By CLAY MUGANDA
Posted Monday, August 1 2011 at 17:56
Posted Monday, August 1 2011 at 17:56
In a bizarre yet expected move, leaders of an East African country where every issue is treated like a hit song — listened to and forgotten — have done another collabo and released a track that they believe will market their sovereign state, attract tourists and help boost their food reserves.
Titled Njaa, the single, which will eventually form part of the Dying is Not a Problem, Living Is album, is the latest off the vocal chords of Emilio ‘Baks’ Kibaki and Agwambo ‘Kitendawili’ Odinga, two seasoned non-performers who have proven that you can actually shake hands with a clenched fist and clap with one hand.
By the time of going to press, Njaa was receiving rave reviews and playing on rotation on all radio and television stations across the country. Numerous international news networks had also picked it up and were playing it round the clock.
“This is a well-engineered track and our fellow countrymen, women and children will not only shake their legs but their heads as well in wonderment over how we managed to get time off our tight infighting schedule to compose such a hit,” Kitendawili told an international network whose crew had travelled to the East African nation to cover the launch of the song.
“Of all our previous releases, this is the best and the greatest,” he added. Speaking in chaste German, Kitendawili further said that, considering how big the single had become, he will name a political party after it. “Na hiyo Njaa... itakuwa chama,” he said.
With its racy lyrics and sounds of rumbling stomachs, wailing children and mothers’ lamentations — over food, water and their dead children — the single became a hit before the composers knew it.
As they were denying its creative genius, international journalists blew their cover, forcing them to change tune and start targeting tourists with it.
“Help us market our latest release because we do not understand how demand affects supply and vice versa,” Baks told a team from the London School of Economics, which is rumoured in some quarters to be considering giving him a refund.
“We have literally reached a dead end after realising that times are changing and trade is not conducted the way we learnt many decades ago.”
In between appealing to the foreigners, Baks took time off to tell off those who claimed that some of the biological accidents of back-up singers he had chosen did not display any choral prowess and could not lead a choir, and that when left on their own, cannot match the lyrical prowess of Njaa.
“Pumbavu nyinyi!” he thundered before asking them why they were acting as if they had the loudest voices.
This is one of the many songs that Baks and his BFF (Best Friends Forever) Kitendawili have composed or sang since 2008 when they signed an agreement after many weeks of their cronies engaging in verbal wars that led to destruction of property and caused the deaths and displacement of scores.
Their first single was Ufisadi Utaisha. Even though well-received, the track did not live up to its name and became just another chorus, echoed by almost every other back-up singer who toured with them.
Video and disc jockeys removed it from their play lists after it became clear that they (the back-up singers) did not understand the song and always got its lyrics twisted.
Critics contend that even Njaa will soon degenerate into a meaningless melody, a chorus or distant echo, because it is just a rendition of a song the duo have recorded many times before.
Their fans have listened to this number before, industry players argue, and it is only a matter of time before the masses lose interest in it.
But the duo have defended their latest composition, saying its lyrics, punctuated eerily by the wailing sounds of the hungry, the malnourished and the dying, have sent strong vibes to both the local industry and international players, and that it will change the way their compatriots sleep on empty stomachs, how they die, bury their dead children and handle the carcasses of domestic animals.
“This will definitely be a plus for the economy because foreigners will want to learn these tactics,” Baks observed.
“It has come to our attention that in other places, dying is a problem, and we are sending a strong message that in our land it is much easier and it will be an experience of a (short) lifetime because we have all the resources to make that happen.”
Kitendawili added: “In keeping with our motto of Dying is Not a Problem, Living Is, we offer numerous choices, and if people feel hunger and starvation is a painless and probably slow way of dying, they can go for the faster yet still effective ways like getting shot by cattle rustlers, robbers, the police or having their sorry bodies bombed by terrorists from across the border.”
The indefatigable duo also added that tourists have a chance to see, albeit in the dark, all the 200-odd bones in the human body and skeletons of dead animals, things that they do not see in their countries where people suffer from bigger ailments like obesity and eating disorders.
“Femurs, metatarsals, ribs, collar and pelvic bones are some of the things they have not seen in their countries and they will definitely see them here,” Baks said.
“We have sung about all those marvels of nature and civilisation in Njaa, and we trust that we are doing our bit in marketing the country.”
But even as they gloat over their song and how it is changing the way people die — in front of television cameras — many of their fans are not singing along, neither are they dancing to the tune, because, they contend, it shows that the authors lack originality and, come next year, it will not be surprising when a track by the same title is released.
“We have heard these lines before and watched these theatrics and we are not impressed,” some say.
“We need people who will move with the times and give us better lyrics which glorify life, not hopelessness, despondency, dependency and death.”
But Baks’ and Kitendawili’s cronies and back-up singers say the critics are being unfair since the duo has done so many things that have made the country not only a place worth dying in, but also a luxurious destination where food, housing and other basic commodities cost the earth, the moon, the stars and other planets.
“We have lowered the price of talk and made it much cheaper, yet local media have totally ignored our efforts and declined to give credit where it is due,” Kitendawili moaned as his cronies burped and smacked their lips in satisfaction after tucking in sumptuous lunches.
“Njaa is a good marketing strategy and will be the theme song for the International Conference on Famine, the talking shop that the country is just too glad to host.”
Even as the singers are taking advantage of the goodwill of local and international journalists and corporate bodies, wags contend that the best is over and the worst is yet to come — all in keeping with the Government’s rhyming credo that, in Kenya, hope sinks eternal in one’s breast, and Man can never be but deprest!
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