http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0Vr1nyXu4Ts Stromae seems determined to turn every song on his 2010 album Cheese into a hit. A video like the one above will no doubt help. I've always been surprised by articles digging for his 'Rwandan roots' (e.g. "in Africa, I am considered white"), for in Belgium we just know him as the dude from Alors on Danse (and its hilarious 'making-of' you must have seen by now).

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i3iU5mD_FFE Cape Town-based Driemanskap's 'I will make it' is not new, but the video for the track is. We threw 5 questions to Damian Stephens, founding partner of Pioneer Unit Records, the independent hip hop label to which Driemanskap is signed. He is also a music producer (as Dplanet) and one half of an audiovisual 'band' called Pure Solid (the other half is Anne-Sophie Leens, who directed the video above). How did you end up in Cape Town? I had an opportunity to come to South Africa shortly after the first democratic elections in 1994. I was inspired by the energy and the feeling that anything was possible. There was an incredible feeling of being part of something historic. I felt that I was on the wrong path in London and South Africa represented an interesting opportunity to re-focus my energy on something more positive. I eventually packed up and re-located in 1996. I was amazed at the wealth of musical talent and the passion for hip hop culture I found in Cape Town. I was also shocked at the lack of infrastructure and resources available to help musicians develop their talent. Lack of recording facilities, access to sound engineers, rehearsal spaces and music venues with good quality sound systems. Then there's the lack of support structures in the form of artist managers, promoters, booking agents and so on. There is also very little independent media that is willing to, or capable of, meaningfully covering South African hip hop. Hearing hip hop done in African languages (primarily Afrikaans and isiXhosa) really excited me. After many years of developing relationships with various Cape Town based artists I decided to start the label. I was absolutely certain that some of these artists had the potential to be developed into world class talent. We are passionate about developing artists who understand the cultural significance of representing the reality of life in South Africa, rather than aspiring to mimic the music and the lifestyles promoted by major labels from the US. In terms of the pressure for musicians to make hip hop tailored to a mainstream audience, South Africa is no different from anywhere else in the world. However, unlike Europe and the States, very few people have made a long-term investment in developing and promoting music which focuses on the art. The Cape's hip hop scene has a long, strong and important tradition (especially when it comes to Afrikaans MC's). As an English speaking immigrant, how did you relate to this terrain you encountered? I have always found that hip hop heads anywhere in the world are generally enthusiastic to share their take on the culture. Being around artists and fans, I learned a lot about Cape Town's hip hop history. It wasn't like an anthropological study, I just took it all in organically. I spent many years watching artists perform, seeing the crowd reaction and talking to fans about why they like certain artists. You can tell a lot about an artist by their performance, even if you can't understand the words. If a particular song caught my attention, I would ask the artist what it was about. Direct translations of poetic language are always difficult but having a song deconstructed gives you an amazing insight, as all the cultural references, allegories and metaphors have to be explained. One thing we in the Cape Town hip hop scene have in our favour is the shared struggle to survive in difficult conditions. We don't have any superstar artists who would consider themselves above working with us. On the flip side, I've approached quite a few local musicians who, for whatever reason, have either dropped out of projects or taken so long to do anything that I've given up. I'm sure this happens everywhere in the world though. Sometimes it's actually easier to collaborate with artists from countries with more developed infrastructures and industries - they are more likely to have access to recording facilities and high speed internet for example. I've been lucky enough to work with some exceptional artists in Cape Town so I'm not complaining -- we make it work! Pioneer Unit seems to think one of the ways to overcome this infrastructural deficit is to invest heavily in an online presence. How big a gamble is this, especially remembering what you yourself wrote some time ago (in a different context), pointing to "our limited access to affordable, high-speed internet in South Africa." Which audience do you hope to reach in making intensive use of these social media? Maintaining an online presence is not a huge investment so we don't see it as a gamble. There is increasing access to the internet via smart phones. I read recently that there are now up to 6 million active internet users in South Africa (almost double the number in 2007), thanks to the proliferation of smart phones. We recently created a mobile-friendly version of our website to give cellphone surfers a better experience. There is no doubt these numbers will increase as smart phones become cheaper and people become more aware of the capabilities of their phones. The label has put out some great videos for Ben Sharpa, Rattex, Jaak, and more recently, Cream: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_g5A9vK1RfQ Some of these are being aired on local and national TV (although it took a while for those channels to pick them up). What has been the response to these 'spaza hip hop' videos on a national level? The video for S'phum'eGugs by Driemanskap was aired on Live, which is a prime time show on the national broadcaster SABC1. It's probably the single largest viewership of any music program on TV in South Africa. The reaction was amazing. Driemanskap's Twitter feed went crazy. There were a few common threads through the comments -- people were saying it was great to hear 'real' hip hop again. They were amazed that isiXhosa could sound so good and they were proud to hear truly South African hip hop. Very few people realised that Driemanskap's album actually came out two years ago -- it was like a major revelation to a lot of people. Being played on Live was a major breakthrough. Since then our music has been played on YFM and 5FM -- two major commercial radio stations. For many years it has felt like we were being completely sidelined by the media. A few months prior to the S'phum'eGugs airing on Live, Metro FM (a national broadcaster) turned down Driemanskap's music. Part of the problem is that people are so conditioned to respond to the ubiquitous 'international' sound that their ears aren't tuned into the quality of what we're producing in South Africa. We're very slow to appreciate home-grown talent. South African rappers often see adopting an American accent, the swag, the slang, the visual aesthetic and commercial sound, as a way of accessing mainstream media -- unfortunately their efforts are often rewarded. Do we find independent labels in Johannesburg approaching 'truly South African hip hop' in a similar way, or is Gauteng another country? There's a video being played on TV at the moment featuring a group of South African rappers who are 'swagged-out' in typical MTV music video fashion, and using American accents (or 'twanging' as it's called here). Hearing them proclaim that they are, 'proudly African', always strikes me as slightly ironic. I am not trying to suggest that they aren't proudly African, but it raises interesting questions about the nature of African identity in hip hop. African identity obviously cannot be distilled to such superficial elements as visual styling or accent, but in the broader context of South African music, the wholesale adoption of someone else's culture (visual aesthetic, accent, slang, fashion, subject matter etc) is unique to South African hip hop. If you listen to a typical hip hop show on one of the major radio broadcasters, it's hard to keep in mind that so much of the content was created in South Africa as it's so generically 'international'. Hip hop is a global culture so there are obviously going to be some elements that are shared everywhere in the world. However, it begs the question at which point an artist's cultural identity is lost. We don't believe that you can create great South African music simply by rapping in indigenous languages. Likewise, we don't believe that it's impossible to create culturally relevant music if you rap in English. However, language is undeniably one of the most powerful factors in expressing cultural identity. Driemanskap always struggle to translate their songs into English because their lyrics are so loaded with cultural references. If you limit yourself to using American English, you risk losing the richness of your cultural identity. The polemic of Johannesburg vs. Cape Town is often used as a lazy way of distinguishing between so-called 'underground' and 'commercial' music. However, I don't believe that it's particularly helpful as an analysis of South African identity in hip hop. There's culturally relevant hip hop being made all over South Africa.

