Skyjacked: Kesivan Naidoo and the Tao of rhythm
South Africa’s pre-eminent jazz drummer celebrates improvisation and collectivism, and hails the virtues of tai chai.
Culture
Thuso Mbedu: Re-(act)ing to a ‘lethal’ industry
With days to go before the 46th International Emmy Awards, New Frame caught up with Thuso Mbedu, who has been nominated again.
Political Songs | Clandestino – Manu Chao
Twenty years on, Manu Chao’s gripping song on the perils of migrancy rings truer than ever, and still gets rumps shakin’.
Text Messages | 100 years of amnesia
A century after the end of the Great War, populist demagogues are leading radical reactionaries towards something that the world
Touch My Blood by AKA
For the hip-hop superstar living a jet-set life it’s no problem that Jacob Zuma plundered the public purse.
Political Songs | Grandmaster Flash and the Furious Five
In the ‘urban catastrophe’ of the South Bronx in 1982 hip-hop transcended to a higher consciousness.
Zoë Modiga channels the power of yellow
Two years after her debut album, Modiga is still dazzling audiences with performances from Yellow: The Novel.
Text Messages | Education as emancipation
We would do well to rehumanise ourselves through the teachings of Paulo Freire, one of the 20th century’s most radical thinkers and
After a whirlwind year, Thandi Ntuli is still on the rise
Thandi Ntuli speaks about her momentous double album and what it means to feature on a Spike Lee Joint.
Political Songs | The Internationale in Afrikaans
Few renditions of the global anthem of the Left are as gentle as Liela Groenewald’s.
Tom Morello moves into EDM
Rage Against the Machine’s virtuosic guitarist is back with a genre-bending album ‘rooted in the sonics of 2018’.
Political Songs | Geoffrey Oryema’s unbearably sad Exile
Spending 40 years in exile inspired the Ugandan singer-songwriter to produce an extraordinarily heartfelt protest album.
HHP: The bridge-builder
The cheer and happiness Jabulani ‘Jabba’ Tsambo brought to South Africa’s hip-hop industry will live on.
Text Messages | Battle cry of the working class
Although tango has been ‘orientalised’ as a typical Argentine tourist trap, its inherent humanity, urgency and artistry are still as vital
Political Songs | Billie Holiday’s Strange Fruit
In 1937 Billie Holiday first sang what many now regard as the greatest protest song in the history of recorded music.
Text Messages | A pall lifts over Peru
In contrast to Brazil’s leap to the right in its elections, the recent polls in its neighbour to the west brought
renewed hope as the country bade farewell to its most notorious tyrant in recent memory.
Stogie T hits a note of higher consciousness
Since adopting a new moniker, Tumi Molekane has given himself space to experiment and express himself in interesting ways.
Political Songs | Víctor Jara’s Manifesto
The popular Chilean folk singer anticipated his brutal death at the hands of Pinochet’s soldiers.
CC Yoyo recalls Fela Kuti and Afrobeat
Ghanian Afrobeat drummer Frank Ankrah, popularly known as CC Yoyo, recalls his experiences with Nigerian icon Fela Kuti and legendary drummer and Afrobeat pioneer Tony Allen.
Marc Ribot revolutionises the protest song
The guitarist and composer channels his rage at the rise of the right in Trump’s America, into two albums in which the virtuous and the
Political Songs | Hugh Masekela’s Stimela
Masekela’s battle cry against the injustice of the migrant labour system on the mines has haunted us since its creation in the 1970s.