{"id":92643,"date":"2021-11-19T12:50:57","date_gmt":"2021-11-19T10:50:57","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/pan-african-music.com\/?p=92643"},"modified":"2022-01-19T11:17:48","modified_gmt":"2022-01-19T10:17:48","slug":"msaki-platinumb-heart","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/pan-african-music.com\/en\/msaki-platinumb-heart\/","title":{"rendered":"Msaki\u2019s Platinumb Heart: when art is the final courtroom"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p class=\"has-drop-cap\">We met Msaki at Nirox Sculpture Parc, one hour away from Johannesburg. The place breathes art: between the paintings, the stages, the garden sculptures and the recording equipment, Msaki seems to be in her element. The singer-songwriter is a frequent user of the venue herself, for artist residencies and exhibitions. \u201c<em>This place\u2019s got a lot of personality\u201d, <\/em>she smiles as she makes us tour the huge main house.<em> \u201cWhat I like about it is that it\u2019s idea-oriented. They don\u2019t care about how many exhibitions I\u2019ve done before &#8211; this is what I wanna do, this is what it looks like, and they are cool with it. They\u2019re trying to make space for different people.<\/em>\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Msaki, born Asanda Lusaseni Mvana in the Eastern Cape, is one of the \u201c<em>different people<\/em>\u201d. A fine-art university dropout, a fully multi-disciplinary artist dabbling in electronic and acoustic music and plastic art and an independent label owner, her vision and expression seem to always be multi-dimensional. She is also one of the artists that comes to mind when speaking about \u201cindie\u201d music in South Africa: as she says it herself, \u201c<em>composing with guitar and voice kinda lands you into the indie space<\/em>\u201d. Sonically speaking, her debut EP <em>Nal&#8217;ithemba <\/em>and then album <em>Zaneliza: How the Water Moves<\/em> were in that acoustic vein.&nbsp;&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>But beware: in the space Msaki\u2019s in, behind the sweet arrangements and the gentle guitar, being indie is a fight. A fight for having a voice, for staying financially afloat, for having decent representation. This is partly why she founded ALTBLK&gt;&gt;, a creative space offering tailored support to independent and alternative artists. \u201c<em>It stands for Alternative Black, and that little arrow is for continua, just picking up on the concept of \u2018a luta continua\u2019. The industry is Black and White in South Africa. The white indie musicians or alternative musicians got a better PR game going on, a better collective representation. As an alternative African live musician, you\u2019re immediately niche and if you don\u2019t fit into the categories, it\u2019s over for you. The understanding of the whole value chain of music, I try to package it for my friends with ALTBLK. It\u2019s a support system: making sure that they all have work, and if they don\u2019t that they have sustenance\u201d.&nbsp;<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<div style=\"height:50px\" aria-hidden=\"true\" class=\"wp-block-spacer\"><\/div>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-embed is-type-video is-provider-youtube wp-block-embed-youtube wp-embed-aspect-4-3 wp-has-aspect-ratio\"><div class=\"wp-block-embed__wrapper\">\n<iframe title=\"Mntakababa\" width=\"500\" height=\"375\" data-src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/xXV0j08IXvk?feature=oembed&#038;autoplay=1\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe>\n<\/div><figcaption>Mntakababa<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<div style=\"height:25px\" aria-hidden=\"true\" class=\"wp-block-spacer\"><\/div>\n\n\n\n<p>However, this doesn\u2019t mean that Msaki embraces and comforts herself in an \u201calternative\u201d spot: \u201c<em>I struggle with labels<\/em>\u201d, she smiles. Indeed, when she released the pure house track \u201c<a href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=oedqjPVN-U8\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Fetch Your Life<\/a>\u201d with Prince Kaybee in 2019, Msaki got as mainstream as one can be, winning the House Record of the Year at the Dance Music Awards SA. With an acoustic and rock background, how did she become this house superstar vocalist? \u201c<em>Mostly by accident<\/em>\u201d, she laughs. \u201c<em>I had no plans on becoming a house vocalist. But one night, I had a show with my band at a theatre, and my friend Mobi Dixon came to see me. He took my guitar and put it in his booth for me to go with him to the studio! We recorded \u2018Love Colour Spin\u2019, I did it in one take and I went home. The next thing, we had a hit on the radio. Obviously, what that did is that it made a lot of other DJs look for me. Revolution Brothers, Oskido\u2026 Black Coffee started looking for me, and I was still living in the Eastern Cape, absolutely uninterested in this world! I love SA House so much. I feel like with SA jazz, it has got such a distinct place in the world. It\u2019s so easy to define<\/em>.