Frank Kaunda imitating Skeffa Chimoto

Mangochi based musician Frank Kaunda has a deep obsession with Skeffa Chimoto. He mimics him a lot in his compositions especially in his track 'Sipuni'.

I am not sure if both of them are aware of my observations but like I have said here before I will say it again: Budding artists should only use the talent of the established for learning purposes and not take it as their own.

There are times when budding musicians copy from established ones in order to get a career foothold as they ascent towards glory. But there is always need to cut out one's own identity when unveiling self.

There is a reggae musician called Siddy Ranks. The first time I listened to his music I realised his futile attempt to be the great Gregory Isaacs' copycat. For me this was a complete put-off!

The one person that I have also discussed on these pages is Evance Meleka. When Evance collaborated with controversial gospel artist George Mkandawire to release tracks ‘Mwalawo’ and ‘Manga Patanthwe’ he realized how sweet it sounds to do tracks that are gospel.

A short while since this attempt, he declared himself a ‘Gospel Artist’ and I have no reservations with his decision because the effort he showed in the tracks, cuts him above the average acts that are polluting the gospel music arena.

My problem with Evance came when he decided to become an Oliver Mtukudzi copycat which instead turned him into an impressionist shame.

Evance is blessed. His voice is unexploited gold which only he can take care of and nurture as time goes by.

Meleka ‘debuted’ his gospel music career with tracks where he imitated Oliver Mtukudzi unashamedly.

I am glad he stopped and got back his senses and ever since he has done a few tracks like 'Yanokola' and 'Baraba' which has made him gain back his respect.

On the question of good voice, I would not hesitate to say the same for Frank who calls himself Ankhoswe. Besides his very good voice, his compositions are lyrically compelling.

Of course a track like 'Masewera chabe' is more of a story telling marathon that sometimes becomes something else. The likes of long-drawn-out compositions of Thoko Katimba which would make you stick around a radio set long enough until it finishes as it is like listening to a short story.

I digressed, but my point is that there is need for our budding musicians to create their own identities. There are many artists who have tried to imitate Skeffa Chimoto, Lucius Banda, Billy Kaunda etcetera but they did not achieve music greatness.

The reason we are today talking about Frank Kaunda is because despite imitating Skeffa Chimoto he has shown us all that he is naturally talented and he has a very bright (in Malawian context of course) future.

Frank ought to realise that Skeffa Chimoto started with imitating and doing covers for Mlaka Maliro but he only used him as a learning passage.

Today, we cannot say that Skeffa imitates Mlaka because that is not what it is as he has now created his own identity which has attracted both local and international admirers including the current Zambian President Edgar Lungu.

There is need to have a cut-off point when an artists who is new in the game is using the works of the established ones.

I will end this entry in the exact way that I ended the one I did for Evance Meleka.

Musicians in this country should not only help each other financially, they also need to guide one another on career direction, surely those that have veered off the road need someone to help them get him back on the track if they have to achieve anything…

This is my message to Frank!

The resurrection of Billy Kaunda

 Sometime in September of 2011 when I was a tenant of the title across the street, I wrote something to the effect that musical star Billy Kaunda was ‘The Fading Musician’. Oh Dear, you should have seen how he reacted.

I still blame the gatekeeper of the Weekender at the time for I was writing as Prof. Zungwala but this did not stop Billy from getting hold of me – this is a story for another day.

Billy was deputy cabinet minister at the time and I really do not understand whether his not taking my perceived ‘attacks’ on the chin was bolstered by this fact or not.

It is not for any fears of similar attacks that I come again to proclaim of Billy’s resurrection having watched him perform at M1 Central Point in Lilongwe recently. This was a musical show organised by Skeffa Chimoto who brought along the Zambian acrobat chief Dalisoul who masquerades as a musician.

Billy was the last to perform and from the onset of his performance up until over 150 minutes later when the curtain fell, he never disappointed.

Billy has a band called Armageddon but on this occasion I was surprised to see smartly dressed young men who I later learnt are members of Lilongwe Baptist Church Band which Billy plays with.

I have never been impressed with such adroit display of a band that never lost it in any way save for one occasion when one of the three keyboards – 3 keyboards you heard me right – went off key and Billy went right there to assist putting it back in order.

What is interesting is that the one behind that particular keyboard was Billy Kaunda Junior, his own younger son who is part of the band. Of course this mishap cannot take away the fact that the boy is equally very talented considering that he is into music as a pass time activity going by his father’s explanation. He just had sat for his form 5 exams at Kalibu Academy and is set to pursue his studies elsewhere. 

Let me borrow from my last entry to say matter of fact that ever since music ‘revolutionalised’ from the era of Robert Fumulani to that of Paul Banda in the early 1990s, the coming on the scene by Lucious Banda followed shortly after by Billy Kaunda changed the music landscape.

‘Mwapindulanji’, an album by Billy Kaunda stormed the industry with, helped to give a fresh impetus to the euphoria of having kissed goodbye the dictatorial rule, ushering in the multiparty democracy that had been ignited by ‘Son of a Poor Man’, a South African recorded album by Lucius Banda.