Before moving down from Maseru to Cape Town in 2008 and exploring the Cape's hip hop scene, Core Wreckah was already heavily involved in Lesotho's capital hip hop scene. When we saw him plugging his new song 'Reverb' here and there on the web, we thought it a good moment to throw him 5 questions about what both scenes have in common, and what sets them apart. But more about that plugging after the song: [soundcloud url="http://api.soundcloud.com/tracks/18204754" params width=" 100%" height="166" iframe="true" /] How has Cape Town been treating you over the last three years? Do you feel at home? Has the city and its people been welcoming? Inspiring, as an artist?

It's been good I suppose, similar to home in the sense that everything that one needs in order to survive is within reach. I found the hip hop community to be quite accommodating, so that was an added bonus - it enabled me to build relationships from very early on.

The disparity in living standards, and inter-racial separation (don't really want to use the word 'racism' since I've given up trying to understand what that even means in a South African context) has been a bit of a shock. Growing up in Lesotho, one never witnessed the levels of segregation which exist between races here. (I wrote a song regarding my feelings about the issue: ‘Looking at me.’) I went to see comedian John Vlismas recently; he made the observation regarding the comparison between South Africa and a rainbow (i.e. the rainbow nation), and commented on how fitting it is since no matter how hard one tries, they can never mix colors of a rainbow. I thought that was a very apt way of putting it.

