For a greater 2 decades and beyond, Ugandan music has seen several stages of music, from the times of listening to music off cassette tapes, Compact discs to now streaming. While listening cultures may not have been the only elements to evolve, so has the music.
We have seen multiple genres pop up, but our sole focus today will be hip-hop. Being a multi gifted race of people we are in Uganda, we have seen a breed of rapper, and emcees crop up, giving a rise to a whole hip-hop movement. Back tracking it to the early 9000’s rap was taking shape worldwide, young rappers from around here started out with imitating the beats and rapping style of the Americans, the likes of Fat Joe, 50 Cent, Jay Z, Nas, Biggie, and 2Pac.
As the 2000s approached, we got the first of its kind, a Ugandan rap group ‘Snag’O”, and it was made up of Ibraw, Kwesto Nsiggo Blakk, Lumix Da Don who met at university. There then was a string of mighty duos Sylvester and Abrams (consisting Sylvester Kabomba and Abraham Tekya), teenage rap duo Prim N’ Propa (made up of Lillian Kelle Butele and Brenda Z’Obbo). This era ushered in the Bataka Squad, a group that took the music industry by storm. Saba Saba (Krazy Native), Lyrical G, Chagga, Big Poppa Momo MC and Babaluku were the members of this group. They later teamed up with other rapping luminaries to form the Ugandan Hip-hop Foundation.
In his cover to Eli Wamala’s ‘Ani Yali Amanyi’ cover, GNL Zamba one of the most proficient rappers in Uganda sang profoundly of the memories at DV8, a spot that was many Ugandan Hip hop artists. It is at DV8, Klear Kut found its first stage, later on going to get a Kora Awards nomination. Other rappers too would go on to battle from here. Places such as Sabrinas Pub and Sharing Youth Centre in Nsambya became the grounds on which many freestyled and tried to break out into an already hard-to-enter music industry.
Baboon Forest Entertainment that is owned by GNL Zamba was a big contributing factor to the wide spreading of hip-hop in the late 2000’s, for it was home to production and signed a few singers, among these being Mun G. Another has been Dustville Records which has been home to some of the biggest producers and sound engineers in Hip-hop. Names like Baru Beatz come to mind when you mention Dustville.
Hip-hop has seen a blend into the mainstream and to this gone to greater glories. A case for instance was BigTril who charted across Africa thanks to his viral track ‘Parte after Party’. The genre was well embraced by females too, seeing the likes of Mc Yala, Recho Rey and Keko go on to become an international sensation. She is best known for songs ‘Make You Dance’, and ‘This Is How We Do It’. Among other wordsmiths to grace the scene is Edwin Ruyonga, who singularly goes by Ruyonga. His style of rap sees him fuse up words and poems to create rhymes and bars.
No way you can have a conversation on hip-hop and not mention Navio. The Rubaga born and raised rapper broke onto the scene with his contribution on Bobi Wine’s ‘Bad Man from Kamwokya’. He also put a contribution on what is tagged as one of the most popular songs of all time in Uganda ‘The Whistle Song’, which had names Radio & Weasel, GNL Zamba, Rabadaba, Cindy, among others. His other stand out greatest of all time are his verses on ‘Mr DJ’, which was by Viboyo, Benon, Vampos, Radio & Weasel, Ks Alpha among others. To this day he has had a couple of albums out. These include ‘Vibes out The East’, and ‘Strength in Numbers’.
Flex D’ Paper, Timothy Code, Pryce Teeba, The Mith and Tucker HD have grown to become house hold names when it comes to new school hip-hop.
A sub-genre known as Luga Flow which fuses Luganda (one of the local languages spoken here in Uganda) into English has also been an innovation onto hip-hop with time. Among its pioneers is Feffe Bussi, Fik Fameica, and VIP Jemo.
In terms of recognition, in place are the Ugandan Hip-hop Awards that reward excellence by providing a platform to award the forces pushing the genre.
With evolution and continued innovation in production birthing music producers like Chxf Barry and Axon, distributing and marketing, there has been a steady growth in hip-hop, with the new cats Lagum the Rapper, Denesi, Moowtonoh, The Hommie, Lukas Blacc, Soundlyk BB hitting the scene hard, it looks like hip-hop as a mass movement is yet to get to its greatest heights yet.
