Over Imitation of Foreign Music

Amongst the many facets that summed up our multiparty politics was the new form of music that we adopted in tune with the new political system which in turn charted a new way for our music trail. We found our people freer than they were since independence from the British; this freedom was ably reflected in our music albeit with huge failures.

The major failure was how out of the multitudes of those that produced music, only few managed what was considered original while the industry was littered with imitators.

What was so confusing was that those that are in the forefront imitating genres from elsewhere, like those currently doing Ragga for example, could not see.

Most of our musicians doing dancehall, who not out of their volition, say they are not musicians, because the Jamaicans the try to imitate also say are not musicians but DJs.

Instead of realising what might have been the reason our radios’ airplay is filled with low quality music describes once as chaff, our musicians think radio presenters are to blame for getting bribes to play mediocre music.

Ever since nine years ago when I started writing on music, I have continuously acknowledged the tendency where musicians bribe DJs and presenters with money – a system known in musical cycles as ‘Payola’ – to get airplay.

A lot of musicians themselves have underlined the fact that Malawi music is hurried and therefore lament that it fails to compete against other regional and continental musicians who invest heavily in their music and this translates into how valuable the stage work has to cost for hire, which also goes with high quality sound.

Well, I have to start by saying, ‘Good wine need no bush’ and therefore good music will not take the singer to have a DJ or a presenter bribed before it can gain airplay.

Because most artists have been lacking in the area of creativity where they have imitated everything from reggae to Kwasakwasa, others have even imitated the Zambian musicans.

Ada Manda, Overtone Chimombo, the late Patrick Tembo, the late Tepu Ndiche and Bright Mkanda as well as many old timers most of them fallen heroes were original and this should have been the foundation where in the last decade we were to build our music industry.

But instead what did we get, Malinga Mafia, Mafo, Gibo Lantos and crew started imitating Jamaican DJs like Yellow Man, U Roy, Sizzla Kalanje and the list is long…They went home building their music using templates created by these Jamaican artists, forgetting that they will be judged using the Jamaican standard because they were imitating Jamaica genre.

What comes out with such imitation is somewhat chaff or husks.

Literally, husks is a by-product of goodies, so the question would be if our musicians are producing chaff, then where are the intended products.

The thing is, to call such products chaff is being so respectful that because we are like saying there is room provided for what could be the best creativity toils, which is not the case.

Mind you, I am not saying we should not imitate. We can, but it does not have to be done with precision like plagiarizing, but it has to be an imitation that is loaded with innovative charm. Take for example the way Evison Matafale played reggae. Many a Jamaican that came into the country like the great Everton Blender let Matafale wear the cap because it was able to fit on his head.

However, if you take DJs like Capleton or Tony Rebel and compare them with our local young pretenders, would you say they would match?

The only thing that make them appeal to local audience is the Chichewa language that used. However, some of the imitators lack ingenuity because the inflection that they use for their songs is all the same.