As an artist, it is only in the past year that I have taken an active role in terms of getting myself onto shows, and generally trying to get as many people as possible to hear and give criticism of my music. I had been lax to do this for various reasons before, but one of the main factors was that I needed to get a feel of the scene in its entirety; it is easy to get stuck with one group of people, which then leads to stagnation. From very early on, I have been interested in becoming a well-rounded artist, and have found that my involvement (either directly or indirectly) in the various scenes in and around Cape Town has had -- and continues to have -- a positive impact on my artistic output.

'The scene in its entirety,' that sounds daunting. You're referring to the hip hop scene? Locally, nationally? How would you describe the scene? You find it 'accommodating'. How so?

The ‘entire scene’ refers to my need to inspect from the side-lines what was happening in Cape Town hip hop, which events to go to, which rappers were making an impact, which breakers and writers were noteworthy, etc. This was important since I could then have an idea of who did what, who one needs to go to to get something done... and so forth.

I found it accommodating in that there was no 'gatekeeper' mentality; people were willing to let me become part of what they were doing. For instance, Driemanskap and Ill Skillz allowed me to sit in on a session one time; I hung out with Rattex a lot, and he bumped for me songs which he was recording during his 'Bread and Butter' album sessions; most of those songs made it onto the final product.

Part of it could have been because of me asking nicely, and part of it could have been due to the fact that I wasn't just another rapper trying to be down with them, or trying to get onto a show, or doing whatever it is that makes people become guarded. So it was 'accommodating' in the sense that I got to form good relationships without a prolonged amount of effort.

Are you still in touch with the hip hop scene in Lesotho's Maseru? Is there a scene beyond Maseru? And is it in any way comparable to what's going down in Cape Town? Is there a line (of communication, of interest, of collaboration) between both scenes?

I am still very much in touch with the scene in Maseru, that's home, that's what I represent in songs and every time I get on stage. I've written a column for the past four years which focused on the Lesotho hip hop scene, and started a blog (in 2008) which had as its main focus the promotion of Lesotho hip hop.

I am not very much aware of the scenes beyond Maseru. I mean, I know of a few people from elsewhere (e.g. Kommanda Obbs and Suuth from Maputsoe, and Mohalakane, a group from a district called Quthing). Apart from that, it's very hard to get music from elsewhere in the country; perhaps people are not so much interested in promoting their music beyond their immediate environment.

The scene where I come from is very much street-level though -- a lot of ciphers, lots of 'bedroom' recordings, a lot of hand-to-hand CD sales. There are no regular performance slots, and Maseru's nightlife as a whole is pretty non-existent -- but that's what I hear from people, and cannot comment much since I rarely go out at night unless it's to support a poetry event or an independent movie screening.

On the other hand, Cape Town has a small but vibrant scene; there are regular events (Kool Out, Party People, etc), and park jams which ensure that hip hop is well-represented, and that rappers have a platform on which they can showcase their creations. So Cape Town is much more 'advanced' in comparison to where I am from...which is all fair and well since the standards of living (economic and otherwise) are different in the two places.

In terms of collaborations, I personally do not know many Cape Town-Maseru collaborations; I know of mc’s who are from Maseru originally -- now making a living in South Africa -- who have done collaborations. For instance, Konfab has done some work with Dplanet (CEO of independent imprint Pioneer Unit), and Arsenic (of Manic Mettaloids/Writers Block). I think Hymphatic Thabs has also worked with Arsenic on some songs. On my part, I am constantly looking for people to collaborate with, but it is not always easy. I suppose people are too busy working on their own projects to bother.

How has the use of new channels like twitter, facebook, youtube, bandcamp and soundcloud influenced your way of trying to get noticed? Are these media efficient tools in South Africa to get your music up and out? I'm asking this because it's maybe a bit too easy to rave about them while so many South African (or Sesotho) hip hop heads simply have no access to these media (not everybody has the money to regularly recharge their smart-phones or spend hours on-line in internet cafes).

