Why I Don't "Listen" to Local Gospel Music

"Sing to the Lord a new song..."

- Psalms 96:1

I think its safe to say that I am a fairly religious person. Right from childhood, I was inculcated to the schema of a Superior Being by my folks, a thing my infantile mind percieved as completely natural. Later, I was to realize this Christianity was more historical than natural. In fact it was part of administrative "extras" imposed by our colonizers in the name of civilization. Outside this paradox was the bigger argument of atheism versus possibilianism versus religion. Confusing as it all is, I have chosen to hover on the religious side of things for certain unexplicable reasons such as the idea of God being comforting. But I am not your perfect church type. I'm a sort of religious voyeur - the few times am in church, I cant help notice grown men staring at other people's daughters in a coveteous fashion right under the noses of pastors who may or may not be strugglin to put everyone to sleep. Still, I'm also sometimes in need of spiritual fulfilment in various forms including gospel music. However, I am finding local gospel moving further and further away from satisfying this need. Let me expound.

Big Bang
Gospel music these sides has come a long way. Remember Joy Bringers on KBC or power couple The Mwauras' Praise and Worship series? What about Reuben Kigame and Shari Martin's Rafiki Pesa hit and all those Prison choirs? Everything about it tended to target mature audiences and the kids were contented with Sunday School classics. Solid themes revolving around Bible verses was the norm. A few blips of rebellion in youth wings of some churches didnt get enough hype until foreign influences came into play. Ron Kenoly, Mary Mary, Kirk Franklin et al precipitated a religious big bang with a youth agenda, paving way for new age pioneers such as Henrie Mutuku and Rufftone. This in turn drew the younger generation to more interesting ways to explore Christianity.

Commercialization
Lets not forget that at the same time secular music was also developing and soon eclipsed gospel productions. Ogopa brought kapuka, taking people by storm and leaving our gospel strategists wondering what to do to fish more men. It was the release of Esther Wahome's Kuna Dawa that provided the light bulb moment. The single acquired a cult-like following from the secular crowd and it was almost immoral for any club or pub or secular radio station not to have it on heavy rotation at one point. Aha! A way had been found! Gospel producers and artistes' renaissance had a lot to do with the money and exposure kapuka musicians got. They wanted that too. . .man must live, no? It was something like the current trend of our religious leaders tryin to vie for public office - a capitalist lunge for economic survival!

The strategy change was simple. Gospel music was now engineered to contain what I call crossover potential. New age gospel singles and albums were created from a secular template. They adopted the architecture and design of a secular track with an attempt to staple a spiritual message atop it. This has so far manifested itself in various forms:

*Production/Arrangement: Using essentially secular music arrangement techniques. MOG's hit Let Him Go attained its popularity not from its content but from its use of the Diwali riddim also used initally by Brick n Lace for Love is Wicked. Autotune use is gaining fast popularity as well in gospel production.

*Secular in Past Tense: My good pal Philip Mwaniki refers to most gospel kapuka as "secular music in past tense". By centering on themes of past lives of partying, sex, alcohol, drug use and the like, these types of songs get good reception from the generic kapuka lover who just wants to hear "pombe, madem, sigara kubwa" and such catch phrases being mentioned.

*Lingala Systems: When was the last time you sang along to System ya Kapungala? At rave, most probably. Any Congolese would also be shocked that coupé décalé can be used for a gospel track. Notice how different Congolose gospel groups sound from their secular mates eg. Makoma.

*Lyrics: It gets hard to point out a song as gospel via the lyrics these days. You are often left guessing until its blatantly clarified that the song 'imebarikiwa'. Case in point would be Chit Chat's chorus to its debut single which goes something like:
"I la la la la/ I like your shoes/ the clothes you wear/your style. . ."
Now that sounds like a chorus Lil Wayne would endorse. Holy Dave makes it worse by spittin some ambiguous verses. The rest of the hip hope fraternity have fallen into this trap.

Paradox?
At the end of the day this trend hurts the youth gospel movement in Kenya. Many of those who follow this movement may do so for all the wrong reasons - to be part of an inverted coolness... Proponents of this trend defend it by saying one doesnt have to mention God or Jesus in a gospel track. They claim that new age gospel tries to pass a message in a way the youth can relate to and subtly introduces to a more flexible relationship with God. Really? It would be quite far fetched to imagine that a drunk man at Grill House singing along to Kuna Dawa will reflect on the intended message.

Am not trying to be conservative in any way. I think we have lost touch with gospel and somehow the initial objective is heavily diluted by how it has been packaged. Look at how other international gospel artistes do it. Mary Mary recently acquired a crunk sound but they still manage to pass clear cut messages and sell records while they are at it.

We are in the Grey Area Era of Gospel music in Kenya and that is why when a gospel track is playing somewhere, I will be in the vicinity with a glass of vodka in one hand, weed in the other and rubber dubbing some woman's ass...

