Some 22 years ago a young woman went to audition for a local band when she was just 17. One of the people listening to her said that her voice was too soft, but she said that she wasn’t given a microphone.
On the 1st of January this year I had the privilege to see that woman perform live with the band that she auditioned for so many years ago. Three of us arrived at Kirstenbosch Botanical Gardens. We were amongst thousands of fans, all there to see the South African wonder band called Mango Groove. I was so amazed. I, admittedly, expected lots of people but mostly my mom’s age and mostly non white. Well let me tell you that the majority of the people there were white South Africans, my age. I was shocked and then it dawned on me that just as I grew up with Claire singing in the background, so did they. I think one of the most amazing things about the setup was the fact that we were all there as South Africans, white, black, coloured, Indian, it didn’t matter what you looked like or where you came from. We were there to experience the Groove that we have been hearing since we were small.
By the time we arrived we had to sit almost at the back and had a very bad view of the stage but still good enough to see as the band stepped onto the stage. The three backup ladies, Beulah Hashe, Marilyn Nokwe, Phumzile Ntuli, were as full of energy as we all remember them to be from all of the music videos, wearing bright reds, yellows and oranges with black. Claire stepped on wearing a red hat, and a top with the print of the South African flag on it.
Then the weirdest thing happened and I cannot explain it. I don’t know if I was proud or what emotion went through me. In that moment that they started singing I wanted to cry. I felt the bulge in my throat and the tears welling up. Thankfully I was wearing sunglasses and I managed to cut before really starting, cuz once I start to cry there is no stopping me. Throughout the show these waves of tears would come over me and I still have no idea why. I have no explanation for what I felt, as I do not even know what it is that I felt.
They had such an energy about them and they created such a vibe that not even halfway in the show I though to myself that I want to be there where she is. I want to be on a stage like that and wear iconic clothes and sing and groove and have an audience of people with whom I can enjoy the moment. Paul and Hobbit seems to think that I can sing. So who knows, maybe I will start singing. During the show it also hit me that I think the reason why they are so successful is because most of their music is happy music. You cannot help but get up and start to dance. And it is not a verkrampte style of dancing where you sway back and forth that comes over you but an African blend dance where you shake your hands and ass like there is no tomorrow and when the music for ‘Special Star’ started (which was their fourth last song) the entire crowd stood up like one man and started dancing in that African blend style. It was like it was pre-arranged. I got gooseflesh. There were no issues with your fellow man, even the woman that was sitting behind us with her chipmunk laugh didn’t bother me anymore. There was no racism left as we were all dancing together, white, black, Indian, couloured we were all dancing and laughing and smiling. And again I wanted to cry. I still couldn’t tell you why.
In the middle (roughly) she explained what she was going through at about the end of 1993 and then wrote the song, ‘Another Country’, ag jirre again I wanted to piss through my eyes when she started to sing it.
The energy I felt there at that concert is one that I have never in my life felt before. I have never been to a single ritual that made me feel like I did that day. I have never felt so close to my fellow man as I did then and I have never felt so connected, not to deity or god, but to Humanity. I felt like we were all in this together and if we can all just stop our petty kak and have such a beautiful energy, everyday, then wow. That is a future that I would like to share with all of you.
To Mango Groove, I thank you for brining us South Africans closer again. Thank you for making it real and never giving up on us. No matter what we have done as a people you have been there to tell us that we must ‘Bang The Drum’ and ‘Dance Some More’.
Thank you
Mwah!
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