Twitter is cool, I like it for the ease of use, and the randomness with which I found it (I clicked on a link on someone else's blog about three years back, got taken to the site, and have not really looked back since). I'm not quite the fan of facebook, but it has its uses I suppose. I worked on a documentary in 2007 which was concerned with exploring Lesotho's cipha scene, and youtube has been very central in letting me put that on so that anyone from elsewhere in the world can check out what I've done; I've also uploaded mine and my band's performance footage on there.

I love soundcloud for how it enables me to discover other musicians's work. For instance, I'd been a fan of Namibian BecomingPhill for a long time, and totally bugged out when I found him on soundcloud. The dude is pure genius, and I think someone needs to get him a premium account so that he stops having to delete some stuff in order to upload new songs. Same goes for Hiperdelic, a producer from Cape Town.

While I have used bandcamp and got some benefit from it, there are still so many more avenues for me to explore within its framework (e.g. the physical goods store). I find it very useful, especially when it comes to collecting people's e-mail addresses; as the argument goes, e-mails have sort of become the new 'currency', though I'm not sure how much I agree with the statement. Having one's e-mail address and sending them updates every now and then does not necessarily mean that they'll read what the mail is saying, but it does definitely increase the likelihood.

Bandcamp has been efficient in getting my music out, as has soundcloud. But what I have discovered time and time again is that people seem to be...I don't like using the word ignorant, but rather lax to check out links to music from those they do not know. I say this because I am part and parcel of that 'unknown' bunch, so even managing to get a single play on my soundcloud is a big achievement for me. But write-up on blogs such as Welfare State of Mind, okayafrica, 25tolyf, and others have certainly helped to direct a bit of traffic onto the portals on which I am present.

As for the point you raised about it being easy to rave since one has access to the internet...well, look, I have been able to achieve a certain amount of presence on the web even before I had a fairly stable internet connection. I have a very good friend, Lyrical Bacteria, from Lesotho who -- though not always connected to the net -- has managed to do amazing things for both himself and Lesotho's poetry scene. His work ethic is impeccable to begin with, and the small chances he gets to go to an Internet cafe he utilizes those wisely. Also, that connectivity argument is tramped by the fact that there is mobile connectivity now in Lesotho, we have 3G and HDSPA technology -- though still a heck of a lot expensive -- making the rounds. An investment of at least 50 maloti (that's our currency, equal to 50 rands) every once in a while will ensure that one has enough data to upload their work on-line, synch their accounts so as to make a single update and feed it to all social media, etc. I know that there are people who have made do with the very limited resources we have. Big shout-out to producer San the Instru-monumentalist who has also managed to release a compilation (Classic Dirt which has on it among others, myself, John Robinson, Moka Only, The Holstar, etc) using those very same 'limited' resources.

It's very easy to suppose that having access to all these social media tools automatically grants one some sort of magical key into the world. I have found that basic rules still apply; a 'please' and 'thank you' will go a long way, etiquette is not negated by on-line presence; in fact, I'll argue that it is even more essential since most of the time one is communicating with people one has never met, and the person being communicated to has no onus to even bother replying to whatever request it is directed at them.

You recently wrote a beautiful ode to Sankomota, a band, you say, which "has served as my sanctuary whenever music seems to loose track" but you also hint at the fact that "we betrayed the memory of a legend." In what way do young Sesotho artists keep the memory of their musical forebears alive, if at all?

From my side, I have a vested interest in Famo (traditional Sesotho music performed with the accordion), and have been researching its origins as well as making a collection of music from the musicians who impress me the most.

One of these musicians, Famole, died around 2004; he was quite instrumental in introducing a sort of paradigm shift in terms of how the music gets performed; his lyrics were striking in that they were a concoction of post-apocalyptic revelations (with a strong Christian undertone, as well as semi-battle rhyme-like (he has the dopest braggadocio songs). He was a man very aware of his own mortality, yet also equally aware that life is to be lived as well as enjoyed.

Famo musicians -- as far as I know -- do not write their songs; so to me, we as the younger generation have this library of people who have hardly gone to school, yet are able to weave together narratives potent enough to stand neck-a-neck with those of the best scholars the world has to offer. Of course the language is different, but the dynamics are the same: the setting, the build-up, climax... all these elements are contained within these songs.

