Loso La Monnamogolo more bacon for Shumba Ratshega
Chippa Legodimo | Wednesday October 9, 2013 22:44
The decorated musician is one of Botswana's true musical exports having broken barriers to expose the local brand to countries like Tanzania, South Africa and Namibia. He has rubbed shoulders with Africa's best performers on international stages like Nigeria's world acclaimed P-Square as well as celebrated Zimbabwean guitarist Oliver Mtukuzi.
According to the muscular musician, his new offering has all the ingredients that made his second album Makhirikhiri such a phenomenon.
Ratshega debuted with Masiela in 2005 and although there were signs of brilliance in the first attempt, nothing would prepare the fans for what would come in the second album.
Makhirikhiri was an instant success and paved the way to the top of the music ladder for the musician and soon he was an inspiration to many. Although he highly rates all the tracks in the new album Ratshega believes the title track Loso La Mmonnamogolo will turn heads this summer. The track is an illustration of how greed and moral decay are corroding our society. In simple terms the song talks of how an old man's death has saved a young man when in actual fact it demonstrates how the widow was quick to jump into bed with the young stud immediately after the husband's death.
The young man is driven by his love for money and fancy cars to fall for a woman almost his mother's age. 'This is a worrisome trend in our society. Yes people have the right to date who they want but going under the sheets with a woman your mum's age cannot be described as love. It gets worse when these young boys expect their parents to negotiate for their marriage,' he said. Ratshega vehemently denies that like many of his peers, his career had taken a knock saying he would not be attracting so much attention from abroad.
However, he blamed the current state of affairs where even good musicians sell a measly number of copies on the poor promotion of the genre by local broadcasters.
'I do not know where the excitement that greeted albums such as Makhirikhiri, Dumelang by Dikakapa and Kulenyana by Culture Spears went to. Why should Batswana tune into Roots for local music?
'Botswana Television as a state-owned station should dedicate a programme like Roots. They are already setting up such programmes in Namibia and Zambia and they have invited us,' he said. He argues that programmes such as Mokaragana and Flava Dome are not enough as they were not specific. 'Those guys with pants below their waists have a right to appear there or any other person doing other stuff but I strongly hold that Borankana is cultural music and needs to have a dedicated programme. Lobebe does not effectively cater for that as it mixes various genres,' he says.