si you’re my fans?: how to be a kenyan ‘artist’

Thanks to Montana, with whom this topic was discussed at length, with lots of ranting, but mostly laughs in the end.
There are quite a number of entertainers in Kenya. I use the term ‘entertainers’ carefully here, because some of them do nothing more than repeating themselves over and over, thinking that the screams from the crowd are from sheer delight/pleasure rather than horror and pain.
Many people are of the opinion that it takes some class of genius to become an artist in Kenya. Indeed it does. But then it also takes a bit of scandal to help you rise above all the other pretenders to the throne.
Here’s how to achieve artist-itude in 5 easy steps.
1. Create a scandal
Everyone remembers a scandal. The best thing is to do something completely out of your character. If you’re the one with dreads and the whole Jamaican bobo shanti vibe going, have pictures ‘accidentally’ taken of you getting a manicure at some uptown salon with those pseudo-French names. Get a shocked face, try to hide if you can, and make sure the one doing your nails gets asked all the questions. Tell her to tell the curious public that you go there all the time, and that you do a lot more than get your nails done at the place.
Suddenly you have an audience. Which leads to step number 2.
2. Ignore your fans
Certainly, with your ‘art’, you will attract a fanbase. Maybe it’s your neighbour, or that guy you owe money so he’s constantly asking you for his cash back, being as you just bought a ridiculously overpriced phone you can’t use… With time, you get recognized. That’s the nature of the game, or whatever you artist types call it.
So with time, you will be afforded the luxury of a fanbase, people who listen/look out for your stuff. Ignore them when they stop you on the street or at an event. What do they know? You’re important now, a celeb even. Say it out loud how you wish there was a way to keep some people away from your events. they’ll still show up, right?
Who’s the important one with his face on a t shirt? You of course.
So your face is on a t-shirt, and people are paying good money for it. Time for step 3…
3. Buy something ridiculously expensive that you don’t even need
You know that diamond-encrusted nose-hair trimmer you’ve always wanted? No? Now you want one. Fame = money = image. Image is everything. Look like you have money, otherwise nobody will want to listen to you. It works. Have you not seen the stuff people have lying around in their houses, or that they drive around? Get a car that needs its own oil well to maintain. You deserve it.
So you’re making money… People are paying you to show up and lip synch along to your own track, right? Time to burn some bridges, or as we say it in the biz, on to the next one, number 4…
4. Diss people
The best people to diss are those you admire. that will get their attention. Other good people to diss are the ones that made you. No, not your folks. Wait… That can work. The people that put you where you are, that gave you the push that got your ‘artist’ career started. What do they know? Fine, they got you where you are, but if they didn’t do anything you would still have ended up where you are, right?
Go on, write that diss track. How else will you honour them?
Bridges have been burned, and those clowns don’t want anything to do with you… But who needs them? You made it. In fact, you made it so hard that you can quit altogether… Which is where number 5 comes in…
5. Be a one-hit wonder
The best way to be remembered is to do one smash hit and then disappear into obscurity. That way there is no way you can top yourself. Leave the country. Blame things on invisible people and the ‘haters’. Haters will always bring you down, right? Who cares if they’re real or not. They hate. That’s a bad thing.
Even better than a one-hit wonder, constantly remix your one hit. Do collabos. Make enough remixes to fill an album and sell it to those fans you ditched back at #3.

All the best. You are officially a Kenyan ‘artist’. Get ready for guest spots on all those deejay shows they have. Heck, get your own show. And build your career. Leave school. School is for sad people who wear suits and make boring speeches about the bottom line. You are the cutting edge baby, yeah…

Dance or Die – Janelle Monae ft Saul Williams

Cyborg, android, d-boy, decoy,
water, wisdom, tightrope, vision,
insight, stronghold, heartless, ice cold, mystery, mastery, solar, battery

Some will pull the gun because they want to be stars
Snatching up your life into the blink of an eye
And if you see your cloning on a street walking by
Keep a running for your life cause only one will survive
War is in the street and it’s an eye for an eye
Run on for your life or you can dance you can die
She’s praying in the sand like she’s the last samurai
It’s a stick up stick up and a pick up pick up
Telling lies and telling lies will put your face on fire
Run and tell your friends to never dream, never win
Ghettos keep a crying out to streets full of zombies
Kids are killing kids and then the kids join the army
Rising and a waking, yes sir here comes the sun
March into the war and with the kick of the drum
The wiser simians have got the bombs and the guns
So you might as well keep dancing if you’re not gonna run

A long long way to find the one
We’ll keep on dancing till she comes
These dreams are forever
Oh these dreams are forever
And if you wanna wake the sun
Just keep on marching to the drums
These dreams are forever
Oh these dreams are forever

