Metswako's 2006 Album Re Tswa Hole

South African Band Fuses Gospel, Synth, Kwaito, Hip Hop & House

Apr 12, 2007

The South African group's latest album and the new and unusual sound they're creating.

Unless you're from South Africa or you had a trawl through a music shop in the country recently you probably won't have heard of Metswako and yet they have won the prestigious Kora Award for Best Southern African Newcomer in 2003.

Metswako consists of three members who are a creating a new sound by fusing rousing gospel phrasing and singing, the lilts of the quintessential Southern African electric guitar, synth, a very strong string section and kwaito, house and hip hop beats. The band's name - Metswako - actually means a mixture of different music genres, forming a unique sound.

The strings - violin and viola - come from band members Tshepo Komane and Bernard Madumo who are both classically trained musicians and have played in the Johannesburg and Cape Town Philharmonics. The vocals come from Shalamar who started her singing in church.

The album is produced by Thabiso "Thaso" Tsotetsi and he is also credited on the album with composing some of the tracks. Thaso is self taught as a producer but is at the centre of the new music coming out of South Africa at the moment, heading his own label Impact Sounds.

Today South Africa's music mixes language, instrumentation, rhythm and genre in bold ways. Emerging artists show their respect for their predecessors but have the confidence and production value to carve their own niche on the airwaves. The labels to describe South African music just never catch up.

Metswako's 2006 Re Tswa Hole is a perfect example of this. The track "The Armor" allows the old school strings to be pushed about by kwaito beats (South Africa's very own urban sound) which are peppered with a more straight house sound. While all of this is going on, the fruity vocals of Shalamar do battle with rap lyrics. The string section - the violin and viola - seem to form the backbone of this album and yet it's about as contemporary South African as you can get.