Live Under The Sun at Emmarentia Dam
This Sunday 2nd November get into the summer Jozi sun with a daytime concert in beautiful surrounds as you lay back and soak up Goldfish, Laurie Levine, Steady Rock and Abert Frost at the Johannesburg Botanic Gardens at Emmarentia Dam. Picnic baskets allowed, but no glass bottles – gates open at 12 and it’s R70 a ticket at the gate or R50 presale… kids under 12 for free. ...
Lerato Mogoathle – Our African Pride
She’s one superbrave continental jet-setter, Lerato Mogoathle is currently uprooting fertile earth all over West Africa as she digs into the highs and lows of our mixed up continent. Get inspired by her moving African travel stories in the City Press (do yourselves a favour) and pack your own backpack for a true African discovery… We’re blessed to be in constant touch with her and to receive page-turning updates on the marvellous world of Miss L Boogie, today she shares her Salif Keita adventure with us. Represent Sisi! Sharpile for your words! : Picture this, if you will. You are a music journalist jaded with the mainstream pop culture, hungry for more African music and currently travelling around West Africa, the region whose music, cultures and literature fuelled your obsession for experiencing Africa. You arrive in Abidjan, Ivory Coast, and love what you see when it is a poster announcing Salif Keita’s concert in two weeks. The first time I saw Salif Keita on stage was in 2004 when he was being awarded a lifetime achievement award at the Kora All African Music Awards. Dressed in white, he literally descended on stage, glowing under the lights. This is the image, and admiration for his music and increasing obsession with Malian music that leads me to Yamasoukrrou, the capital of Ivory Coast. The newspapers said the show starts at 6pm. I arrived there in the nick of time, only to wait and wait for what felt like eternity to start. The ball starts rolling three hours later, with sound checks and opening acts that, as entertaining as they were, only made me my waiting that unbearable. The Malian great Keita gets on the stage. The hall falls silent. We know we are about to experience a moment in time, not any other live show. He starts the show by kneeling before us; thanking us for being with him that night. He opens with two acoustic songs. The first feels like a worship session; calming, serene and with that haunting voice, a channeling of Allah’s presence and manifestation in the moment. The second song is a duet with Ivorian superstar Aisha. They are a class act, delivering a performance that seems like they are always practicing how to deliver the song. We watch in silence. Then Salif raises his hand. The 11 piece band, whose sound check lasts as long as they need to make sure everything comes out PERFECT, joins him. It was the second best live show I have ever been to. The other also belongs to Salif, a day later in the town of Bouake. We rise and...
Love Jozi do it again
What more can we say… Yes, we’re proud to say they’re part of our extended family, but damn they never fail to blow us away with their superb sense of innovative style, always keeping us on our toes and filled with renewed vows for our city. Love Jozi we ♥ u. Respec’! This time round it’s all about Jozi being a MODEL CITY… (naaaasss…) this exclusive range of Model City Love Jozi t-shirts is available as part of the Virgin Mobile Pop Up store that will be popping up all over Jozi in the next month and a bit… just click on the flyer below! PS: Brad, don’t forget we need two to represent here in...
Represent Introduces: Anthea Moys
Representah Alana Cremonte is a big fan of performance artist Anthea Moys who is currently dabbling in the inner city… Alana wanted to share the love so that perhaps you too can take a ‘ncane break, a petit pause, una momenta… and smell…the… uh… jacarandas…while reflecting on this mad thing we call life. Sharpile Alana!: Why are so many people so caught up in their day to day fast-forward, that they forget how easy it is to just take a step back, pause and choose their next direction before moving forth? I guess they haven’t even realised that they need this luxury. Whether or not that has to do with the fact that this idea hasn’t been properly marketed with an ad campaign yet, is totally besides the point and I think it was small-minded of you to bring it up. To be fair, life does seem to be moving at a tremendous pace these days. So much so that even if you wanted to just stop and smell the roses, you’d find yourself at the back of the queue and desperately treading water. So, imagine if you had a moment of play forced on you. What if, you were interrupted from your hustle and bustle by “Jozi’s Golden Girls”. A gaggle of grannies, performing a choreographed dance routine in the middle of your city square. Gold and black tracksuits sparkling in the midday sun, good time music as their soundtrack and a young girl in the middle, joining in, almost a part of their world. Anthea Moys is the performance artist whose incredibly relevant work finds her positioned, both figuratively and literally, in the middle of people’s lives. She is constantly daring South Africa to stop and ask, why? The question is, if confronted with some of her work, would you stop and take it all in? At the very least you’d have to commit to a smile, right? Most people find a sigh of relief in her performance art. She doesn’t rely on shock tactics to get her message across, but rather, gently holds that proverbial mirror up to show her audience a piece of themselves they have forgotten. The world has charmed her and she openly admits to being curious of “people in their little worlds”. And that’s what she has consciously worked on showing us, a little glimpse and a “momentary gift” that unites you, so very specially, to anyone else involved. The moment is yours and you can hold your opinion of it close to you heart as you revel in the fact that you are sharing something that will never be recreated, just...
New Music Review: Tamarsha v Imbube
Oh yes, it’s a live and kicking music review battle on Represent as our resident reviewer, the delicious Dawn Penny, puts two new South African releases up against each other… RnB meets HipHop… We did warn you muso’s, don’t mess with Dawn, she knows what she likes and of course readers, what she believes you’ll like and what’s worth spending your hard-earned dosh on… Read all about it: Tamarsha – I ain’t givin’ up vs Imbube – Hip Hop Theatre Tamarsha – 4 beats out of 10 Imbube – 7 beats out of 10 I’ve decided to introduce something new to my music reviews and that’s “Battle of the Beats”. This will basically consist of a head to head between two genres and our first one is Hip hop vs R&B. The songstress Tamarsha going against the gutter rappers, Imbube. My criteria for this battle is Talent, X-factor, Sound and Favourites. Let the battle begin… Tamarsha – I ain’t givin’ up Talent: Before receiving this CD to review, I had never heard of Tamarsha before. I must say off the bat, she is talented. I mean she has an amazing voice and takes the time to write her own lyrics, which is always refreshing of an artist. Tamarsha has a beautiful voice and sounds like she knows how to use it. With so many males dominating the R&B scene in South Africa, it’s quite refreshing to hear a female vocal in the mix. But then a beautiful voice is only a mere fraction of what makes an artist. X-Factor: Um, this is a hard one because either you have it or you don’t. If you don’t, you’ll be stuck in suckville with no passport to leave. If you do, you will remembered – or at the least be sung along to. I have no doubt that Tamarsha has talent, she just doesn’t move. She doesn’t stand out, she doesn’t have her sound but rather a quilt of Destiny’s Child, Keyshia Cole or any such artist – but the 90s sound of that. I think she just needs more experience and more time spent finding that thing that sets her apart from the next girl. Sound: The production on Tamarsha’s album is not quite something that’ll make the short list in demos sent to producing greats. It’s mediocre at best. I mean it’s not bad, it’s just not good. It’s a sound that’s been heard before and doesn’t do much for her X-factor strife. Oh, she does her own rendition of Humpty Dumpty, ‘cept there’s no story behind it, no depth to it, just Humpty sitting on that wall and...
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