Another Dosage of Kenyatta Hill

Kenyatta Hill and Culture were in Malawi in June last year where they performed in Blantyre and Lilongwe. I attended the Blantyre show at Mibawa. 

Given an opportunity I can get to their show again and again. In fact everything being equal, I won't miss their Sand Festival show for anything.

And as an icing of the cake this time round Andrew Tosh is going to be part of the festival this year and for a reggae fanatic this is more than one can ask for.

However, my excitement cannot fail me to look and question the pattern when it comes to inviting the international acts. Of course I know of same music stars that perform in Amsterdam year in, year out as an annual fixture.

However for Malawi at least we have had Fanton Mojah, Luciano, and twice Morgan Heritage brought by Born African Productions. While Sand Festival has brought Busy Signal twice and of course through Impakt Events, Lucius Banda's company that organises the festival, also brought into the country Kenyatta and Culture.

Now the announcement that has come to light is that Kenyatta Hill and Culture alongside Andrew Tosh will headline the musical face of the festival this year.

What I could not fail to notice is that Impakt Events is fond of inviting artist severally. I don’t know the business of bringing these guys into the country and 

I will therefore base my opinions from the heart.

Which is that we have numerous artists of reggae out there who can as well be invited into the country so that we have an opportunity to appreciate them the way we did last time Kenyatta and Culture came.

If we will go to Kenyatta's performance again, it will be for the fact that he is a great entertainer, there are others though who will not be very excited because they already watched his performance last year.

It surely would be double exciting to have new big names. Of course there is Andrew Tosh. The similarity between Andrew and Kenyatta is that they are both sons of the greatest reggae icons, Peter Tosh and Joseph Hill respectively.

Having died in 1987, Peter Tosh does not resonate so well with today's youthful audience whose attraction is a different genre altogether. Joseph Hill died in 2006 and because he was one artist no world music lover would ignore, he managed to interest the modern youth even though they are into some other funny genres.

Now with this when Kenyatta who is now 39, stepped in it was all easy for him unlike Andrew who has rode more on the songs left behind by his fallen legendary father. Of course Kenyatta too has fully adopted the sharp social commentary and catchy rhythms characteristic of his father's music.

While Kenyatta's debut single, “Daddy,” backed by a masterful roster of musicians including Sly Dunbar and Dean Fraser spelt the way for him and helped him to make own name, for 51-year-old Andrew who first release a single in 1985 two years before the demise of his father, not much has happened.

The other good thing with Andrew is that he has had it all, having been exposed to the music of his father's group The Wailers from an early age. Andrew also performed two songs at his funeral, "Jah Guide" and "Equal Rights". Imagine! He is also nephew to living reggae legend Bunny Wailer.

His work with producer Winston Holness on his debut album, Original Man was followed in 1989 by a second album, Make Place For The Youth, which was recorded in the United States and was nominated for a Grammy Award for Best Reggae Album.

Andrew Tosh also toured with The Wailers Band in 1991. But if you ask many, not one will know Andrew Tosh's own tracks. This is unlike the Marley children who have managed to popularise their songs.

Well, while I am looking forward to their performance I just could not help it, but point out a few things.

The way of Kenyatta Hill

Joseph Hill, the fallen reggae hero whose son Kenyatta and wife Pauline were in town a few weeks ago should be smiling from above.

There are several Jamaican reggae artists that have died. One that quickly comes to mind is Gregory Anthony Isaacs, a reggae legend who had released over 500 albums in his career. He lived from July 15, 1951 to October 25, 2010.

Of course before Isaacs, four years earlier Joseph ‘Culture’ Hill died after collapsing following a performance in Berlin on August 19, 2006.

Unlike Gregory Isaacs, Joseph Hill is one lucky fellow as his son is continuing doing the work he died doing on that fateful August day.

What is even more reassuring is that Kenyatta is performing with the original Culture members that include his Uncle Albert Walker and Telford Nelson.

Early June, the group performed at Mibawa Multipurpose Hall in Blantyre and Civo Stadium in Lilongwe a day later.

I attended the Blantyre show where in the process people who had entered the show venue with ulterior motives robbed me of my smart phone and a cash filled wallet right at the time when Kenyatta ascended unto the stage to perform.

If his performance was going to be a display of mediocrity then this would have been the longest night.

In any case the theft I suffered would have given me the perfect cue to exit the venue and drive back home. It was never to be and later after the show I felt more than compensated for my loss.

Kenyatta respected his fallen iconic reggae legendary father with dynamite packed performance. It dawned on those of us who exult good music that the legend of Joseph Hill lives on as he will continue bubbling on the top 100 forever and ever not only through his body of work but also through his son’s awe-inspiring musical performance.

Kenyatta has his father’s voice only that his has more clout and dynamism that he packages with youthful energy and electrifying stage presence.