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Her new album <em>Platinumb Heart<\/em> couldn\u2019t escape the latest South African house craze: amapiano. \u201c<em>I ran away from amapiano a bit, just because I\u2019m naturally scared of things that are trending\u201d<\/em>, she says. \u201c<em>But musically, I\u2019ve always been interested in what they do with the drum. There\u2019s actually a song where I put the log drum underneath an orchestra.<\/em>\u201d The project features heavyweights of the movement such as Major League Djz, Abidoza, and <a href=\"https:\/\/pan-african-music.com\/en\/tag\/kabza-de-small\/?_per_page=17\">Kabza De Small<\/a> and <a href=\"https:\/\/pan-african-music.com\/en\/tag\/focalistic\/?_per_page=17\">Focalistic<\/a> on the soft \u201cMntakababa\u201d. \u201c<em>I met Focalistic at Kabza\u2019s studio. I was writing a song about going home in December and trying to bring something back from my labour in Johannesburg, wherever it is that you are a migrant labourer. I\u2019m so uncool that I was literally singing about bringing bricks home and Kabza was like \u2018No Msaki, not the bricks\u2026\u2019 <\/em>(laughs)<em>. And Foca was like \u201cI\u2019ll bring you some swag, and money to wipe your tears\u2019.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<div style=\"height:50px\" aria-hidden=\"true\" class=\"wp-block-spacer\"><\/div>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-large\"><img decoding=\"async\" width=\"1010\" height=\"1414\" src=\"https:\/\/pan-african-music-production.fra1.digitaloceanspaces.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/11\/Msaki-2-1010x1414.jpeg\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-92644\" srcset=\"https:\/\/pan-african-music-production.fra1.digitaloceanspaces.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/11\/Msaki-2-1010x1414.jpeg 1010w, https:\/\/pan-african-music-production.fra1.digitaloceanspaces.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/11\/Msaki-2-759x1063.jpeg 759w, https:\/\/pan-african-music-production.fra1.digitaloceanspaces.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/11\/Msaki-2-661x926.jpeg 661w, https:\/\/pan-african-music-production.fra1.digitaloceanspaces.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/11\/Msaki-2-465x651.jpeg 465w, https:\/\/pan-african-music-production.fra1.digitaloceanspaces.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/11\/Msaki-2-375x525.jpeg 375w, https:\/\/pan-african-music-production.fra1.digitaloceanspaces.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/11\/Msaki-2.jpeg 1097w\" sizes=\"(min-width:1010px) 759px,100vw\" loading=\"lazy\" \/><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<div style=\"height:50px\" aria-hidden=\"true\" class=\"wp-block-spacer\"><\/div>\n\n\n\n<p><em>\u201cI think Kabza is an incredible producer, we actually jammed as if I was with my band! He played the piano, and he was intentional about me bringing my guitar. He was just so open about a new sound of amapiano, my guitar is so present in that song! It\u2019s carrying the melody, and that shows that we\u2019re open to form new genres, write new ways of making electronic music. The purists will be pissed off but we don&#8217;t really care, I\u2019m unfortunately the worst nightmare for purists. If you\u2019re attached to any kind of genre in its purest form, you will hate me because I\u2019m gonna mess with it in all imaginable ways.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Amapiano didn\u2019t exist when Msaki started working on <em>Platinumb Heart<\/em>. The whole process started after a contemporary South African tragedy taking place in the country\u2019s North-West province in 2012. The Marikana massacre was the killing of 34 miners by the South African Police Service, after a massive strike. It was the most lethal use of force by South African security forces against civilians since 1976. \u201c<em>Platinum is the mineral, but I added the \u2018b\u2019 to reference the state of emotional numbness, non-feeling, cold, unpleasant\u201d<\/em>, Msaki explains<em>. \u201cThe first song I wrote for the album was \u2018Blood Guns and Revolution\u2019. That\u2019s when I knew it&#8217;s probably gonna be a protest album. It was referencing what had happened on the platinum mines of Marikana, where miners were shot for a bit of living wage. It sparked a series of other protest songs: \u2018At Stake\u2019, \u2018Status\u2019&#8230; Other songs that just were processing my rage, my disappointment in this country. Now the oppressor is who? I was really just jolted out of my rainbow nation haze. That\u2019s why I have to put that album out. Art becomes the final courtroom where you can still ask the hard questions. Like 4000 rounds of bullets\u2026? But nobody premeditated it? That still doesn\u2019t make sense to me in a democracy.