 For me, the artist Famole best personifies what I would like to achieve with my music: a man capable to engage his audience by using elements from the environment, objects such as names of towns and/or activities that people can easily identify with. So in my music, especially my Sesotho stuff, I sort of channel -- though reluctantly, being careful not to loose myself in the process -- what to me Famole's music personified, and still personifies. But it's not only him that I look up to... the music of Letsema Mats'ela also strikes a deep chord within me, and I also channel him -- especially with regards to my vocal intonations.

I have also recorded a song (still to finish it though) whereby I address the issue of murders within the Famo community. Legends such as Sanko, Lesholu, and most recently Selomo, have succumbed to the violence which seems to be rife in Famo music. The song is a call-to-arms of sorts, but from the perspective of a hip hop head.

In the greater scheme of things, I have not heard a lot of homage being paid to our musical heroes by my fellow artists, but this could also be attributed to the lack of a functional distribution channel for hip hop artists in Lesotho. However, a lot of my friends are very clued up on our traditional as well as contemporary Sesotho sounds; it is perhaps just a matter of time before that awareness translates to them incorporating elements of that into their musical compositions.

Papa Zee and Dunamis (both quite well known in Lesotho) are the only two people I know of who have actually recorded songs with Famo contemporaries. Besides that, I haven't heard much.

So in conclusion, there is an awareness that the legacy of those who came before us has to be preserved by Lesotho's hip-hop community. I have a feeling that the time is near when this awareness shall translate into actualization through music.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-9DFWp32L6g We plugged Kinshasa-born Gracias not too long ago. This is the video for Mon€y, another track from his new EP.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sEOKgjoxoto There's so much going on in these 8 minutes of rap by Akala, we can only suggest you take the occasion's title on its word: Fire In The Booth. Via Mikko Kapanen.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yD2ZHiGmws8&w=600&h=373] The program of selected films and documentaries for this year's Rwanda Film Festival going down this weekend and next week at the KWETU Film Institute in Kigali is an eclectic bunch (amongst many others, there is Na Wewe, Le Mec Idéal and Afrique en Marche). One of the documentaries I hope to see sometime is 'Surfing Soweto' (trailer above). Anyone around to give us feed-back?

http://vimeo.com/26301164 We liked the previous recent work by DJ Hamma and Jitsvinger. No surprise then the result of the two of them collaborating is dope. The track is lifted from the album we blogged about last year, but the video's new. DJ Hamma says: "We shot it in August 2010. I was initially very disappointed with the shoot and the footage. Too much drama... The footage wasn't enough, not what I asked for and didn't follow the initial storyline we had in mind. I wanted to redo the shoot but got caught up in my life and travels as a dj and producer. I just about gave up on it but due to the mounting requests from people for this particular song I decided to have another look at the footage. The idea was to see if I could slap something remotely decent together to become the 'unofficial' video representation of this track. "Niks om te se nie" translates as "Nothing to say". Jitsvinger expresses his views regarding modern day mc'ing. He feels that mainstream hiphop lacks lyrical substance and doesn't really relate to the mind and thinking of the general listener or followers of hiphop music. In the end it's all politics. It's like he sees it as the common fast food franchise... no matter where you buy your meal it will taste the same... Mc's became these carbon copies of what they see on tv. We believe in 'doing us'... this song expresses that to the fullest and with no apologies nor shame."

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hef6Roa2z3U Kwa Heri Mandima (Goodbye Mandima) is a short film by the French-Dutch director Robert-Jan Lacombe doing multiple film festival rounds over the last year. Born in 1986 in Mandima, Robert-Jan -- and his family -- left Mandima, the village in northeast Congo (then still Zaire) ten years later. A short interview with the director (in French) can be found here. Thoughts?

Earlier this year, Djiboutians marched the streets of their capital (where more than half of all Djiboutian citizens live), rallying against their sitting president who changed the constitution in 2010 allowing him to run for another term. It didn't pan out as planned, with the president (who replaced his uncle as leader of the ruling party in 1999) securing a third term in April. "I regret having no opponent," he said. "I accuse the opposition of not having the courage to give voters the right to choose between several candidates." But that doesn't change the fact today is still Djibouti's Independence Day. Awelah Adan is the country's latest star, singing in Somali. This video dates from a while back, but it is a classic: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LQQsVnhgJRE Abayzid Ali, on the other hand, sings in Afar. His lyrics have a more poetic touch: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PKuyC4xOozs Writer Abdourahman Waberi put us on to this song by Mohammed Ali aka 'Fourchette' about whom he says: "It may sound weird, but it is more than that. Inspiring, poetic. He's singing in Somali. Popular among the youth as well. His son has remixed some of his old songs": http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2ysh99ebFpM And finally, this song. Not quite from Djibouti, but the video was recorded there. Why? We have no idea. Neither are we sure they're showing this on Djibouti TV. Lumidee ft. Chase Manhattan: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3fDX_ZOdiiw You'll find more on the DjibTube video channels.

