adminAfter Independence in 1980, groups such as The Four Brothers, Thomas Mapfumo and The Blacks Unlimited, Leonard Dembo and Barura Express, Oliver Mtukudzi and the Black Spirits, Jonah Sithole, Lovemore Majaivana, Tinei Chikupo, The Bhundu Boys and many others instantly revolutionised the music scene as we began to hear more and more of Shona and Ndebele songs and beats in the new music.
Before 1980, there were several black Zimbabwean rock bands who played nothing but pure rock. Groups such as Muddy Face, Baked Beans, Electric Mud, Wells Fargo, Ebony Sheik, Four Aces, Whitstone, Dr Footswitch, The Sound Effects, Movement, Heart, Mind and Creation, Eye of Liberty, Sweet Charity, Terry Yon’s Combo, The Four Sounds, Eye Q and many others.
There were also some white musicians in Zimbabwe such as Robert and Allan Zipper of Otis Waygood Band, The Heritage Band, Stallion, Klunk, Nick Pickard, Iris Jones, Clem Tholet, Noreen Welch, The Gutter Band, Steve Roskilly and Martin Norris. They all played rock music. However, today there are only a few traces of this type of music left in the country.
All these groups were inspired by the rock music they were subjected to before Independence. Even black radio DJs who included Patrick Bajila, Ephraim Chamba, Webster Shamu, Wellington Mbofana, Ishmael Kadungure and Hilton Mambo who were based at the Rhodesia Broadcasting Corporation’s African Service could not resist the music of Pink Floyd, Grand Funk Railroad, Deep Purple, Jethro Tull, Wishbone Ash, Led Zeppelin, Jimi Hendrix, The Beatles, The Rolling Stones and Credence Clearwater Revival. This was the music which was available and record companies such as Teal (now Gramma) and Gallo (now Zimbabwe Music Corporation) preferred to release this type of music. Rock was the music of the day and rock band festivals in the 1970’s became an annual event.
Way back in 1972, music promoter Jack Sadza organised a multi-racial music festival at Nyamanhindi’s Resort near Bazeley Bridge, 30 kilometres from Mutare. He called it “The Rock Band Festival” in which both black and white groups participated.
Manu Kambani, who was one of the participants with his Whitstone Band, outshone everyone with his unique guitar solos and stage acts which included playing the guitar using his mouth, while carrying it on his back and pouring paraffin and burning a fake guitar on stage (Hendrix style). He was wearing a T-shirt emblazoned “Jimi Hendrix is dead but Manu is alive!” The next day, Manu appeared on the front page of The Rhodesia Herald – marking one rare occasion when a black face appeared on the front page of a white-owned national newspaper. Other music heroes who also started to make headlines after this event were prolific drummer Jethro Shasha, Louis Mhlanga, Isaac Chirwa, Soul Evans with Soul and Blues Union, Boykie and Robert Moore with Sabhuku, and Hilton Mambo and The Groovy Union.
It was not until the late 1970s with the war of liberation gaining momentum that record companies began to show an interest in chimurenga and sungura music because of the huge sales that the likes of Thomas Mapfumo with albums such as “Hokoyo” and others were making. From then onwards, the floodgates of Zimbabwean music were opened.
Even a few bands which had stuck to Western music such as The Pied Pipers, The Delphans, The Springfields and The Harare Mambo band began to change with the latter group making a hit with “Mbuya Nehanda Kufa Vachi Shereketa”.
In the early 1980s there were still traces of rock musicians in the country. Brian Rusike, who had just left The Stardust Band which played rock, joined the Pied Pipers and influenced them to play the same music genre for a while. But on seeing the trend the music was going they followed it with hits such as “Amayo”, “Country Boy”, “Reggae Sounds of Africa’” “Ruva Rangu”, “Let’s Rebuild Zimbabwe”, “Jimmy Boy”, “You Can’t Stop The Revolution” and “African Woman”, but most of the songs were still sung in English .
The Harare Mambos continued with mostly cover versions of songs from the rock era as they moved to Victoria Falls where they performed mainly for tourists visiting the country.
