LOCAL dancehall artistes who seem to be thriving on dirty and violent lyrics will come face to face on November 8 at the Sting Tune for Tune Dancehall contest to be held at City Sports Centre.
WINSTONE ANTONIO OWBN CORRESPODENT
The show resembles the borrowed concept of the annual Jamaica’s most celebrated Sting Festival.
Local chanters have been embroiled in nasty fights typical of the Jamaican “Gaza and Gully” wars of late that has been reflected in their lyrics where they take time to diss each other.
Fans have also joined warring Zim Dancehall “factional wars” by throwing missiles to their nemesis on stage.
In Jamaica, the rivalry between “Gaza and Gully” resulted in many deaths among young people with gun battles in ghettos being a common phenomenon.
Locally there are also many rival stables which include Dangerzone clan with dancehall chanter Freeman, Princo Spice among others, the Mabhanditi Clan that has Seh Calaz and MaNinja camp that has Winky D as its self-proclaimed president.
But, organisers of the event said they will soon embark on a programme to conscientise dancehall fanatics to shun violence ahead of the potentially explosive gig.
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Partson Chimbodza of Chipaz Promotions, who is organising the show said participating artistes should make sure that the show remained a lyrical and musical confrontation nothing personal.
“As organisers of the Sting Tune for Tune Dancehall Clash, we have already engaged artistes who are going to be performing and their managers over the issue of violence and way forward to shun ugly scenes at dancehall shows,” Chipaz said.
Due to the volatile environment created by dancehall fans, promoters had to erect nets and cages to prevent rowdy fans from throwing missiles. This time, Chipaz said there will be no barricades on stage.
“We condemn violence obviously, but the truth is we need to nurture these artistes and violence will soon be a thing of the past,” he said.
It remains to be seen how the show will turn out after most of the previous shows were marred by chaos and violence as some rowdy fans throw objects onto the stage during artiste’s performances.
“We want to end violence and the throwing of cans at dancehall shows. We are going to be engaging relevant stakeholders to achieve this,” Chipaz said.
The Zimdancehall war, observers said was caused by both artistes and fans, with musicians being accused of chanting lyrics to diss rivals.
In March this year, Jamaican-born artiste Ras Jabu, aka Trevor Hall speaking to NewsDay, on the side-lines of the inaugural Zimdancehall Awards held at the Zimbabwe College of Music, urged dancehall artistes to be more creative and desist from promoting violence if their music was to be recognised internationally.
However, one of the chanters to perform at the show, Seh Calaz showed that achieving clean, violent-free lyrics from the musicians to arrest violence will be a tall order.
The Mbare-bred chanter told journalists that he will continue singing violence-oriented songs and referred fans hungry for clean lyrics to man-of-the-moment Tocky Vibes.
“I will continue to sing violence oriented songs which I am good at and if people want mature lyrics without violence then go and listen to the so called dancehall Priest Tocky Vibes,” Calaz said.
“Violence has always been there and those who have a good understanding of dancehall know where we are coming from and where we are going. Asi kana mukaita ngoma dzekubatira pamusoro zvinonetsa.”
The Kwatinobva singer’s sentiments left many perplexed at a time promoters were trying to cleanse the genre from violence.
His views are indirect conflict with the event’s theme which is, No to Violence, No to Can Throwing.
Seh Calaz and Soul Jah Love will headline the clash while Terminator will square off with Qounfuzed, Lady Squanda is expected to face Lady Bee, The Conquering Lioness Bounty Lisa will face X-Patriot while Badman will clash with Jiggaz.
DJs have also been awarded an opportunity to prove their prowess on the turntables.
DJ Cables will face Black Identity while Mighty Ducks clash with Fyah Links and Black Spider will battle it out with Red Fox Family.
Dancehall doctor Freeman, Dadza D, Kinnah and Mostuff among others are also part of the line-up that will also feature emcees Garry B and Templeman.
Dancehall has suddenly become the biggest movement on the Zimbabwean showbiz scene, but the vices that it brings along have also been worrisome.
