Camp Mulla: Cool Kids on the Edge of A New Frontier?

"...welcome to the future, I'm the captain of the cool kids..." _ T.I. in Hello Goodmorning

I've listened to quite a bunch of interviews of Kenyan artistes who are (relatively) accomplished in the local music industry in terms of having a proper following and several singles on daily rotation at clubs and radio, as well as being able to pull regular concerts/tours around the country and for Kenyans abroad. The trend in these interviews is when they get to the "Whats next for you as an artiste/group?" question the reaction is almost always a *sigh* followed by:

"Next for me/us is definitely conquering the African and international scene!"

That answer usually comes with a degree of justified fatigue. That fatigue is justified because majority of these artistes have sincerely ended up being checkmated by the the international/regional game. Many times its a matter of content - I know they say the language of music is universal, but its mostly world music, retro-afro, soul or rock that they be talking about as opposed to sheng-loaded genge music for example. In reality, most people just aren't willing to step out of their comfort zones musically and go out in search of the exotic.

Other times, its simply a matter of not being willing to play around with strategy. An artiste may be so successful locally with a certain way of packaging the music (s)he delivers, that the backlash from total abhorrence to their music overseas may be too much to bear that the artiste may stick to the devils they know ie. the unforgivably pirating happy Kenyan market. We all saw what happened at last years MAMAs when *ahem*the likes of Hapa Kule suddenly became boring tracks (how now??)...

However, sometimes its also a matter of chance. There are still a lot of talented artistes and groups that remain undiscovered and/or underexposed, despite aggressive marketing and social network buzz. Things just remain as they are, forcing a bulk of these artistes to re-package themselves as being "underground" even though nothing about their music is alternative.

This got me asking myself if there will ever be a local artiste or group that can at a very early stage be already suitably packaged to take on the mainstream local, regional and international music scene. For a long time, the answer has always been a firm NO, NOT NOW MAYBE LATER until a few days ago when I introduced myself to new kids on the block Camp Mulla. Okay, it was not really self introduction per se; there had been quite a lot of good noise about them on twitter for the past couple of months after they got airplay and chilled in-studio at a major FM station. I finally succumbed to my curiosity and visited the group's Fabebook page (lots of info on them there) where I was tempted to prematurely conclude that they were just another kapurap (kapuka rap) outfit who happened to have one of their members look like KiD CuDi hehe...

Camp Mulla

I then scooted over to their SoundCloud page and after devouring their tracklist, I can now affirmatively, in my opinion, say that Camp Mulla IS suitably packaged for conquering the local and regional/international music markets as at now 29th April, 2011. Here are a combination of reasons that have helped me make this conclusion:

1. Content? Check!
Camp Mulla's musical style is predominantly urban hip hop - a genre that has gained universal popularity for its soft feel-good themes and its ability to easily traverse the tight domains of traditional hip hop and traditional RnB. We all know its the USA based artistes that have this genre on lock, so there is an obvious pre-conception that good urban must have their kind of sound. Camp Mulla excel in this and look the part as well. Any random person in the world who has never heard of CM listening to a track of theirs, say their re-do of P. Unit's Kare or the Slow Down freestyle solo by member Young Kass would automatically assume that he/she is listening to an American group.

However, they do not lose their Kenyan identity. They in fact choose to summarize their content as 2-5-Flow (playing upon the country code 254). A close listen to some of their tracks also clearly indicate their producers do their thing in a Kenyan state of mind. For example check out their new single, Addicted (below). Its has a laid back arrangement that sort of reminds me of pre-kapuka/genge Kenyan old school urban tunes, something like K-South's classic Tabia Mbaya, no? Not to mention that the single is produced by Camp Mulla member K'Cous who may have links with K-South's former label honchos, the Kibukosyas of Samawati Records. Even though I'm not really into mainstream hip hop for daily listening I definitely would NOT mind bumping to this in the car on my way to execute a drive-by shooting or at a club:

2. Female Vocalist(s)? Check!
Very few local cats doing hip hop and related genres contemplate the sort of value a female vocalist can add to their work. A female vocalist tends to further soften their content and make it more palatable to a mainstream audience, even if she goes just as hard as her male counterparts. Somehow, it directly attracts a higher female audience, and a higher male audience as well but very indirectly ;)... Look at Nazizi's significance in Necessary Noize, how Black Eyed Peas suddenly plummeted into fame after their addition of Fergie and Lauryn Hill's unavoidable presence in The Fugees as a measure of the potential benefit a group of predominantly male artistes could gain from this.

Camp Mulla have this sorted already with two(?) female vocalists bringing in their higher octave swag that results in some nicely done choruses and hooks, mostly from Miss Karun who brings with her an eclectic vocal range and a good look as well.

3. Versatile Production? Check!
Apart from a group of talented singers and rappers, through Camp Mulla we could also be looking at number of potentially good producers coming up. Their original content reveals a lot of versatility and it is quite hard to make out the presence of any signature beat or arrangement that is constantly exploited.

