NADIA NAKAI is letting a lot of issues off her chest in her new single, “IMMA BOSS”, where she goes in with clear, hard-hitting verses reminding everyone that yes, she is securing endorsement deals and collecting these bags – showing exactly why SHE IS A BOSS and a RAPPER first.
Becoming the new ambassador of Courvoisier Cognac; Flexing her creative designer/ fashion curator skills with her multi Sportscene X Redbat clothing range;
Showing off her diversity and versatility as the new co-host for the international TV show YO! MTV Raps and now getting ready to drop her long-awaited debut album, NADIA NAKED.
We can all agree that she is the BOSS.
Nadia Nakai Picture/Instagram
The surprise drop comes after fans have been pleading with her to release new music – the more pressing request being for her to drop a full body of work.
These calls have not fallen on deaf ears; the release date for Nadia’s debut album, Nadia Naked, is FRIDAY, 28 JUNE 2019.
Sports TV and Radio presenter Robert Marawa was Thursday night fired from his SuperSport job via an SMS.
Marawa got dismissed less than two hours before the show that bears his name ‘Thursday Night Live with Marawa’ went live on air.
He posted a message on Twitter saying that he had been told not to come to the studio for his show which broadcasts on SS4 at 8.30pm.
I received a text around 18H50 tonight informing me that I should not bother coming to Studio for Thursday Night Live with Marawa Show on @SuperSportTV… I would like to thank all those who have supported my journey as a Sportscaster & those I've worked with at Supersport! ✌?✌?
“I received a text around 18H50 tonight informing me that I should not bother coming to Studio for Thursday Night Live with Marawa Show on @SuperSportTV … I would like to thank all those who have supported my journey as a Sportscaster & those I’ve worked with at Supersport!” Marawa wrote.
Marawa was previously fired from the SABC in July 2017 and later rehired, and he was previously also fired from SoccerZone on SABC1.
In another tweet Marawa insinuated that he was fired for speaking against sexual harassment happening at SuperSport.
Working and reflecting….Imagine paying for a service where people who r guilty of sexual harassment r employed and encouraged to work!! Lovely hey….
In a statement, the channel said: “SuperSport is in the process of an exciting refresh of its local presenter line-up, which will be unveiled as part of our new football season campaign.
“This restructure includes us not pursuing our contractual relationship with Robert Marawa.
“Robert was personally advised of our decision earlier this week.
“We are grateful for his contribution over the years, and wish him great success in his future endeavours.”
Coke Studio Africa just released the music video of “Switch It Up”, performed and written by fierce fast-rising Namibian femcee Lioness, South African media personality and rapper Boity and legendary Kenyan femcee Nazizi.
The video carries through the theme of the season finale of Coke Studio Africa, which was to blaze a new trail for women in music, and place talented females behind the scenes and in front of the cameras and mics.
It’s an all female original composition produced by Kenyan producer Viola Karuri with the video directed by Thandi Lottering.
Over the years Nazizi had to balance another kind of challenge: “I was trying to think back to my day, and if I had anybody to inspire me as an African female rapper.”
Her step back in time drew zero memories of such: “I started rapping in 1998, so that’s 20 years of rap, being the only female.
“She frequently wonders, “So who am I inspiring?” She got to see on Coke Studio Africa when she met up with other Femcees. “It’s nice for me to sit back and watch and see other female MC’s coming up. You can really tell how different we are on Switch it up,” noted Nazizi.
Nazizi is a Kenyan veteran of 20 years who added Swahili spice to her bars, Setswana flexing Boity is a South African cover girl celeb who had only been in the game for months when this song was recorded and Lioness is surely the only Doctor and MC known in hip hop.
Lioness not only managed this balancing act, she flourished, making serious waves that she was invited to be on Coke Studio Africa. She says, “We can do what we want, we can choose what we want to do.”
For her this made the whole experience even more dreamlike, “I had to be in studio and in the hospital, it was really hard for me to balance a lot of my life.”
Though as Boity said of their banger, “This track is based around women and female empowerment,” Boity found it “Fantastic” that African artists now have the freedom to show off their skills regardless of their gender, “At the core we are doing this without having to be ‘female MC’s, we are just being rappers.”
And every rapper wants to kill it says Nazizi, so “It’s very important to stop making that distinction, that she’s a female MC and he’s a male MC – we are rappers full stop.”
He joins the elite list of great crowd pullers like Winky D, Judgment Yard and Alick Macheso who also made a second coming after thrilling the crowd again last year.
Enzo who came dressed elegantly proved that not only is he a year older, he is a year wiser and a year better as he managed to thrill the thousands at the Borrowdale Racecourse last Saturday.
It didn’t matter which of his songs he belted out, old or new the love for the new dancehall find was clear with the way the fans responded.
One would think the crowd at the Castle Tankard must have milked all of Enzo Ishall’s energy but reports from the City Sports centre where he was performing at this Birthday gig suggests a different story.
Meanwhile, four-year-old gelding Peggson by Jay Peg won the RTGS100 000 at the Castle Tankard (GR1) run over 2000m.
Peggson – Picture/Andrew Philip Equine Photography
Peggson is trained by Bridget Stidolph, who has saddled the Tankard winner two years in succession and was ridden by local jockey Brendon McNaughton.
Saturday was the 57th running of the 2000m Castle Tankard (GR1) in a race that can be said to have been conceived in 1959, born in 1960 and came of age in 1967.
The race has proceeded from strength to strength and has never lost its glamour or appeal throughout its history.
A good deal of hip hop discography speaks and has always spoken openly and in depth about aspects of urban poverty, particularly the grip that street culture has on many young people from indigent communities and that of their counterparts in the affluent suburbs.
The historical outcast-ed genre, Tricia Rose observed, gives a ground-level view (though not the only view, or a comprehensive view) of what it might mean to live under what are nearly forlorn conditions in communities that face a myriad of daunting circumstances.
Sometimes, rap lyrics really do offer gripping tales of loss, sorrow, exploitation, rage, confinement, hopelessness, and despair about conditions that are denied in the larger society.
It is important to admit that these powerful stories far too often uncritically reflect attitudes and beliefs that many would consider destructive in achieving a socially just environment.
But it is also true that society at large only sporadically pays attention to the extraordinarily despair-producing conditions in which young people attempt to survive.
The ability to telescope such tales, however, is an earmark of fewer rappers. Some try it, others try to try it, while only a batch can really do it.
In Zimbabwe, one such rapper who has consistently managed to deliver “astronomical high-powered prolific lyrical miracle molecules through ya stereo” bars about the state of the nation is The Prince of Puns, Prince Butawo, landmarked-ly known as Noble Stylz.
When he’s not online catching you up on the trendiest spiels and dropping massive creative industry wisdom colleges and universities don’t teach, he’s either sipping his favourite Jameson somewhere or kicking it in the studio.
Veiny, earlier this week Noble released his latest single Kanyika Kanaka, where he uses hip hop as a springboard for a larger discussion about the urgent social and political issues affecting Zimbabwe.
A translation of the title could suggest that ‘all is well’ in the country, although some would beg to differ, saying it is a pathetic reference to “this Country”.
With Fun F handling production and the chorus, the Masofa panze wordsmith employs caricature to expose the shortcomings of the current administration where he laments over everything, from the high rate of unemployment, the rise in cases of depression, incessant price hikes and the rise of the standard of living.
In between rhymes, Noble cut through the divisiveness nature among politicians and emphasised the need for unity and corporations among citizen in rebuilding the country, reinforcing it with the anecdote, Rome was not built in a day.
With Kanyika Kanaka, Noble delivers dagger-sharp verses that will rank among the best hip-hop verses of this decade. Overall, the song could be a culmination of everything Noble or Fun F had done before.
It gets us excited for what is to come from their collaborations.
It’s bigger than hip hop and dude is a standout in an era when most rappers his age de-emphasize lyrics. It also appears that fans have a zeitgeisty catchphrase from the title.
The song is available on the link below. Listen and reflect:
If your playlist needs someone sending you positive upbeat energy, then Tatenda Mahachi’s ‘Victory’ delivers with every word.
The encouragement in this song comes from the long list of best wishes expressed from the beginning to the end.
Recorded at the JP Studios by Rodney Beatz the same producer behind some of ExQ’s hits on Tseu Tseu, the song has a sing-along chorus that permeates the soul with its good news.
“You’re dreams are big. There’s a fire inside of you that wants to achieve everything you’ve planned, its these thoughts that inspired me to pen this song,” Mahachi told Zimbuzz.
“You have worked incredibly hard to get this far, and at times you wonder if you have the strength to stay the course, I say don’t despair keep pressing because you are a victor.”
Black Panther actress Danai Gurira’s Met Gala outfit inspiration came from an unlikely source.
The gorgeous 41-year-old looked cool in a black, beaded top hat, black jumpsuit with a dramatic train and cane as she arrived at the event with designer Gabriela Hearst.
Her inspiration came from Oscar Wilde an Irish poet and playwright who was one of London’s most popular playwrights in the early 1890s.
Posing on Instagram beside Wilde’s portrait, she wrote “Me and Oscar Wilde, my inspiration for the evening: the dandy reimagined.”
Danai Gurira Picture/Danai Instagram
The theme of the Met’s 2019 Costume Exhibition was “Camp: Notes on Fashion.” meaning exaggerated fashion.
The exhibit was inspired by Susan Sontag’s 1964 essay that defines camp as “love of the unnatural: of artifice and exaggeration.”
What is the Met Gala?
The Costume Institute Gala at New York’s Metropolitan Museum of Art is the biggest event on the fashion fundraising calendar.
Danai Gurira at the Met Gala 2019
Founded by publicist Eleanor Lambert, the benefit was first held in 1948 to encourage donations from New York’s high society.
In its modern incarnation, the most famous faces from the realms of fashion, film, music and art come together to raise money for the Met’s Costume Institute and celebrate the grand opening of its latest exhibition.
Zimbabwe’s women cricket team kicked off their T20 World cup Qualifiers on a positive note crushing a hapless Mozambique side by 163 runs at Old Hararians sports club in Group A opener.
The Lady Chevrons won the toss and elected to bat as the wicket was not offering any form of assistance to the bowlers.
Zimbabwe’s batting order had a fine day at the crease as they posted a competitive total of 198 runs in their allotted 20 overs.
Sharne Mayers was the pick of the crop, with a fine knock of 62 runs and was rightfully awarded player of the match.
Mozambique struggled with both the bat and ball. They only managed to score 35 runs as Lady chevrons bowling attack was full throttle from on set.
Precious Marange, Anesu Mushangwe and Josephine Nkomo all picked up two wickets each.
Zimbabwe entertains east Africans Tanzania in their next match where they will be hoping to pick up another win.
In other matches played on the opening day, Tournament favourates Uganda cruised to a 90 runs victory against Sierre Leone. While Rwanda made light weight of Nigeria bowling them out for only 65 runs, winning the match by 37 runs.
Kenya started the qualifiers on a bad note going down to Namibia by 39 runs.
Universal Music Group (UMG), the world leader in music-based entertainment, today announced an exclusive global recording agreement with acclaimed Nigerian singer-songwriter Tiwa Savage, one of Africa’s biggest stars and an artist whose success spans music, fashion, film and television.
Under the agreement, her future music will be released internationally through UMG’s operations in more than 60 countries worldwide.
Projects will be executively produced by Efe Ogbeni of Regime Music Societe and Vannessa Amadi-Ogbonna.
The acclaimed singer-songwriter was born in Lagos, Nigeria, and later received a scholarship to study Professional Music at Berklee College of Music in Boston, Massachusetts before embarking on a career that has seen her achieve creative success across a multitude of mediums.
2018 was her most successful year to date, which saw the singer-songwriter, philanthropist, entrepreneur and fashion icon crowned Best African Act by the MTV European Music Awards, making history as the first female to win the accolade.
In the same year, she also became the first African female to sell out London’s IndigO2. In December, Tiwa was handpicked by Coldplay’s lead singer Chris Martin to perform alongside Beyonce, Ed Sheeran and Jay Z live at the Global Citizen Festival in Johannesburg to a 70,000 strong audience and millions across the globe in celebration of the centenary of Nelson Mandela’s birth.
An accomplished live musician, she has performed around the world, including a notable performance at Jay Z’s Made In America festival in Philadelphia in 2017.
Tiwa was named one of the world’s Top 100 Inspirational Women in Fashion by Vogue US then later featured in British Vogue’s December 2018 issue as one of 10 women that are changing the face of music globally.
She has released a string of singles including ‘Mr Lova Lova’ ft Duncan Mighty, ‘Diet’ and ‘Tiwa’s Vibe’ all of which hit the No. 1 spot across charts within Africa, securing her position as one of Afrobeats leading artists.
A resilient force within Africa’s ever-growing entertainment industry, she has also managed to carve a career as a reputable songwriter, conquering the charts in Africa whilst balancing her roles as an entrepreneur, mentor and mother.
Throughout her career, Savage has been active in her philanthropic endeavours, supporting various youth engagement organisations and breast cancer screening projects across Nigeria and further afield.
Tiwa Savage Picture/ Dami Oyetade
Through her work with MTV’s Shuga, Savage is also keen to share further knowledge of HIV/ AIDS prevention and awareness within the continent.
One of Africa’s most followed women on social media, Savage was the first African female to represent Pepsi as an ambassador and represents leading global brands including Nike, MegaGrowth Hair, MTN and Star Beer.
Throughout summer 2019, Tiwa will play a string of international festivals including the UK’s Wireless Festival, Afropunk in Paris and Oh My! Festival in Amsterdam.
Tiwa Savage said, “My biggest goal is to make Africa proud. I’m so excited for this moment and I’m thankful to Sir Lucian Grainge and my new UMG family for their belief in my dreams. I’m looking forward to this next chapter in my career and I’m more ready than I have ever been.”
Adam Granite, EVP Market Development, Universal Music Group said, “We are looking forward to partnering with Tiwa and her team to help her music reach new audiences around the world.
As one of Africa’s most successful, influential and dynamic singer-songwriters, Tiwa has truly global ambitions and UMG is committed to help her in achieving them.”
Efe Ogbeni & Vannessa Amadi-Ogbonna of Stealth Management said, “We’re very proud to be a part of this ground-breaking partnership between Tiwa Savage and Universal Music Group.
Tiwa is undoubtedly the most hardworking and talented female artist crossing over from Africa to the rest of the world, and UMG has demonstrated its commitment to the Continent by placing its formidable machinery behind her amazing career.
Partnerships like these symbolise the hopes and dreams of so many talented artists back home in Africa and it is an honour to be the executive producers of her project.”
