Bahamadia bonanza
Many people have told me that when rappers come to South Africa toperform they get a bloated sense of self worth. All of a sudden theyare too good to spit their real hardcore seminal stuff down. I know for
a fact that when Snoop Dogg was in the country he was a wanker who had
the nerve to tell MTV that in this country we thought of him as a god
so he had to come to save his people. WTF?!
So I guess expecting
something of that kind when Bahamadia was in the country, I was waiting
for the usual shit. But it was completely different. Bahamadia has been
on the scene for almost 20 years. She started out in 1993 in
Philadelphia with mix tapes on the street, getting her recognised, like
many rapper Happily Ever After stories. These mix tapes helped her get
her first album sold internationally in 1994. From there she
collaborated and toured with loads of groups including the Roots crew,
Brand New Heavy's, Slum Village, the Fugees and many more. The release
of her second album was delayed because of issues with her record
label, EMI. She was contracted to them while the label was folding and
she was trapped, not being able to get out of the deal, so she got
around this by featuring on various tracks. Her music was still played
on commercial radio in America, with her mix tapes playing on stations
for two years. It took four years before she could get out of her
contract with EMI, so she decided to tour the world doing tracks with
other musicians in drum and bass. It was after that that she released
her second project, BB Queen, and is now working on her third album.
Some call her one of the greatest females emcee's ever, and with good reason. She killed hard, with her driven lyrics and powerful voice. "Hip hop is for everyone. In America we are not as exposed to the scene in South Africa as we should be. I thought with the Internet we would be seeing a lot more of the scene in other countries, but it's not happening. The scene is still segregated globally and that is really unfortunate. I don't see it as a segregated thing, when I listen to people music from other countries I don't look at it from where that person is from, I look at it only from a hip hop stance and who that person is as an individual." She put that theory to the test by sharing the stage with local females emcees and poet, giving the mic to Nthabo, Bianca and power femme, Lebo Mashile. Her drum kick sneer man DK Statick held down for them too as local talent made her smile. "Music and more specifically hip hop should unify us all, especially the spoken word because it is the most powerful tool we have." She says hip hop should be genuine to the person who is doing it, no matter that language it is. Bahamadia is also not into people emulating, and Americans seem to define that as the real hip hop. " That says you don't have knowledge of yourself as a person and that is very disappointing. When I come here I don't want to see someone trying to be a Bahamadia. I am a unique individual; we are all unique individuals. So when I come I want to see what you are doing here that we are not doing over there, so we can all learn from each other. That is my understanding of hip hop and it's gotten me this far."
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