Other rock groups included Banned whose members were Nigel Dams (vocals), Len Strydom (lead guitar), Brad Townsend (rhythm guitar), Dave Hughes (bass), Richard Juscek (drums) and Paul Smith (drums, replaced Richard).
The band enjoyed a residency at Harare’s Archipelago. They also made occasional appearances at The Hangar.
Bud Cockcroft was another outstanding rock musician who, after leaving the Zimbabwe Air Force in June 1982 and joining the Omani Air Force really got seriously into guitar playing. This was due, in no small measure, to the amount of spare time he had on his hands! He had, of course, always had an abiding interest in music and had played in many school boy bands as a drummer. He became famous for his song “Run Rhino Run”, which was aimed at preventing poachers from destroying the rhino species.
Another rock group, Cutlass, which was made up of Joey Roberts, Adrian Beecham, Brian and Dave Nunema gigged regularly at the Holiday Inn.
Private Limited is yet another rock group of the early 1980’s. Its members were Karen Hegarty (vocals, Gavin Hooker (vocals & guitar), Nigel Dams (vocals & keyboards), Paul Heath (bass) and Anthony Bourdillon (drums).
The band played 80s and 90s dance music and appeared regularly at Marilyn’s. They also appeared at the Harare International Conference Centre which they described as “a buzz”.
Much later in 2002, a rock band called Kwe Kwe was formed but it did not make much impact in music circles as a lot of music fans had since moved away from rock music. Its members were Brian Williams (lead vocals & percussion), Melody Banditi (vocals & percussion), Ellen “Fanny” Kapusa – Vocals & percussion, Len Strydom (lead & synthesiser guitars), Luba Mahalkovic (second lead), Christo Georgiadis (bass) and Mark Robbins (drums).
Subsequent personnel changes in this band were: Melody Banditi and Luba Mahaklovic who both left in 2004 and were replaced by Isaac Chirwa, who came in on keyboards.
As Zimbo-rock has disappeared from the Zimbabwean musical scene, a lot of controversy has been going on in the last two decades regarding what Zimbabwean music should be called. One of the great beauties about Zimbabwean music is its variety. Traces of all different forms of music that Zimbabweans have been exposed to in the past are found in many of the compositions from today’s Zimbabwean pop musicians. For instance, there are traces of Western pop and rock in the music of groups such as Ilanga and Talking Drum while Solomon Skuza, The Pied Pipers and Ebony Sheik fused most of their composition with reggae music. John Chibadura, Nyami Nyami Sounds, Marxist Brothers, Devera Ngwena, Leonard Dembo, Naison Chimbetu and many others fused their music with the Zairean rhumba beat. Their version of rhumba is sometimes referred to as sungura. There are also some groups who fuse their music with South African mbaqanga. The likes of Lovemore Majaivana, Fanyana Dube, Jungle Band and Oliver Mtukudzi fall into this category.
To add to this, some groups fuse traditional folk music with modern pop to give a completely new sound which is now being identified as exclusively Zimbabwean music. Names such as chimurenga, jiti, Afro-acid and mahobho have emerged in the last twenty or so years as labels for Zimbabwean music.
Some names such as reggae have been adapted wholesale to represent the kind of music being played. Names such as kwela, smanje-manje, marabi and rumba are also commonplace. Today’s youngsters even go on to emulate Jamaican dancehall and American hip-hop and simply start singing to it in Shona.
It is therefore almost impossible to give one brand name to Zimbabwean music because it does not come in one form.
There is no single sound which could be described as uniquely Zimbabwean as no single name will suffice since Zimbabwean music fuses rumba with traditional mbira beat plus many other beats. Most of Zimbabwe’s music, like all other music genres, expresses the social life and hardships experienced by the people. It talks about the war, the social conditions of ordinary people, poverty and the injustices in society. At times it talks about romance.
One thing for certain is that less and less people are still keen on Zimbo-rock. Zimbo-rock seems to have experienced a quiet death.
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