Internationally popular artistes are into multi-genre production these days, always trying new combinations and all - anybody noticed how RnB singers have been doing some seriously dance and electronic influenced stuff? The production team behind Camp Mulla (Sub-Saharan Records) have proven they are just as capable especially with this demo track Captain of the Cool Kids. The breaks in this track are just a joy to listen to - at around 1:00, it gets down to something close to kwaito, then its switched up to a section that even a super-producer like Timabaland would be head bump to of at 1:47 and later at 2:58...:

4. Favourable on Social Media? Check!
This group follows Just A Band's example of how aggressive marketing on social media networks can pay off. Currently, the CM page on Facebook and Reverbnation is quite popular and they have managed to get #KenyansOnTwitter (a dangerously opinionated but highly influential section of the twitter universe) behind them, which is no mean feat at all!

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In conclusion, this crew has, from the get-go, a combination with the potential of at least causing a stir in Africa if not worldwide, as of today. What happens tomorrow and the future is entirely up to them and a bit of chance as well. And since most of them are still a couple of years or so shy of 20, there's still a lot of time for them to hone their craft and fine tune their skills to be able to churn out high quality music capable of being appreciated worldwide. Meanwhile, I and many others shall continue to listen...

Recalled To Life _ Part 2

But then again, Dear Blogosphere,

These are indeed strange times to be recalled to life…A period of great dualisms and polarization that can easily shock anyone to silence, reminding me of a similar period in 1775:

“It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair, we had everything before us, we had nothing before us, we were all going direct to Heaven, we were all going direct the other way…” – The Period section of the first book of Charles Dickens’ A Tale of Two Cities.

We are deep into the Golden Age of The Internet. It is now the thread that connects the scattered hemming of the world and brings it together in one tight ball of fibre-optic cable called a global village. It is an unspoiled sea of space begging for input, like a desert or a vast jungle where we can each discover newer versions of ourselves and transform our own personal apportionment of that space as much as we like, creating a huge, never-ending virtual pyramid of information. The beauty of this pyramid is that everyone is building this pyramid for everyone’s sake. From Wikipedia to YouTube to torrents, you can learn and gain information on almost anything. Skills and art are constantly influenced and improved by this medium – access to thousands upon thousands of professionals, technicians, developers, creatives, spectators, critics etc. etc. are easily crammed together as global exposure and global recognition work hand in hand. They call it Crowd Accelerated Innovation. You can even get your KCSE results by asking for them via Yahoo Answers! Amazing, huh?

This same internet phenomenon is also quickly loosening the hard rules that revolve around certain concepts that have remained unchanged for a very very long time. It is behind the changing face of democracy – we have already had a number of revolutions that have been sparked off from the click of a keyboard button this year and any world leader is bound to be worried by the presence of ‘e-dissent’ in his or her country. It is also what is behind the changing face of capitalism for better and for worse. Instead of the masses being strictly the market consumers, they can barge right in and influence production of goods and services long before the process starts. Looks at what happened in the GAP logo redesign fiasco for example. It seems like the tide is turning and now most things are nowadays influenced by the opinion of the global masses.

Social networks have made human interaction a boundary-less affair and even I myself am left wondering how many physical man hours of socializing I would have to go through to meet some of the awesome friends and colleagues I have met on twitter, facebook and other social networks. However, these networks have a way of going karma on our asses and showing us their unavoidable ugly sides. Just located side by side with their more useful avenues, social networks also possess virtual dark street alleys shared by lynch mobs, bullies, gang rapists, quacks and street preachers with the sprinkle of honest passers-by turned victims, most of the time played by the same persons – you and me. We switch these roles quite seamlessly, perhaps because of the assurance that we will soon have our turn at the other end of the equation as we also try to prove how much of a joke we can take.

What has resulted from this development is a radical change in what social conscience/mass conscience has turned out to be. Mass conscience driven by Trending Topics and Status Updates and 4Square notifications etc. etc. simply has simply transformed into a mixed bag of ironical values somehow working together and against each other at the same time. This is perhaps the greatest exhibition yet of how morals cannot be uniformly conformed to or enforced in a society, especially a society whose online users determine in real time what morals and positions are popular.

For the younger generation that still needs some form of mentoring, it seems that what they are doing with now are noir role models caught between looking good and doing bad things who never really help to influence the paths that these kids should follow. It’s like all the good role models – the Mother Teresas, the Gandhis, the Mandelas of this world – either prove too boring or seem to be part of distant history. Maybe there is a need to expose and learn about the really bad role models who meet bad ends now more than ever…I don’t know…

As regards language, things are also changing to reflect this age of new and improved revolution and resistance fuelled period so much so that grammar rules are continually changing to reflect irritating informality and jarred brevity. We again find ourselves with a lot who think they are told what to do a lot too frequently, not only by their parents but also by the current mass conscience of the internet and social network users born between the 70s and 90s.I have a feeling that resistance to the death of Latin was similar, but like all the fallen dictators this year we are sure to lose the war against the XOXO and SMS language users. Also, since mode of dress, tattoos, drug and alcohol usage doesn’t miff us any more (take a look at the mother-daughter combinations in malls on weekends, for example) perhaps language is the new miniskirt of the 60s and 70s, or the new sagging pants of the 90s - a bold exhibit that the world is about to change more radically than we can ever imagine and we must be able to change with it in order to survive.

