Could it be that the hip hop scene in Zimbabwe is coming back to life?! I am, as you may or may not know/believe, Zimbabawean and as such when growing up, in the 90s, hip hop was huge! Well to be fair hip hop was big in many African countries as well as here in the States. The age of Wu-Tang Clan (& all the amazing individuals therein), Biggie, Tupac, Nas and Jay-Z, Dead Prez and them. LL Cool J, MC Lyte, Queens Pen and Latifah, Naughty by Nature. There were so many in that beautiful blur that now is almost 20 years ago. *Suddenly became very aware of my age*. I was too young to know the intricacies of what makes good music except the beat and maybe the catchy lyrics. I mostly learnt and internalized what makes for good music through what I heard intermittently on the radio and watching my, then teenage, aunts and uncles putting records on and playing cassettes in the sitting room in the hours that my grandparents were out at work. The window of time that shaped my taste and understanding of music therefore was formed in the time they got off from school and when my grandparents came home. It was extended into a much wider window during the holidays when the teenagers and their, what i now recognize as, raging hormones were home for the holidays from boarding school. All day the Patras and the Tevin Campbells were blasting. Dolly Parton, Boyz II Men and Phil Collins were when someone was either very much in love or just got their heart broken. I really could go on and on, but won't.
Fast forward to a few Sundays ago. Sundays = the day she (referring to self in the third person) rests. Especially more so since I did not have work the next day. There is a guy I had started following on twitter for his rather prolific tweets by the name of Tehn Diamond on twitter. His tweets caught my attention for the unabashed bluntness during a #263chat about Zimbabweans in the diaspora and relations with those in Zimbabwe. I knew nothing about him, but felt he must have been on both sides of the fence that I am currently struggling to navigate and negotiate at some point in his life.
Outside of the #263chats I didn't really pay much mind and remember that the tweets of his I did notice tended to be talking about his website and how people were not ready, it was coming soon, big things in the works etc etc. Ok. This is twitter. You just follow and read. THIS is what we were waiting for:
No disappointments here! This video is amazing and between the song and it it's hard to figure which should be awarded! What I liked the most is that although the content has very urban leanings and probably would mostly appeal to young people in Zim, what was rapped about wasn't directly mimicking what American rappers talk about (i absolutely haaaate it when that happens). It spoke to the experiences of the two artists, Tehn Diamond (@tehndiamond) and Junior Brown, as well as a good amount of [not all however] young Zimbabweans IN Zimbabwe today. A revealing window glimpsing into some of modern Africa. Zimbabwe for all it is and isn't, was and will be, IS in fact what you hear about, but also a lot more. See evidence above :)
______________
*@afropolitaine*
Fast forward to a few Sundays ago. Sundays = the day she (referring to self in the third person) rests. Especially more so since I did not have work the next day. There is a guy I had started following on twitter for his rather prolific tweets by the name of Tehn Diamond on twitter. His tweets caught my attention for the unabashed bluntness during a #263chat about Zimbabweans in the diaspora and relations with those in Zimbabwe. I knew nothing about him, but felt he must have been on both sides of the fence that I am currently struggling to navigate and negotiate at some point in his life.
Outside of the #263chats I didn't really pay much mind and remember that the tweets of his I did notice tended to be talking about his website and how people were not ready, it was coming soon, big things in the works etc etc. Ok. This is twitter. You just follow and read. THIS is what we were waiting for:
No disappointments here! This video is amazing and between the song and it it's hard to figure which should be awarded! What I liked the most is that although the content has very urban leanings and probably would mostly appeal to young people in Zim, what was rapped about wasn't directly mimicking what American rappers talk about (i absolutely haaaate it when that happens). It spoke to the experiences of the two artists, Tehn Diamond (@tehndiamond) and Junior Brown, as well as a good amount of [not all however] young Zimbabweans IN Zimbabwe today. A revealing window glimpsing into some of modern Africa. Zimbabwe for all it is and isn't, was and will be, IS in fact what you hear about, but also a lot more. See evidence above :)
______________
*@afropolitaine*
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