The music that Thandiswa Mazwai is making right now, invoking the spirits of Miriam Makeba & Busi Mhlongo & Abbey Lincoln is some of the most important new music anywhere. She chooses to sing songs that say something of the world we live in, songs whose lyrics are charged with urgency, be they about love, about social justice or simply about the fragile humans. When she sings her love songs, there’s a range of emotion that is sorely missing in so many of the sentimental songs

He should have been a Sophiatown heavy. With his two-tone brogues, tweed jackets, and occasional bowtie, he looks like something straight out of Sophiatown. Or from the Harlem of the Renaissance in the 20’s. All of which would make sense because Bongani Madondo’s literary soul mates include James Baldwin, E’skia Mphahlele and Miriam Makeba. He is a fast talking dandy armed with an encyclopedic grasp of all things Pop drawn to noire movies.  He devours long reads in Esquire, V