It is in such a world that I have been recalled to life, dear Blogosphere… what we shall do with it or about it, I don’t know yet…

“Mr. Jarvis Lorry—sitting opposite the buried man who had been dug out, and wondering what subtle powers were for ever lost to him, and what were capable of restoration—the old inquiry:
‘I hope you care to be recalled to life?’
And the old answer:
‘I can’t say.’
The end of the first book.” – Conclusion of the first book of Charles Dickens’ A Tale of Two Cities.

WP.

Recalled To Life _ Part 1

Hello Blog World,

No man is an island but an island is often a refuge for many a shipwrecked man. After being washed to shore and surviving a few days you start to enjoy yourself. You begin to discover your wild hunter-gatherer side, how to hack living off the damn place by eating wild boar and sweet berries without even paying for it in the mall or market as you would in the modern people-filled world you come from. How a tree house can get way cosier than your apartment in a pollution-filled city somewhere far, far behind. And then voila, just when you think things can’t get any better, Nature also provides an ever faithful helper a la Robinson Crusoe who doesn’t talk back and everything is hunky dory. G.O.O.D Fridays indeed.

It has been around 3 months and a few days since anybody saw me these sides. And yet here I am blogging away with so much as an explanation; like a sailor back from another long trip from unknown ends of the earth. Let’s just put it this way: it’s been a period where a lot of things got caught up in the high seas of life and never made it out of there in one piece. And, in the midst of all that chaos, my most primal urges kicked in and I sought to be alone, far from as much deep social interaction as possible. There I was smiling with the world, talking to them, telling them great stories and laughing back at their jokes with my inner self constantly removed, watching and impatiently waiting for my outer self to finish with everybody else so that we could once again be on that solo dolo tip.

However, the longer an island remains a shipwrecked man’s refuge, the more it changes him and accustoms him to its odd and savage ways. Robinson Crusoe does a full 180 and you find yourself in yet another long drawn season of Lost or a re-enactment of Lord of the Flies. All of a sudden there will be more than one voice in your head. Paranoia creeps in along with thoughts to the effect that you are not alone on this island. You may find yourself drawn closer and closer to the Heart of Darkness that is the true soul of that place and, with enough time, it could turn you totally mad. But then there are those who manage to overcome those fears, make a canoe and simply sail away again back to their proper worlds. Others are also lucky enough to have fate pitying them enough to send them a rescue team. And as the island plunges further and further into the horizon, one starts to feel their old life resuscitating and he slowly manages to find his voice and coherence back in the presence of fellow human beings:

“The faintness of the voice was pitiable and dreadful…It was like the last feeble echo of a sound made long and long ago. So entirely had it lost the life and resonance of the human voice, that it affected the senses like a once beautiful colour faded away into a poor weak stain. So sunken and suppressed it was, that it was like a voice underground.” – The Shoe Maker Section of the first book of Charles Dickens’ A Tale of Two Cities.

One of many people’s greatest fears is the fear of themselves and thus many times they are afraid to be left alone with themselves, not literally of course. It is this fear that I have for a long time courted and befriended. I have absolutely learnt the art of self-entertainment (and this has nothing to do with #TeamFapFap), perhaps from the experience of shifting from a neighbourhood where I had tons of friends to a desolate place where the only person I knew other than my mum lived at least 13 kilometers away. So to complete in order to complete the process of banishing myself to this island, I knew I had to also abandon normal interactions I had with myself for the sake of self-entertainment.

I just watched things come and go, watched issues crop up, watched people passionately discuss them, have beef with one another in the process and conclude them somehow. I let myself be alone with myself for that long, just for the sake of it. Maybe not only just for the sake of it; part of me had grown tired of being another voice in the sea of millions of others trying to make this point or prove the other, trying to conclude this revolution and trying to start another. This position as casual invisible observer had its perks but it ended up terrible in the long run. I tried to rediscover myself, explore those parts of myself that I was not used to going to. Forced myself to see things from other people’s perspective without adding my own true thoughts… It was a refreshing time being on Fuck-The-World mode. Read a few random books here and there, discovered a huge bunch of new music, got to do things that I normally wouldn’t like cooking and ish… But then again, it was painful to let go of some really good ideas that would have translated into an awesome blog post or a decent telephone conversation, or a local revolution, or a new lover, or…something, anything… these moments were painful and some drove me to near insanity. I was quickly consuming myself, and things began becoming more and more incoherent while processed and bottled in within my inner self. I soon realized I had to escape from myself and once again embrace the world with all its wonders and flaws:

“Why else keep a journal, if not to examine your own filth?” – Anne Sexton, Letters to Dr. Y

So here I am. Back from Me. It was an eventful trip with mixed results but what matters is that am here now. Back to do what I do best – I write. I write to share my thoughts as they are. To share my filth with you and I so that we can examine it together… so that we can diagnose and cross-examine Life. Isn’t that why they demand stool samples at hospitals – to discover what is wrong and what is cool? I’ve been recalled to life once again because maybe, just maybe, I can add a little extra to this radically changing world beyond myself…

*Clicks the PUBLISH button*