Africa Is a Country

Sampling Semenya

Sampling Semenya

By
Tom Devriendt

An interview in a (South African) Sunday paper with a ‘hopping mad’ Caiphus Semenya (the South African musician* was surprised to hear his music was being sampled in the ‘Murder to Excellence’ track on the Jay-Z & Kanye West’s Watch The Throne album — without him being consulted) got us curious about the song used. Turns out it is ‘Celie Shaves Mr./Scarification Ceremony’, of The Color Purple soundtrack which Semenya co-wrote with Quincy Jones, Harvey Mason Jr., Joel Rosenbaum and Bill Summers:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9ci8KKr5zV0

Get them, Caiphus.

In the meanwhile we’ll stick to Zuluboy sampling another song of his (‘Nomalanga’):


[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LNhkatwxLXo&w=600&h=373]

*If you’re wondering who Caiphus is: with his wife Letta Mbulu (fronting their family band) they built respectable careers out of Los Angeles in the 1970s and 1980s. (Click through for the videos of Letta on Soul Train with Caiphus on backing vocals and later in the early 1980s.) When he arrived in the US in the early 1960s, Caiphus started collaborating with Hugh Masekela and Jonas Gwangwa (listen to their Union of South Africa).

Further Reading

No one should be surprised we exist

The documentary film, ‘Rolé—Histórias dos Rolezinhos’ by Afro-Brazilian filmmaker Vladimir Seixas uses sharp commentary to expose social, political, and cultural inequalities within Brazilian society.

Kenya’s stalemate

A fundamental contest between two orders is taking place in Kenya. Will its progressives seize the moment to catalyze a vision for social, economic, and political change?

More than a building

The film ‘No Place But Here’ uses VR or 360 media to immerse a viewer inside a housing occupation in Cape Town. In the process, it wants to challenge gentrification and the capitalist logic of home ownership.