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Bruce Ndlovu, Sunday Life Reporter
AT the start of every December, when the festive season beckons, talk inevitably turns to the songs that will be on rotation as the year draws to a close.
The track that dominates playlists at this time of the year becomes the “song of December,” a tune that lives forever in the hearts and minds and becomes the soundtrack that creates festive memories.
Due to the weight of the memories it carries, a true December song never fades. Instead, it lives on forever, drawing strength not just from its infectious quality but the nostalgic feeling it evokes in people whenever it is played.
Music, after all, is a time capsule, transporting us back to times and places that we left behind, reawakening memories that we want to remember or forget.
The December song also has the singular honour of getting airplay in the minutes towards and after midnight on 31 December, performing the role of both undertaker and midwife as one year is buried and another is born.
In Zimbabwe, like almost everywhere else, the December song is important and in Bulawayo, where parties are the order of the day during the last month of the year, it has become part of tradition.
However, despite the fact that the city embraces this culture, very rarely has a home grown-hit had the distinct owner of being the fabled “December song”.
As 2024 draws to a close, it seems as if this will be the case again, as there has hardly been a noteworthy mainstream hit coming from the City of Kings during the calendar year.
For some, the lack of hits from Bulawayo’s musicians is not a problem of their own creation, but a result of the failure of club DJs, radio, TV and other platforms to give music from the city a fair share on their platforms.
“A hit can be made in a number of different ways but what I have realised is that a hit needs a number of stakeholders to move it,” musician Mzoe7 told Sunday Life.
“A hit needs the radio to move it, it needs the DJs to move it and it needs the artiste to move it. In addition to that, the song also needs to move itself. So, I feel like while we might have good songs coming from this side, we don’t have consistency in airplay to make sure that the songs become hits. The DJs don’t keep it on rotation in bars long enough. So, I think it all comes back to our PR which is not good enough. So, there are a lot of factors that lead to our songs failing to make it big. We don’t have the structures that will ensure that a song hits hard.”
Some have pointed to the men on the decks in city clubs as the cause of the malaise in the local music industry. They play too much foreign music, some have alleged, and throw a few scraps to local artistes whose music does not get enough airplay to make an impression.
Sweeto, a local DJ, said artistes were putting too much pressure on DJs who were also just trying to make a living.
“As a DJ, I never branded myself through local music. So, some people might follow Sweeto for his kwaito, piano or dancehall sets and that’s fine because that’s what they like. So, for me to continue to get gigs, I have to maintain that because I am also looking for money to feed my family. Of course, we are there to introduce new music to people but with the advent of social media, people want to listen to what’s trending because that is what they hear in their daily lives,” he said.
Sweeto also pointed out that the Zimdancehall movement had managed to go mainstream without the help of the formal channels of music distribution.
“At one time I was in Harare during the early days of Zimdancehall. What I noticed at the time was that those guys were not played on the radio because it was said that their music was not really up to standard.
“However, they never waited for the radio to play their music. They were on the streets, pushing their own stuff right until when people began to take notice. So, it mustn’t be a situation of anyone blaming someone else. Stand up for yourself and if your craft is well done, people will take notice.
“The moment you start pointing fingers at someone else for your business failing, it simply means you’re too lazy to do your own job and want someone to do things for you. Secondly, we now have platforms like YouTube and Spotify which are an even playing field in the sense that anyone can find your music there depending on how you market yourself. If you market your music well then people will get access to it and I feel like this something that our artistes are not doing for themselves,” he said.
Sweeto said while artistes in the city might claim they are producing quality, their music usually did not meet the standards set by their foreign counterparts.
“Our standards are just below what you get from the South Africans. If I’m playing an amapiano song from SA and then introduce a Zimbabwean one next, you can hear the difference immediately,” he said.
Music legend Jeys Marabini said while it was tough to actually dissect what went into the making of a hit, local support was imperative to make sure that good music reached as many ears as possible.
“Musicians are working very hard and I believe in their studios, hits are being made. However, we need the community and the people who consume that music to support it. So far, when I listen to young musicians like Mzoe, their music seems up to the right standard.
“Their music is playing on Channel O or Trace Africa and it doesn’t sound out of place. In terms of quality, I believe that we are up to par. Of course, there is always room for improvement but what is needed more than anything is for people to support our music. Perhaps getting more airplay on national platforms would also help the situation,” he said.
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