For years, he has been his father’s sound engineer and this is also well demonstrated in the way he controls, not only the band, but the two elderly backing duo that has traversed the world with his father.

To imagine that he had only practiced with the band which had South African based members for a few hours, what followed spoke volumes of the kind of future that is in store for the young Hill.

He also displayed discipline that is only present in professional artists. If you must know, Kenyatta has three albums to his name, released after the death of his father. Never in a moment did he play any of the songs that he has done as a solo project.

When the sound was not coming out the way he liked he would stop the performance in the way that looked like it was part of the act. He was holding a short carved black stick that he was systematically using to tell one on bass what he wanted. He was in fact using the stick to communicate to the whole band.

Listening to his performance one would have thought it was Joseph Hill with improved rendition of his tracks. Under the prevailing circumstances he performed like the spirit of his fallen father had entered him, more so with his mother sitting right on stage watching her son.

Those artists that curtain raised the show like members of the Black Missionaries and Mr. Cool; I should believe learnt a lesson or two.

We have had children of Bob Marley, Peter Tosh’s son Andrew and even Garnet Silk Junior performing after the fall of their fathers. None has come so near to the perfection of the works of their fathers as has Kenyatta, he has his unique way.

  

Kenyatta Hill, the True Musical Son

When you listen to the album, ‘Live On: Tribute to Culture’ by the son of the legendary Jamaican reggae outfit’s front man Joseph ‘Culture’ Hill you realise how a true musical son he is to his father.

I really do not know if his situation can be compared to the other sons that took over from their fathers, like the Black Missionaries back home, for example, but in the case of Kenyatta Hill one would really be tempted to believe what is written on the website called http://www.fastlaneintl.com/khill_live_on.htm  that his career began the day his father’s ended.

Kenyatta’s dad, Joseph, who was the front man and songwriter for the Jamaican vocal trio, Culture. He collapsed and died while on a 2006 tour of Europe. The website notes that to the amazement of promoters, fans and critics alike, Kenyatta stepped onstage and delivered electrifying performances time and again - nineteen shows in all - until the tour was complete. And this was unheard of in any genre of music at any time, it states.

“Kenyatta gave of himself so totally – as his father had for so many years – that the two seemed to become one, the eerily similar voices and the vibes igniting the critics and yielding a new reggae mantra ‘magic, not tragic!’” the website reports.

As if what he displayed with the remaining shows of his father was not enough, at the Ranny Williams Centre in Kingston, Jamaica, at the memorial concert for Joseph, the website states that Kenyatta’s performance with Culture was the highlight in the star-studded night and garnered him the rousing applause of the hard-to-please Kingston reggae audience. It further notes that Kenyatta went on to front Culture in a series of performances in the US, Caribbean, Brazil, Argentina and Peru, again leaving audiences amazed and delighted.

The coming on the scene by the young Hill is said to be influenced by elements of dancehall grounded in the roots tradition and motivated to carry on his father’s work. Kenyatta set to writing, finishing songs that Joseph had started and creating new music of his own.

“On his poignant debut single, “Daddy”, (Tafari Records) backed by a masterful roster of musicians, including Sly Dunbar and Dean Fraser, and produced by Lynford “Fatta” Marshall, he confronted the emotional pain and uncertainty he felt after the loss of his father. He cried while he wrote, just as audiences in Europe had cried while he sang,” the website states.

I am getting all that the website wrote because it truly expresses what I wanted to say about Kenyatta having listened to his album this week. The website marks ‘Pass the Torch’ as the complete CD having “a collector’s item feel” which was released in 2007 to long-time Culture fans and critics who have embraced the son, named after Jomo Kenyatta, the first President of Kenya.

“With its very lovely and high level vibe Kenyatta Hill’s first CD prompted one long-time Culture fan to proclaim, ‘Culture is ALIVE’,” states the website matter-of-factly.

The website says indeed Culture, featuring Kenyatta, continues to share the wisdom of Joseph’s conscious reggae, overlaid with Kenyatta’s own lively and youthful musical vision. Kenyatta toured in support of ‘Pass the Torch’ with a number of festival appearances throughout 2009 as well as a highly successful US tour with Beres Hammond in 2009 and 2010.

It was after these tours that in 2011 he released ‘Live On’, a highly-acclaimed tribute to the music of Joseph Hill and Culture with Kenyatta performing fresh renditions of some of their classic compositions. 2011 also saw Kenyatta Hill on tour with a hot new band and expands his musical horizons beyond his formidable roots.

Of course, the father is always the father, but listening to ‘Live On’ one cannot help it but realise that indeed the father, Joseph Hill, is still alive in the son, Kenyatta Hill.

One big question back home would then be: is it the same with the living sons? Is Robert Fumulani still alive in the persons of Anjiru and Chizondi?