|
|
|
|
|
|
From Voëlvry to FokofpolisiekarAndries Bezuidenhout
Talking about an underground in Afrikaans music is somewhat problematic. Since the mainstream in Afrikaans music is so painfully mainstream, anything that is remotely off the beaten backtrack is usually described as “alternative” or “underground”. Indeed, the first successful response to the mainstream came from the musiek en liriek [music and lyrics] movement from the late seventies onwards. People like Koos du Plessis and Jannie du Toit wanted to create quality Afrikaans music – music with a message. They succeeded in doing this, and the growing Afrikaner middle class became the main market for their songs. This movement had very little political content, though, and actually sat quite comfortably with the Afrikaner nationalist project of the time. There were exceptions. Anton Goosen and David Kramer successfully penetrated this market, but their protest songs were often too subtle to make a large-scale impact. Hard-hitting songs were censored by the state apparatus. Very few of Kramer’s fans knew that “Skipskop” was a song about a community that made way for a missile-testing facility. The first real protest movement emerged from the underground clubs and theatres of Johannesburg – places such as the Black Sun and Jameson’s. Performances were deeply political and condemned the apartheid regime in no uncertain terms. But to make a broader impact, the movement had to emerge from the underground and go popular. James Phillips (reinvented as Bernoldus Niemand), André Letoit (who soon changed his name to Koos Kombuis) and Johannes Kerkorrel embarked on a national tour – the Voëlvry Toer in 1989. Voëlvry represents an ironic phase in Afrikaans music. Instead of destroying the symbols of Afrikaner nationalism, irony was used to expropriate them for a different project. The ox wagon was changed into a “funky nuwe rock & roll ossewa” by Kerkorrel, and the Voortrekker Monument was painted neon (it was the eighties!). The institutions that annoyed the more cosmopolitan segments of the Afrikaner middle class were knocked – the church, authoritarian schools, and above all conscription and the army. The fact that all this came from people singing in Afrikaans caught the Botha regime completely off guard. A part of Voëlvry’s success can be attributed to their voicing the smouldering irritation with apartheid’s grip on the personal freedom of Afrikaners. No wonder that it toured university campuses. But its success also imposed a limitation: it never penetrated the working class, and stayed clear of the townships – physically, as well as in terms of most of its lyrical content. The problem with apartheid was what it was doing to “us” – alternative (but middle-class) Afrikaners. With the end of apartheid, the ironic phase came to an end. James Phillips died, and Kerkorrel and Kombuis consciously became part of the mainstream – with varying degrees of success. For a while Valiant Swart and Paul Riekert’s Battery 9 kept the scene alive. But no one was prepared for the explosion in Afrikaans music that happened from the mid-nineties onwards at places like Oppikoppi and the Afrikaans arts festivals. How do the current waves of Afrikaans music relate to the protest tradition of the past? Three strands have emerged. The nostalgics converge in bars where popular singers do medleys of Koos Kombuis tunes, but without the irony. They sing along to traditional Afrikaans songs. Their t-shirts say: 100% Boer or Praat Afrikaans of hou jou bek [Speak Afrikaans of shut up]. The fact that the protest singers made it cool to be Afrikaans again suits them well, but they nostalgically long for a past without crime and affirmative action. Many of them are too young to remember this presumed carefree past. The romantics play good solid rock, but their lyrics are about parties, love, booze, drugs, and sometimes our beautiful country. They build on the rock tradition of the protest singers, but see no need for protest. They are upwardly mobile consumers and not interested in politics. The Afrikaans media calls them the Zoid generation. The cynics celebrate their marginality and sing about crime, emigration, poverty and the new fat cats in government. They retain some of the irony of the protest music of the eighties, but mostly complain about how things are going wrong. Some are tired of feeling guilty about apartheid. After all, they did not go to the army, nor did they decide to spend billions on a crooked arms deal. One could hardly call any of these strands “underground”. Nevertheless, the recent upheaval over a member of Fokofpolisiekar’s late-night blasphemy has brought back some of the spirit of Voëlvry. Suddenly the University of Pretoria, the only Afrikaans university where Voëlvry were allowed to play on campus, bans the band from performing. New struggles around censorship emerge. People realise that some of the institutions that upheld a conservative Afrikaner identity in the past – churches, schools, and the white suburbs – are remarkably resilient in a post-apartheid context. (Ask any black pedestrian in Waterkloof.) Will this incident revitalise the Afrikaans underground? Maybe, but for now
the notion seems a bit quaint.
Send your comments to webvoet@litnet.co.za to continue the discussion on SêNet, our interactive opinion page.
|
||
© Kopiereg in die ontwerp en inhoud van hierdie webruimte behoort aan LitNet, uitgesluit die kopiereg in bydraes wat berus by die outeurs wat sodanige bydraes verskaf. LitNet streef na die plasing van oorspronklike materiaal en na die oop en onbeperkte uitruil van idees en menings. Die menings van bydraers tot hierdie werftuiste is dus hul eie en weerspieël nie noodwendig die mening van die redaksie en bestuur van LitNet nie. LitNet kan ongelukkig ook nie waarborg dat hierdie diens ononderbroke of foutloos sal wees nie en gebruikers wat steun op inligting wat hier verskaf word, doen dit op hul eie risiko. Media24, M-Web, Ligitprops 3042 BK en die bestuur en redaksie van LitNet aanvaar derhalwe geen aanspreeklikheid vir enige regstreekse of onregstreekse verlies of skade wat uit sodanige bydraes of die verskaffing van hierdie diens spruit nie. LitNet is ’n onafhanklike joernaal op die Internet, en word as gesamentlike onderneming deur Ligitprops 3042 BK en Media24 bedryf. |
|||
Click here and subscribe to our fantastic free newsletter - for your
weekly cultural fix!