\u201d&nbsp;<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<div style=\"height:50px\" aria-hidden=\"true\" class=\"wp-block-spacer\"><\/div>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-large\"><img decoding=\"async\" width=\"1010\" height=\"1414\" src=\"https:\/\/pan-african-music-production.fra1.digitaloceanspaces.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/11\/msaki-4-1010x1414.jpeg\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-92657\" srcset=\"https:\/\/pan-african-music-production.fra1.digitaloceanspaces.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/11\/msaki-4-1010x1414.jpeg 1010w, https:\/\/pan-african-music-production.fra1.digitaloceanspaces.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/11\/msaki-4-759x1063.jpeg 759w, https:\/\/pan-african-music-production.fra1.digitaloceanspaces.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/11\/msaki-4-661x926.jpeg 661w, https:\/\/pan-african-music-production.fra1.digitaloceanspaces.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/11\/msaki-4-465x651.jpeg 465w, https:\/\/pan-african-music-production.fra1.digitaloceanspaces.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/11\/msaki-4-375x525.jpeg 375w, https:\/\/pan-african-music-production.fra1.digitaloceanspaces.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/11\/msaki-4.jpeg 1097w\" sizes=\"(min-width:1010px) 759px,100vw\" loading=\"lazy\" \/><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<div style=\"height:50px\" aria-hidden=\"true\" class=\"wp-block-spacer\"><\/div>\n\n\n\n<p>To process this tragedy, to make something beautiful out of the ugliest, the singer has decided to use the format of a double album, one being fully acoustic and the other one electronic. However, despite a sonic difference, both parts express the same anger\u2026 and love. \u201c<em>The two part album was just because there\u2019s a lot of things being split down in the middle with me\u201d<\/em>, she shrugs<em>. <\/em>\u201c<em>I\u2019m a singer songwriter, live musician, electronic dance musician and then I had an album of protest songs, an album of love songs\u2026 I didn&#8217;t want to split them in the middle. So when I decided to group it, I was like \u2018let\u2019s mix the protest and the love songs a bit\u2019.\u201d <\/em>Even the love songs, as light and cheerful as they sound, subtly carry the weight of Msaki\u2019s will for change. \u201c<em>Songs like<\/em> <em>\u2018No Rainbow\u2019, \u2018Status\u2019, \u2018Chem Trails\u2019 reference a lot of disturbing things, even being about love. \u2018Chem Trails\u2019 is about falling in love, and I\u2019m referencing the violence of putting chemicals in our environment, the same way that if you are falling in love, it\u2019s a violent chemical reaction. The dopamine is attacking you, you can&#8217;t eat, you can\u2019t sleep\u2026 It\u2019s an agony, but I\u2019m talking about a polluted universe &#8211; which is the body. I do think that people have the capacity to dance to some really serious stuff. But there\u2019s definitely more fight in the acoustic part. Definitely more acid, more anger, more yearning for solutions.\u201d&nbsp;<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The yearning for solution Msaki expresses is once again multidimensional, going beyond the music. Our conversation ends up drifting about fighting through music, but also fighting for music, in a country where it is probably not recognized at its highest value. \u201c<em>They\u2019ve shown us that they have the littlest, lowest regard for art in this country\u201d<\/em>, Msaki sighs<em>. \u201cDuring covid, they squandered our elder\u2019s funds, and the funds for cultural workers were stolen and embezzled. It disappeared, evacuated through corruption as usual. They call us the golden economy &#8211; the irony of it! That is so close to the truth if they knew that our artists are gemstones. This is a highly exportable, extremely valuable industry, and if you had supported it and treated it the way they should have&#8230; Historically, any civilized society held artists in high regard. It raises the living quality of the whole population when artists are highly regarded. We are feeling this disregard, living it. And to practice and to make like we do becomes a form of activism.\u201d&nbsp;<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<div style=\"height:50px\" aria-hidden=\"true\" class=\"wp-block-spacer\"><\/div>\n\n\n\n<p><em><a href=\"https:\/\/open.spotify.com\/album\/22FziGbftNET7IBUj4IFdP\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Platinum Heart Open<\/a> <\/em>and <em><a href=\"https:\/\/open.spotify.com\/album\/5I1PuwMzFN5Ooh8R5zUncS\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Beating<\/a><\/em> by Msaki, out on all platforms. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<div style=\"height:50px\" aria-hidden=\"true\" class=\"wp-block-spacer\"><\/div>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-embed is-type-video is-provider-youtube wp-block-embed-youtube wp-embed-aspect-4-3 wp-has-aspect-ratio\"><div class=\"wp-block-embed__wrapper\">\n<iframe title=\"Chem Trails\" width=\"500\" height=\"375\" data-src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/x8QiMkG1In4?feature=oembed&#038;autoplay=1\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe>\n<\/div><figcaption>Chem Trails<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<div style=\"height:25px\" aria-hidden=\"true\" class=\"wp-block-spacer\"><\/div>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-large\"><img decoding=\"async\" width=\"1010\" height=\"1010\" src=\"https:\/\/pan-african-music-production.fra1.digitaloceanspaces.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/11\/Msaki-Platinumb-Heart-1010x1010.jpg\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-92648\" srcset=\"https:\/\/pan-african-music-production.fra1.digitaloceanspaces.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/11\/Msaki-Platinumb-Heart-1010x1010.jpg 1010w, https:\/\/pan-african-music-production.fra1.digitaloceanspaces.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/11\/Msaki-Platinumb-Heart-759x759.jpg 759w, https:\/\/pan-african-music-production.fra1.digitaloceanspaces.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/11\/Msaki-Platinumb-Heart-100x100.jpg 100w, https:\/\/pan-african-music-production.fra1.digitaloceanspaces.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/11\/Msaki-Platinumb-Heart-661x661.jpg 661w, https:\/\/pan-african-music-production.fra1.digitaloceanspaces.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/11\/Msaki-Platinumb-Heart-465x465.jpg 465w, https:\/\/pan-african-music-production.fra1.digitaloceanspaces.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/11\/Msaki-Platinumb-Heart-375x375.jpg 375w, https:\/\/pan-african-music-production.fra1.digitaloceanspaces.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/11\/Msaki-Platinumb-Heart-200x200.jpg 200w, https:\/\/pan-african-music-production.fra1.digitaloceanspaces.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/11\/Msaki-Platinumb-Heart-85x85.jpg 85w, https:\/\/pan-african-music-production.fra1.digitaloceanspaces.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/11\/Msaki-Platinumb-Heart-73x73.jpg 73w, https:\/\/pan-african-music-production.fra1.digitaloceanspaces.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/11\/Msaki-Platinumb-Heart.jpg 1080w\" sizes=\"(min-width:1010px) 759px,100vw\" loading=\"lazy\" \/><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The singer-songwriter unveils a dense double project, set in the injustices and the beauty of contemporary South Africa. PAM chatted with Msaki, the eternal art activist, about her fights and her hopes.\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":48,"featured_media":92649,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[11036,7833,90,120],"tags":[34102,4096,23842,41001],"location":[7843,7844],"yst_prominent_words":[8403,35171,8539,8996,8505,8414,8447,8933,8618,40261,8402,8435,8501,9006,8543],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/pan-african-music.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/92643"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/pan-african-music.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/pan-african-music.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pan-african-music.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/48"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pan-african-music.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=92643"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/pan-african-music.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/92643\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pan-african-music.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/92649"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/pan-african-music.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=92643"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pan-african-music.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=92643"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pan-african-music.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=92643"},{"taxonomy":"location","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pan-african-music.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/location?post=92643"},{"taxonomy":"yst_prominent_words","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pan-african-music.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/yst_prominent_words?post=92643"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}