Achille Mbembe (the links are to previous references of Mbembe on this blog) gave a lecture at the Birkbeck School of Law in March of this year. You can download an audio recording of the talk entitled 'Law, Democracy and the Ethics of Mutuality: Notes on the South African Experiment' here. 

Today is the 51st anniversary of Malagasi independence. Things could have been better for its citizens. What with being governed by a former radio DJ and its army and with threats that Western governments and aid agencies will withdraw financial support. Anyway, we're celebrating. For the sake of the Malagasy people. This is also the start of a new regular gig where we'll celebrate a country's independence day by featuring some of the music of its young people. We had a harder time coming up with the short list below (we had an easy time with South Africa's Youth Day (June 16th) and yesterday's Mozambique Independence Day), but we found plenty of great stuff available. So here we go. (If we missed anything, let us know.) Oladad: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_HPDBB6kk-w K.F.R. feat. KIM: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BBPkMiCNROY Aora: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jsEWUZlYBmo Suprem: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wb1L9RSVD2A Volkany Sound: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=msqa_jPRp1c Raboussa: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lzynGN9aHsI

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=932nXiUN-dY Nice video for "Bienvenue au Cameroun", a track by Cameroonian (yeah) artist Ayriq Akam.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LTRmpJ_EpJE Dub Colossus member Samuel Yirga "plays one night a week in Addis's only jazz club/coffee bar, where the way he mixes Keith Jarrett and Herbie Hancock with Ethiojazz has won him a cult following." He says:

I take traditional music and turn it around, and people in Ethiopia are starting to listen to the way it swings now. Our musical culture is under attack from inside and out, it's all rock bands, hip-hop groups and pop singers, and nobody can afford to run a big band.

Via Real World Records.

At the margins of this year's Art Basel (15-19 June) and curated by Christine Eyene, FOCUS11 presents a group of African artists in the city of Basel, Switzerland this weekend. The selected artists ("reflecting new trends in Africa and the Diaspora") are Nirveda Alleck (above is "Suspended Thought," a 2006 photocollage by Alleck), Natalie Mba Bikoro, Graeme Williams, Ato Malinda, Mohau Modisakeng, Jan-Henri Booyens, Steve Bandoma, Rowan Pybus, Ntando Cele, Vitshois Mwilambwe Bondo, Fabrice Wamba and Youssef Tabti (who is distributing this postcard all over the city these days). With the exception of two, all of the artists seem to reside in South Africa or Europe.