The Times They Are A-Changin' : LOL???

Come mothers and fathers throughout the land
And don't criticize what you cant understand
Your sons and daughters are beyond your command
...
For the times, they are a-changin'

- Bob Dylan

Individual to individual human being communication has come a very long way, fact. We should pity our Neanderthal anscestors to whom communication was most vital during mating seasons - whose head is the biggest, who can throw a stone farthest, whose genitals. . .- yes, John Locke, those were short, nasty and brutish times. We can also stop by the south african deserts and admire the Bushmen and Hottentots who boast an alphabet of click sounds à la Gods Must Be Crazy? Its hard even distinguishing an abuse click from an appreciative click. Now imagine trying to propose to a rugged haired, bare breasted Hottentotty:

"Click click click click click?"
"Click?"
"CLiiicK"
"cLIcK!!! CLick, ClicKKK!"

Shit. At least we have managed to evolve out of that and now can utilize our tongues in more ways than offering cunnilingus. We can finally SPEAK! Huyay! We can also write and type! Thanks to Western "civilisation" campaigns, nearly the entire globe is trapped in the phonetic dungeons of English, French and Spanish. We don't have to be born in the same kraal to understand each other, aint that swell?

Another fact is that we all don't grow old at the same time. There will always be an older generation keen to pass down their (sometimes archaic) morals and mannerisn to the younglings who will obviously set up resistance on various fronts. We sneak out of the house via the fence to sample date rape drugs in the club. Girls make out with girls and well, boys give each other anal exams.

On the communication front, the resistance is in the form of subjecting the wazee to lingual alienation via the use of slang. Speaking in code so that the peeps who have not "chanukad" to cower in shame for trying to invade the privacy of the conversation. According to the auhoritative Sheng Website , Sheng was born out of the need to go into "stealth mode" by kids of early Nairobi immigrants of the 60s whose house were usually one or two roomed houses thus what you said everyone heard. A very noble cause, dont you think? Look, we have even imagined to convince these aged adults that cheating in KCSE takes place between 2pm and 5pm thus no more afternoon exams! Duh, cheating takes place all the time!!

A different form of slang, however, has began to develop with the advent of technology. Now that the average young person communicates via mobile phone or social networkin sites, the central aim of communication has become INSTANT MESSAGING. Delivering the message as fast as possible, and somehow thinking that you can squeeze your life's thoughts in 160 characters. Speaking and writing in Acronym. The trend often tends to bite us in the ass when we end up not communicating at all! I have now gotten used to messages, wallposts and text messages like this:

OMG WP dd u c dat BFF o myn? She GBROTFLOL, SMH!

Its very confusing if you dont ake a spirited effort to catch up. LOL is the current favourite. Laughing out loud. I know some people who cant write three words without inserting LOL. Kwani, have you been taking an overdose of nitrogen oxide?

"I HATE YOU. . .lol!" Really?
"Am pregnant with your twins lol!" Seriously?

Why not just stick to the more humane Hahahaha or more bestial Bwehehehe. At least those have some life in them. LOL sounds like something R2-D2 of Star Wars would say if tickled.


And they vary with taste and purpose. OMG has a sort of blonde connotation to it, I have been made to understand. WTF/WTH have replaced all the exclamation statements ever thought of. Whatever happened to Holy Cow? It took me forever to understand SMH, kumbe its something to do with shaking the head. GBR/GNR - Got a bitch/nigga rollin - very queer too. I've never seen boys in an Always ad. . .never!

They are even coming in tribal slips now! Ati LOL is the same as GOR - Gutheka out Roud, and in Naija its translated to UGKMO - U Go Kill Me Oh, and if youre from the lakeside its NMA - Nyiero Matek Ahinya.

Lets not forget NKT!! and MSCHEEW!!! often used by mamsilas in their udaku sessions. How do you even pronounce those???

Its an unstoppable wave. In three years, I'm predicting the pressing need for an Acronym Dictionary or else we will never manage to understand ourselves. The greater concern however is how these short codes compartmentalize and curtail our thought processing and eventually limiting creativity. So "Oh my goodness fuck me sideways, you have done something very stupid!" is relegated to a simple WTF!! Don't be surprised if kids in 2030 will be LOLing instead of a e i o u-ing.

In the meantime, I'm being updated by Anyiko and Fena on the latest new Acros. . . So, TBNOBIGHAD. Don't ask me what that means!!

Nakufeel vs. Nimechill

Everytime am back from the long May - August holidays, something very interesting changes in the university's demographic. A good number of girls (increasing every year) show up glowing, noticably plumper with their bellies distending - very, very pregnant! We have accepted and come to terms with the rampancy of it. It is now almost a fashion statement around here (we call it "going to the beauty spa"). Maybe we can also attribute this to the past few extremely cold months, ama?

