2005-11-19,+Felasophy,+Chimurenga+No+8

= FELASOPHY =

Chimurenga Vol. 8 Launch: “We’re all Nigerian!”

Shivava Café, Newtown Precint, Jozi: Friday 02 December 2005, from 8pm

The Reader,

If you don’t know about //Chimurenga//, it’s because you’re not looking. And you’re definitely not reading. A magazine established independently in March 2002, from Cape Town, title meaning struggle in Shona, this quarterly publication probes with unnerving regularity the condition and scope of humanity from an African locale.

Steven Bantu Biko in his seminal study, //I Write what I Like//, (before Gideon Niewoudt and others bashed his brains out to decorate cell 69), said that Africa’s greatest gift to man has yet to come, and that is to give the world a more humane face.

Well, //Chimurenga// is part of that project.

The latest issue, to be launched in Jozi – each issue births with musicians and word artists – at Shivava Café in the Newtown precinct, interrogates and states the condition of nation; as we make it and speak it and simultaneously silence it. The title is, as usual, provocative:

“We’re All Nigerian!”

Thing about this publication is that it places on the agenda what we really know, but hardly ever utter, that taboo. In this case, that of being Nigerian and its place and function in contemporary society. So, ja, yaa’ll will read about the woman who smuggles drugs in her viscera via trans-continental flights; her motivation and lodestone the disabled very horny young male she has produced. And yes, there’s a parodic 419 email from Dubya’s wife, Laura. The Ogoni 9, encapsulated in the name of poet and anti-global oil warfare activist Ken Saro Wiwa, receive an obituary in the form of a tale about their last minutes on earth before the late Nigerian dictator Sani Abacha hangs them. Yes, there’s the story of an educated woman who goes job hunting in Lagos, gets her butt mauled by the males who will pay her wages and takes the job. Street photographer in Akinbode Akinbinyi resurrects the power and beauty involved with artists from the hood who choose to represent our own. Olu Oguibe, with great bitterness and historical precision lays down the history of Biafra, that West African genocide that is iconic of the ethnic madness that Frantz Fanon calls the “oppression of the oppressed” – that condition where we kill and maim in the name of an imposed progress. Ishtiyaq Shukri writes of walls, visible and not, from here to Palestine. All of this wrapped and motivated by Wole Soyinka, that inimitable voice from the wilderness of the west of Africa, who, on Nigerianess, mos sings in pidgin: “E push me so, I push am back/ Na’im and me go live till I die.” And, of course, this issue is about the Chief Priest, Fela Kuti: King of Afrobeat and people art, and the art of being people. Anikulapo. An amazing interview with him – his last – conducted by musician Keziah Jones. Plus great visuals; plus poetry; plus cover art by Rucera Seethal; plus more.

So, rightly, the launch of this issue is dubbed “Felasophy.” The founder and editor of //Chimurenga//, Ntone Edjabe, and Paolo Chibanga from dub band 340ml, together with the Zakhe Arts group from Alexandra, have invited some of the latest crop of progressive musicians and mic artists in Jozi to re-voice the words and music of Fela: a core groove section (drums, bass, guitar, keys, horns, DJ, percussion and backing vox) that play selected grooves inspired by Fela’s compositions, and a number of featured ‘voices’ (instrumental and vocal) that intermittently add layers (rehearsed and improvised) on top of the grooves. The foundation-tunes for the jam are: Water No Get Enemy; Dog Eat Dog; Upside Down; Expensive Shit; Shakara; Coffin for Head of State; Lady.

Here’s what you can get at Shivava on Friday 02 December, from 8pm:


 * //Chimurenga// Vol 8: “We’re all Nigerian!”
 * A tribute to AND celebration of the music and words of Fela Anikulapo Kuti
 * Smarts
 * Spirit
 * Power
 * Love
 * Human tings

And entrance is FREE.

Who No Know Go Know. Start with //Chimurenga//.

Heita.


 * For more information:**
 * http://www.chimurenga.co.za/**
 * info@chimurenga.co.za**
 * tel: +2721 4224168**
 * fax: +2721 4241673**