With the 35th anniversary of the June 16, 1976 uprising by high school students in South Africa on our minds today (the uprising that started out in Soweto, triggered by the enforced instruction of black students in Afrikaans, ushering in a new era of resistance both inside and outside South Africa against white racism and economic exploitation), we thought it a good idea to put up some videos by young South African artists that have surfaced on the web over the past year (or so). It's an eclectic bunch although the Johannesburg and Cape Town presence is heavy. Did we miss something? What else has come out of Durban, East London or Port Elizabeth recently that we don't know of (and that we haven't featured before)? The Federation: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tQYGNlm2bBE Tumi ft. MXO: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BQY4_v6Gzss 5th Floor: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0m29SbT_hp4 Kritsi Ye'Spaza: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6RT-DbXuTzk Deep Level: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8Bmp0jgdur8 Backyard Crew: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RUayrUGt5a0 Yugen Blakrok: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mVCShsFW3Hw Purple Hearts: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-I5jETJ0wrM Ill Skillz: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5wYRHVydYqM Jozi's Finest: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fKbvwUS7aL4 Zuluboy: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wPpHLwikgFc But let's not kid ourselves, the big crowd-pullers are still the Professor: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eDMBB3lAMPE ...and everything else being put out by the Johannesburg-based production team Gorilla Films. Nor should we fool ourselves into believing young South Africans can watch all of the above clips in one sitting these days without being cut off for having reached the limit of their monthly bandwidth. What the future holds for the South African youth will be decided this weekend; that is if they still care about that kind of politics or are looking elsewhere for leadership and inspiration or squat in West London. And that's your extended Music Break.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BOV5jEa-vwc TV On The Radio's Tunde Adebimpe and Kyp Malone join Tinariwen for this song. BTW, Tinariwen is touring the US this summer. (They're playing New York City on July 20.)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BMdM03miCgo Johannesburg-based Tumi of Tumi and The Volume has released a mixtape. It seems to be in support of People Opposed to Women Abuse and was inspired by the story of rape victim Akona Ndungane. Among those getting the Tumi remix treatment are Mos Def (a fan of Tumi), the Beatles, John Mayer, Radiohead and Kanye West. Film director Teboho Mahlatsi pitched in with this dramatic video above; watch through till the end for the finale). South Africans Zubz, Tuks, PRO, Chen Lo, Zaki Ibrahim, Molemi, Ben Sharpa, KG and Lebo (of Voodoo Child) join Tumi on the mixtape. Get it here.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CHLtVhTaZjA We're impressed. Like we were last year. (Via)

Over the course of fifteen years (1994-2009), Elke Zuern has interviewed civic and social movement leaders, local government leaders, members of NGOs and other community organizations in South Africa. In her new book, The Politics of Necessity,* she compares these movements in South Africa to those elsewhere on the continent (Benin, Botswana, Nigeria), and beyond (Argentina, Chile, Mexico). We definitely recommend The Politics of Necessity. Below follows an excerpt from the introduction to the book: From apartheid to democracy, South African movements have drawn connections between material necessities, stark inequality, and basic rights. Through popular protest they have constructed their understandings of what democracy must entail. South Africa under apartheid offers one of the clearest cases of cumulative inequality: poverty, race, and a complete lack of political rights all overlapped. Like Brazil (and the United States among advanced industrialized states), South Africa has long stood out for its high levels of income inequality. Similar to those in Brazil, South African survey respondents have expressed high levels of dissatisfaction with their democracy. In the Afrobarometer surveys conducted from mid-1999 to mid-2001 in twelve largely English speaking African countries that had undergone some degree of political and economic reform, South Africans expressed the highest levels of dissatisfaction with their democracy (44 percent of respondents were "unsatisfied with democracy"), followed by Malawi and Zambia (Bratton, Mattes, and Gyimah-Boadi 2005, 83). This is particularly striking when contrasted with external perceptions of South Africa as one of the strongest and most vibrant democracies on the continent. Countless analysts have lauded the rights and freedoms enshrined in South Africa's new constitution; Freedom House (2010) has given South Africa high scores for both political rights and civil liberties. In South Africa, in contrast, less than half of the survey respondents defined themselves as "very satisfied" or even "fairly satisfied" with democracy in 2008 (Afrobarometer 2009a). Since 1999 this dissatisfaction has increasingly been seen on the streets. During the 2004/2005 financial year, almost six thousand protest actions took place across the country (Atkinson 2007, 58). In 2009, protest actions once again reached new heights as citizens demonstrated their frustration with the government by marching, submitting petitions, and at times destroying government property (Sinwell et al. 2009). Clearly those who praise the extent of South Africa's democracy are missing something to which both the survey respondents and the protesters wish to draw attention. South African respondents stood out across the surveyed African countries in that they expressed more substantive understandings of what a democratic regime should entail by including socioeconomic conditions in their definition of democracy. They also demonstrated a greater readiness to engage in protest actions. This led Michael Bratton, Robert Mattes, and E. Gyimah-Boadi (2005) to suggest that South Africa may be exceptional as a product of its apartheid past and its recent liberation. However, if one approaches the case of South Africa with an eye to the experiences of Latin American states, South Africa appears as much less an outlier. Growing dissatisfaction with democracy and high levels of protest action, often in response to poor living conditions and services, seem to be correlated with a perception of relative deprivation and high levels of inequality. In fact, given South Africa's significant political and economic reforms as well as its urbanization, processes that all African countries are struggling with in different ways, the South African experience may well be an indicator of challenges that other states and societies will increasingly face. Just as apartheid was an extension of the broader politics of colonial rule rather than an exception (Mamdani 1996), South Africa's current challenges and its citizens' discontent are a product of severe inequities that are felt across the continent and around the globe. Over a decade after the African National Congress (ANC) came to power, addressing the material poverty of the majority remains a stark challenge. Government development indicators show persistently high unemployment rates. According to the narrow definition of unemployment, which includes only job seekers who looked for work in the four weeks before the survey, unemployment declined slightly from a high of 31.2 percent in early 2003 to 25.3 percent in mid 2010 (SSA 2010, xii). In the broad understanding of unemployment also presented in government indicators, 36 percent of South Africans remained unemployed in 2010 (Economist, August 23, 2010). South African survey data from 1993, 2000 and 2008 show a substantial increase in inequality, both within the population as a whole and within the African population (Leibbrandt et al. 2010). In 2009, the government reported that income inequality still had not been reduced despite years of economic growth (RSA, Presidency 2009, 25). Although the indicators do show some growth in the incomes of the poor, the rich have gained at a faster rate. Poverty remains pervasive. Government indicators report only a slow decline in poverty since 1993. By 2008, 22 percent of the population (the "hard core" poor) continued to live below the very low international poverty line of $1.25 a day, or R283 per month (RSA, Presidency 2009, 27). Afrobarometer's 2008 survey offers indicators of "lived poverty": 42 percent of adult respondents said they "went without" food at least once in the past year (down only 1 percent from 2004); 36 percent said they went without clean water (the same as 2004); 52 percent went without electricity (up from 47 percent in 2004); 53 percent went without a cash income (down from 60 percent in 2004) (Afrobarometer 2004, 2009a). While stark, these numbers may still underreport indicators of lived poverty, due to the difficulty of reaching the country's poorest citizens (Cape Times, March 11, 2005). They do, however, demonstrate the impact of state interventions: the decrease in people without a cash income is a product of the increase in social grants, and the increase in people without electricity is at least in part due to disconnections for nonpayment. These grim realities are a product of South Africa's past as well its present. A few statistics, while offering a partial and vastly incomplete picture of the brutality of apartheid, demonstrate the great challenges that postapartheid governments have faced. In 1946 white per person income was more than ten times that of African income (L. Thompson 2000, 156). Between 1960 and 1983, an estimated 3.5 million people were forcibly removed from their homes and communities to the overcrowded and impoverished "homelands" far from urban centers and jobs. In 1975–76, an astounding 381,858 Africans were arrested for violating the pass laws, which were designed to keep them out of white areas where they sought to find work. Even after a considerable increase in the number of African children enrolled in school by 1978, the apartheid government still spent ten times more per white student than it did for each African student (L. Thompson 2000, 193–96). The legacies of racial discrimination in education and job opportunities, the removal of so many people from their homes and communities and the impact of a migrant labor system that separated families are profound and daunting. As Jeremy Seekings and Nicoli Nattrass argue: "No other capitalist state (in either the North or South) has sought to structure income inequalities as systematically and brutally as did South Africa under apartheid" (2005, 2). These hardships have led to what is termed here a "politics of necessity," where engagement in the public sphere is defined in an environment in which many struggle just to get by: to feed their families, to maintain a home, and to obtain basic access to health care, education, and paid work. In certain circumstances, these needs lead to community organizing and concerted efforts to bring material and broader demands to the attention of government. The politics of necessity is not exclusive to South Africa. In their discussion of Latin American social movements, Sonia Alvarez and Arturo Escobar have referred to a "politics of needs" mobilizing popular struggles (1992, 320). In Mexico City, Miguel Díaz-Barriga found a discourse of necesidad among urban movements; grassroots activists defined their goals in terms of necessities that included land, education, and basic services such as electricity, potable water, streets, and medical clinics (1998, 257). Around the globe, the absence of what people locally define as basic necessities can translate into movements that work to bring the private struggles of marginalized individuals and silenced communities into the public discourse with potentially profound implications for democracy. * Published by the University of Wisconsin Press and the University of KwaZulu-Natal Press.