My argument for thinking that Billy’s career is fading took us back to the early days where lyrics in songs of Lucius Banda and Billy Kaunda were all but political and it was of little surprise that the two ended up doubling as politicians.

Again Lucius stepped on the political terrain earlier and from this time he started experiencing a divided following; others that followed his music thought the United Democratic Front, a party he had vilified in his songs but later joined, showed that, in principle, he is more worst than the politicians he musically castigated.

When Billy followed, the public swipe he faced was not as bad as the one Lucius had politically.

While both entered parliament and pursued political careers alongside the musical profession, Lucius had to be brought down politically and his music managed to clean up the political egg that smeared his face.

Love him or hate him, Lucius managed to survive because regardless of his political involvement he still had time for his music and every time he entered the studio to do a piece or two he brought out that which keep people debating.

Unfortunately for Billy Kaunda, ever since he joined the political fray, he never gave the seriousness that his musical career deserved and therefore while Lucius suffered political backlash it is Billy’s musical career that had to contend with some hostility due to the raw deal the industry says it was getting from him.

Now out of politics Billy’s musical career is back. I will explain why later.

Nsaku: From analogue to digital

Charles Nsaku is a musician that the young ‘urban’ age can not relate to; at least this is according to my submission.

Nsaku emerged on the scene from a very different Balaka route, but it was Balaka nonetheless.

A wealthy business person had started a band which he called Mwizalero Band in Balaka and that’s where he cut his professional teeth.

If you ask me, I will put Nsaku with a special generation of musicians who brought a special wind of music direction in the country. The Generation marshalled by Sir Paul Banda.

Paul’s younger brother Lucius prides himself as one who at one point or the other hosted many popular musicians when he established his Zembani Band and in the process helping to begin careers of Mlaka Maliro, Paul Chaphuka(Late), Billy Kaunda, Coss Chiwalo, Wendy Harawa, Emma Masauko, Enort Mbandambanda, Charles Nsaku etcetera.

But I put them in one music generation and of all those that emerged from this generation, only Lucius Banda can confidently declare that he is indeed moving with time. He has survived the tides and has responded to the present day demand. In my own words, I can say he has managed to migrate from analogue to digital.

It has been a process that has taken longer than one would anticipate. But one just needs to the listen to Lucius albums that he has hauled from past to the present including the present one rightly called ‘Thank You’.

Pardon my digression; I want to talk about Charles Nsaku. His choice of migration from analogue to digital was a little bit uncharacteristic and proven not to be in compatible with the system.

Being someone who has been around, especially when he established his band called ‘Ali ku Town Sounds’ many artists claim to have gone through his hands via the band including the current big names like Skeffa Chimoto.

Now, in an effort to return the favour, sometime last year Skeffa decided to hold a joint show with his mentor Nsaku at Wakawaka. The mistake that was made was to still use the obsolete ‘windows’ into the present advanced sophisticated operating system. You know issues of incompatibility.

Nsaku was still using the language he used to tell the fans he was performing before 15 years ago; still tried ‘Ankolo Pansi pa Bedi’, ‘Makaniki’, ‘Economy’, ‘Ndiphike Nyemba’, etcetera, oh God, it just could not click.

He really tried hard but it was apparent that most of the youthful patrons that had come for the show only waited for Skeffa as they could not identify themselves with the tracks of the old. No wonder those of old age responded with gusto and worse still the turnout was not one that is associated with Skeffa Chimoto, meaning even the old ones could be counted with the fingers of just one hand.  

One thing is now clear; either Nsaku has to retain his niche market that has fallen for his music over the time or he has to adjust and adapt to the market demand.

At his time, musicians used to make a lot of money by selling cassette albums through OG Issah music distribution system. Now this is system is no longer relevant.

Not even CDs are an attraction as with the advent of digital production and piracy of course; people carry all the lifetime albums of an artist in just one singe CD or a memory stick in the name of MP3. 

MP3 or MPEG Media layer III was designed by the Moving Picture Experts Group (MPEG) as a means of compressing a sound sequence into a very small file, to enable digital storage and transmission.

What has to happen now is even a change to the approach of Nsaku music. The studio work has to be different from what he used to do. Now people popularise music that has been well done and this advertises for one’s upcoming live shows. This is where the musicians are currently mining their gold.

Unless Nsaku takes a drastic shift in his approach, he will be best suited to perform in our museums.

Lucius Banda has managed to avoid this by appealing to the present as well. When he plays his music people of different generations still know he is their own. One clever way that Lucius has managed to do to achieve this is to circumvent the issue of analogue and meet half way down with digital all the time. He has always adroitly moved with the pace. He has his place in all the generations. He has even co-opted into his album productions all youthfull musicians of the moment through collaborations among others.

If for example Joseph Nangalembe was to come back to perform today, it will be folly for him to expect to have a pull that he was commanding in his time with the performance of the old which was also meant for the audience of then.

Nsaku has been in the wilderness for so long, his comeback cannot be on the basis of riding on his ghost. On the said day, he even tried to bring along his younger brother Dave. Apart from the dreadlocks Dave is sporting now, he was just the same old one; energetic on stage yes, but with the same style that appealed to the old folks.

Sorry guys, times have changed, move with it if you still want to matter in the current Malawi music scenario.