This semester, of those who have gotten the spa treatment, I kinda know two of them on a personal level. The first chica, let's call her X, she's a piece of work. She has an innocent baby face and a petite 5ft 4' body that reeks of sex appeal which she's not afraid to flaunt in tiny skirts and low cut tops. In the second week of her freshman year, she was warming the bed of a student leader and moved on to her next "victim" the following week. And she has had many victims. No matter how many guys you hear she been with, her baby face makes her appealing still. In the early days, I'd taken her to the club after some heavy drinking - I never saw her again until early the next day - yeah, somebody else had chips fungad her. I'm geniunely shocked seeing her now plump and glowing like that. I was thinking since she was used to these things, she had the know how on contraceptives and the like.

The other mamsila, Y, is an Alliance Girls alumni and made it directly to law school with straight As. She's very uptight. Me and my boys tried throwing vybe her direction but her defence mechanism shot them all down. For three years, she was in the league of untounchable women. Fancy that now somebody took her to the spa.

So its clear and evident. There is a worrying and indiscriminate upsurge in unwanted pregnancies. Even the seemingly "good ones" are caught in the trap. And all this is happening smack in the face of spirited and determined campaign for abstinence or at least condom use. Question is what is wrong?

Its actually funny how the Condom and Abstinence ads fight for prime time spots. At a certain point in time, the Nimechill, Nakufeel, Trust and Femiplan ads were running almost back to back! Mixed messages or what? Do you want us to chill or do it?Apparently the people controlling these campaigns seem to be losing the war on delaying the sexual debut. The casting for the Nimechill serves as sufficient evidence. What are 14 and 15 year olds doing on TV saying they have decided to chill??? Forget kalongo and cha mama, that shouldn't be an age anyone should be having proper sex at!!

As regards the Nakufeel advert, I'm sorry to poop on it but normally what happens when relationships are as deep and commited as depicted in the ad, people tend to become overtrusting, if not careless. Since we are faithful to each other, we've taken an AIDS test and we negative why not hit it skin to skin on her safe days and take P2s just in case?

Yes, the EC pill. Very little is said about the use of this form of contraception notwithstanding the fact that its widely used. Just ask your local chemist how much P2s he pushes across the counter in a day alone. Many people are using these pills improperly thus unwanted pregnancies. There should be a more agressive campaign on EC pills than even CDs so that people can get a wider appreciation and its effect. . . I believe this can move more and more EC pill poppers to start serious use of condoms.

Reproductive health advertising is becoming a sort of sexual Tower of Babel leaving some young adults quite confused.Anyways, I'm sure X and Y are watching the KTN feature on midwifery very keenly. Good luck to them. Can't wait to be a brand new uncle again.

What's In A Name?

Inspired by a conversation with Pope Boy.

For a long time, I have been baffled by some phenomena in movies and series about Africa. First, the kind of names they come up with for fictional African countries and kingdoms.There is just something about the syllablles they pack into it that reeks of a sort of "Primitive" innuendo. We can excuse the "Phantom" comic strip for their reference to Bangalla - sounds like something a witchdoctor would say to rid you of a grandmother's curse. That was set a long time ago. But what do we say about the more recent names? Take for example West Wing's reference to a West African state known as Equitorial KUNDU. Kundu??? Lol whoever came up with that name? The closest African word to that known to me is KUNDE and you will be hard pressed to find a people who will name their nation after a variety of bitter herbs.

In Casino Royale Daniel Craig has a run-in with some guys from Nambutu ... hehe probably a mix of Namibia and Mobutu Sessesseko.

And I have just started watching 24 season 7 where the US is held ransom by a rebel leader from Sangala .

Another thing. The characters in these Western productions tend to have a stereotypical form and attributes. They are usually either savage looking or savage sounding, and the language they speak is either French or Kiswahili even if the particular story is based in Egypt. It is these quick copy paste stereotypes that Western producers need to get rid of. In as much a I respect artistic freedom, is it so hard to do some research or consult some people adept in linguistics or some other relevant field? We all remember the gaffe by the Russians when they decided to name their joint energy firm in Nigeria NIGAZ!! Am sure that did nothing to soften Russia's image as a place rampant with Racism.Or is it up to to us to change these stereotypes?

Season 7 of 24, however, surprised me by placing the character of an African leader as actually having the financial capability to bully America (something the likes of Museveni have only dreamt of no doubt).

An interesting depiction of Africa from the blaxploitation era is 1973's Shaft in Africa. I first saw the flick a few months ago on TCM, its kinda hilarious, there's a scene where Shaft fights some peeps naked and its depiction of modern slavery is also interesting. The plot is triggered by the murder of the son of an EMIR in a fictional kingdom in East Africa. You will spot some of the stereotypes I have mentioned in its trailer below: