Thandiswa
Zabalaza
Gallo, 2004
Escondida, 2006

In 2004, it was news in when this talented, young singer sidelined her successful career as the blustery charmer in the kwaito trio Bongo Maffin to strike out on her own with an eclectic solo album.  Now Thandiswa’s expansive mix reaches the American market, hopefully as a presage to a tour.  For truth be told, Thandiswa live delivers more charge than this album does, despite its many strengths.

Things start out well as polished pop numbers are interspersed with brief vocal and percussion interludes.  Thandiswa’s urge to connect her youthful audience with their easily forgotten past finds admirable expression in songs like “Nizalwa Ngobani? (Do You Know Where You Come From?)”  Strains of funk, Zulu traditional pop and sweet vocal balladry merge easily with Thandiswa’s confident, engaged vocal front and center.  “Zabalaza (Rebellion)” taps into South African jazz history with tasty piano accompaniment and a swinging groove.  As it winds up to its sassy, funky stride, a radical message emerges:  the shortcomings of the post-apartheid state may call for further rebellion.  “This should not be happening at my fathers’ house,” sings Thandiswa, and then switching to English, “They gave up their lives for this…and it makes me want to scream.”  “Revelation” opens as Steely Dan-inspired rock, and works its way to a gospel high, via 70s soul, which of course, inspired Steely Dan.  Thandiswa certainly has the vocal chops to raise rafters, as this song’s rowdy, pumping conclusion demands.

Perhaps the strongest song here, “Lahl’ Umlenze,” calls on Africans to take pride in who they are, appropriately harnessing the deep tug of minor-key Zulu pop, slow and heavy, shimmering with accordion, grounded in earthy piano chords, and rich with vocal harmony.  In the album’s later tracks, though, things turn decidedly more bland.  The bouncy, retro-soul kwaito of “Kwanele,” a buck-up song to a despairing woman, and the sleepy balladry of “Transkei Moon” don’t deliver on the promise of earlier songs.  In fairness, though, Thandiswa has to appeal to an impossibly broad set of constituents, and her effort to broaden all of them is bold and praise-worthy.  Roots pop fans, who were heartened by urban traditional releases by Busi Mhlongo a few years back, will be heartened to know that is producing an excellent crop of traditional pop these days.  Unfortunately, none of it is being released internationally at the moment.  The kwaito, soft jazz, and hip hop that sell best within the country may distort perceptions about what can succeed globally—all part of ’s continuing emergence from the political and cultural confusion of the apartheid years.  But Thandiswa is a genuine talent, a fabulous singer, and an artist who may yet come through with the international star power that South African music fans have been waiting for, and become the Makeba of her time.  Stay tuned.

Contributed by: Banning Eyre for www.afropop.org