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Various artists Zulu Guitar Blues: Cowboys, Troubadours, and Jilted Lovers 1950-65 Matsuli Music Review by Bruce Miller
However, considering how many single and various artists’ collections exist of African acoustic guitar playing from Kenya, Tanzania, and the DRC, a collection devoted to Zulu guitar seems criminally overdue. And Matsuli’s 25-track LP, Zulu Guitar Blues: Cowboys, Troubadours, and Jilted Lovers 1950-65, is as stylistically thorough as it is excellent. Proto-mbaqanga jive, slide guitar-driven swing, single chord drones, and much else can be heard here, all of it buzzing with life.
Sure, there are some hints of American country music here and there; Mike Khuzwayo & the Playboys’ “Zibedu” includes nearly constant “yips” and other howls that seem pulled from a cowboy movie battle scene. Yet, the track begins with an a capella Zulu vocal in the style of Solomon Linda before the guitars appear. Perhaps some of the most heartbreaking solo guitar playing to ever come out of Africa is here too in the form of several tracks by an artist who went by the name “The Blind Man with his Guitar” (not to be confused with “The Blind Guitar Player,” who also features on this collection). The instrumental tracks “Isoka Labaleka” and “Uncedo Wabantu” are performed with a mixture of bounce and melancholy, suggesting a musician whose only escape from misery otherwise too much to bear was his guitar. Perhaps a close second for sheer musical tear-jerking is Almon Memela’s “Lashona,” a lament for a man who can’t make it back to his lover on time. Compare his style to that of fellow Zulu acoustic guitarist John Bhengu’s “Umakotshaha” (found the second volume of The Secret Museum of Mankind) for a musician of similar style and depth. It’s players such as these who make the case for South Africa having some of the most forlorn acoustic guitar sounds to be found on the continent.
But then it’s not all sad. The Mfongozi Guitar Players give us the sunnier “Marabi Jazz,” its emphatically strummed chords underpinning a melody that gains strength as it repeats. Elliot Gumede’s “Amasoka” positively slaps, while the Nongomo Trio’s “Guga Mzimba” borrows its slide touches from Hawaiian recordings even as its rhythms are more homegrown.
Ultimately, this collection demonstrates the playfulness, the melancholy, the rebellion, and the delight South African acoustic guitarists managed to record in spite of apartheid’s horrors.
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For as long as mid-20th century recordings from Africa have been available, there have been hints of South Africa’s acoustic guitar scene’s power. The Original Music label’s Siya Hamba! - 1950's South African Country and Small Town Sounds, featured two devastating examples of the style by Cape Province guitarist Citaumvano. Topic records’ 2003 collection, Gumboot Guitar - Zulu Street Guitar Music From South Africa, featured two tracks by solo guitarist Albert Nene that bordered on the avant-garde in their length and attention to minimalist repetition. And of course, 78 RPM archivists Jonathan Ward and Pat Conte have sprinkled their respective collections Opika Pende and The Secret Museum of Mankind with some riveting examples of South African acoustic guitar playing. Conte even devoted a hunk of his 2002 WFMU show on African acoustic guitar players to some dazzling examples specifically from South Africa.
Black South African pop music styles in general are some of the most jubilant on earth, yet they arose from some of the most wretched circumstances to be found in the 20th century, on the African continent or elsewhere. As disgusting as forced mid-20th century segregation in the United States was, South African apartheid was perhaps worse, considering a white minority was able to subjugate a Black majority, forcing them into lives of brutal labor in the mines and restricting their movements around the country all while pushing them off land that was theirs in the first place. Bafflingly, mine bosses tried to placate labor with Western-made cowboy films. As a result, Black musicians saw the films’ protagonists as outlaws to be emulated in song and attitude. And thanks to a booming record industry and a radio show titled This is Bantu Jazz, thousands of recordings were made, bought, and listened to on readily available victrolas. On this collection, there are a number of recordings made by artists who took on names such as Cowboy Superman or the Cowboy Sweethearts and sang songs satirizing apartheid, describing the brutality of prison, or doling out warnings about messing around with women instead of staying gainfully employed.
