 2016 when I was booking acts for Outland, an ambitious music festival that was fun for the one time that it happened. I was looking for young hip-hop acts who were doing cool things but hadn’t really been on festival lineups. Sthembelo Dlamini, our hip-hop plug at Durban is Yours, recommended a few acts but 2 in particular stood out, ByLwansta and Robin Thirdfloor. Both these cats have since carved unique paths for themselves in the industry and have achieved impressive feats, both locally and internationally, which says something for Sthem’s ear for talent.

    This is about Robin, but you should definitely google ByLwansta if you’re not familiar yet.

    At the time, Robin was promoting his Sounds Empty Pockets Make EP, a homage to old school hip-hop that was all about being young and broke, which is always relatable. On the EP, he told the story of a young rap dude with a fake gold chain who just wanted to be like Biggie and Pac and to do his mama proud.

    I’m pretty sure his mama is proud by now, and if she’s not, she should be. I mean, off that EP the young rapper went from Umlazi to SXSW, which I’d consider to be a pretty big deal. Coming off of that career high, Robin dropped his ‘Bhotela’ EP, exclusively to Deezer thanks to locking down an ambassadorship with the streaming platform.

    Bhotela is vastly different to S.E.P.M and Robin seems like a vastly different person from the kid he was in 2015. There’s more confidence in everything he does now and Robin seems more certain of the path he’s walking. While S.E.P.M was an ode to old school hip-hop from the States, Bhotela is an ode to Umlazi and draws from kwaito and hip-hop to deliver something more distinct.

    Every time I chat to the young rapper and entrepreneur (he has a side hustle called Somdanger Concepts), he always has new questions about the industry and how to navigate it. He’s constantly calculating his next move and putting in the time and effort to make sure that everything he does is just right. From visual aesthetics to sponsorship proposals, Robin makes sure that everything is on wax which is why I don’t doubt that 2018 will be the year his pockets start jingling.

  • Loui Lvndn: Chasing the Princess

    With his debut album ‘Your Princess is in another Castle’, Johannesburg based artists Loui Lvndn presents a body of work with a clear concept and narrative. On the album the singer, songwriter, rapper, performing artist, visual artist and writer uses the video game character Mario and his repetitive quest to rescue his princess as a metaphor for the search of happiness. “Our character is failing to find this princess and the princess is anything, it’s love, your aspirations, the best version of yourself, success. All of those things,“ notes Loui Lvndn.

    Told in a linear fashion, the album follows the exploits of the main character from a cold-hearted, ego driven place to meeting a girl and bringing her into his life, while slowly falling in love with her, before being overcome with jealousy and insecurity, before losing the her in the lifestyle through which they met and ultimately becoming the person he was before they met again. “With the album I resolved to ending the story with two endings. In one ending the repetitive nature of it seizes once the main character Loui achieves this happiness. He finds it in one. And the other ending is recurring. It’s sometimes about the journey. You revel in the moment and the experience of it all. Sometimes you actually do find it. Which is not to say you lose it and you search again. So I added both endings because there is a duality,“ muses Loui Lvndn.

    The album also sees Loui Lvndn in full control of all aspects, from the art direction, to the narrative and the composition. “This is the first time I got full control over what these melodies were doing. What these compositions were like. So I created everything from scratch. For the first time I think this entire body of work is exactly what I sound like today.“ To add the final touches to the album he worked with London-born, Knysna-based producer Jumping Back Slash. “He helped finesse and refine all of the sounds, make them listenable. But he did a super job because he tuned into the wavelength that I was on and actually even took it a step further.“

    Despite presenting dual outcomes to the narrative on the album Loui Lvndn believes that the search for one’s metaphorical princess is continuous. According to Loui, “success will always take a step forward as I take a step forward. So I don’t personally think I’ll ever find it. No matter how successful I am. I can have success and still be looking for it and I can have love and still be looking for it. It just seems like that sort of play.”

     

     

  • pH, A sound connoisseur expanding the boundaries of urban African music

    Raw X studios is where the magic happens, where pH has produced and recorded some seminal South African works. The esteemed producer dropped his solo effort, From Giyani with Love last year to astounding success. I sat down with him to review his recording career, and delve into the world of a brilliant beatmaker.

    My first interaction with pH was the rapper launching his album at Koolin Out, the city’s premier live hip hop event and showcase. The magic of this moment was palpable in the presentation of his debut. And the performance was incredibly special, offering insight into the rapper’s journey while delivering live energy and raw lyricism.

    From Giyani with Love proved to be a really successful project, with features from Yanga, Reason, Thandiswa and AKA the album offered a range of sounds and stories to connect too. The rapper provided a fresh perspective for hip hop in the country and through identifying himself as Shangaan, from Giyani and using the language in his work, pH made a contribution to cultural pride in his community, a necessary contribution in a country where much ignorance and insecurity abounds around Tsonga people. The album is an excellent introduction into the expansive beats and languid lyricism from this artist. And a follow up is already on the way; D2 is to be dropped sometime this year, and he’s is excited about the progress he’s made as a rapper, finally feeling himself in the medium. pH details the tricky process of finding his voice as a rapper, the dedication and preparation that goes into being able to express yourself in rhythm and poetry.

    from-giyani-with-love

    Lost in Time, is as much a Khuli Chana album as it is a pH production. The two made the album together and through the special musical connection they shared, they made a classic, critically acclaimed album. It produced the hits Tswa Daar, Hape pt 1 and Hazzadaz Move. It went on to be the first hip hop album to win the SAMA for Album of the Year and it projected its protagonists, Khuli and pH into the upper echelons of the music industry. It also introduces pH as a rapper, on Chillin’ the world got to know the voice behind the beats and the confidence from the album pushed him to begin work on his solo effort.

    ‘Once you can create, you should be doing that everyday’, the words of a committed creative, a person consistently pushing their craft and career. A sound connoisseur working to expand the boundaries of urban African sounds. pH’s love of music, pride in his cultural heritage and pure talent comes together in the music that provides references from the continent whilst understanding the universal appeal of homegrown sounds. An artist to watch and appreciate as he continues to create music that holds the tension between the urban and the traditional; a beautiful balancing act.