Now I’m not saying it’s better to bailar (Spanish for dance)
You can pull the trigger or you can build you an ark
My words are rather kind you keep them held in contempt
Looking for a nine and then a droid you can tempt
Zombie, zombie, zombie, where do dreams come from?
A little bird is chirping and she’s singing a song
She’s shaking em and waking em and giving em mas
As the clock tick tocks and the bodies drop
I’m gonna lay myself so far way down right in your chops
Modern day example of the wolf vs flock
Freedom necessary and it’s by any means
Frozen they were stolen all the kings and queens
Sudanese and Congolese who put the roll in the rock
From here to Sudan, Metropolis to Iraq
It’s a minute to the dawn and yet the sun ain’t back
It’s still a war in all the stress and yes freaks will dance or die

A long long way to find the one
We’ll keep on dancing till she comes
These dreams are forever
Oh these dreams are forever
And if you wanna wake the sun
Just keep on marching to the drums
These dreams are forever
Oh these dreams are forever

Angel, blossom, gunshot, dodging,
dream, bright, beat, light,
breathe, live, help, give, focus, trance, wake up, dance!

I’m praying for the man sitting without much time
May he understand the clock will never rewind
Wisen him and sharpen him and give him a motto
hate no more, said he must hate no more
You see the daylight comes into the kingdom
But the kingdom’s full of ignorant men
Just keep rebelling away, you gotta dream it away
Because the weatherman on TV ain’t creating the weather
This man wants to see another jubilation
And that man wants us in emancipation
And then there is the man who wants a stronger nation
You see we really got to and i think that we ought to
Protect the mind from degradation
Sow in the seeds of education
They run from us, are we that dangerous?
There’s a war in all the streets and yes the freaks must dance or die!

Tagged

So I was watching this music video I haven’t seen in a while, Dirty Vegas’s Walk Into The Sun. Basically the plot revolves around the characters in a restaurant and they’re all tagged. They have their identities, like the white girl that’s ignorant, and the black boy that’s ignored, the waitress that’s bored, then she serves coffee to the guy that’s alone.
So all in all, everyone has their entire character broken down into that one word. Everything they do, say, see, hear, feel and such is boiled down to that word. Their whole lives are defined by that one tag. Usually from a habit, like the junkie or the drunk, some a little more wordy, like the washed-up has-been. Others are age-defined. Preteens, tweens, teens, twenty-somethings, thirty-somethings, middle-aged, old…
But what is the purpose of this?
Human minds are made to compartmentalize. Groups of things are easier to process than individuals.
So are we wired to be prejudicial?
Perhaps not. Prejudice is a reaction to this compartmentalization, sometimes made easier by physical differences.
Safety in numbers… A herd mentality. That’s what ends up making the situation the way it is.
Labels… More than meets the eye.

Nine in the Afternoon

There’s a thing about me and music, every time I hear a song I like, it plays perpetually in my head till I go download it, read through the lyrics online, then realize there’s a lot more to it than what I’d heard before. Like Panic at the Disco’s Nine in the Afternoon. there’s an interesting reference in there.

Back to the street where we began
Feeling as good as lovers can, you know
Yeah, we’re feeling so good

Picking up things we shouldn’t read
It looks like the end of history as we know
It’s just the end of the world

Back to the street where we began
Feeling as good as love
You could, you can

I found Miss Girl’s blog. I’m calling her Miss Girl because she’s an interesting mix of maturity and that child-like love for life that wears off, in most other people, with life’s gritty grittiness…
Reading it, I realized, one, that I don’t know as much grammar as I should, and two, that my actions as a human being affect more people than I know, or even take credit for… So much for the insight that comes with having a massive brain.
Now I’m not one to acknowledge my human side, and I have been blamed for having an annoying aloofness, with good reason. So for that, mea cupa, mea culpa, mea maxima culpa.

√4012009 = 2003

Apparently today is the first perfectly square (that’s if you live in the parts of the world where dates are written as month/date/year) April Fools’ Day. So happy Pranking. Just don’t prank me…

Wikipedia went overboard today, with stories so outrageous that they just might be true. Like the one where the Irish Prime Minister was seen walking around naked. Yeah, that one was funny.

It’s one of those days, long, hot, the kind where you just want to go nap and forget everything, especially after extenuating circumstances. Seeing as I’m on strike, I figured, why not use my energy for good? Have internet, will blog.

So, buckets in doorways aside, it was an interesting April Fools…
Way to make a start, eh?

Plus I’ve been listening to awesome music and such, like Natasha Bedingfield and Nelly Furtado. Yeah, that’s what I get for wrecking my laptop and trading 36 GB of music for the contents of two 1 GB flash disks…
Oh yeah, plus I finally got to watch Jason Mraz and Colbie Caillat’s video… I have eclectic taste, that’s my excuse.

Here it is, enjoy.

Lucky – Jason Mraz with Colbie Caillat