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Monaja’s latest album, June 25th, is different from other works that emerged from the earthquake that was the Gen Z revolution. Opening new fault lines and laying bare previously covered cracks, the movement gave new confidence to Kenyans about what was possible. Street action in Bangladesh had just led to the ousting of its leader and Kenyans were sure that Kenya’s political class was next on the list.
Darius Okolla’s Generation #Occupy analysed the revolution; the Wajukuu Art Project, In the Absence, reimagined it. What Monaja does is give voice to the panoply of emotions and experiences that sparked and accompanied the 2024 Gen Z revolution.
The first song, Mshike Nare, pulsates with energy and intensity; it leaps and bounds. The repeated call “Vidole mbili juu kaa wasee wa multiparty”, takes us back to the multiparty era of the ‘90s when pro-democracy activists fought for Kenya to become a multiparty state. The voice and the beat are angry, strident, and enraged.
Shika nare colloquially translates to “catch the fire”. The song captures Kenyans’ penchant for victimhood – victims of the Stockholm Syndrome. Habits such as remaining silent when transgressed and oppressed, failing to demand accountability from the political class, and the perpetual tendency to not see the wolves in sheep’s clothing that surround us all bring to mind American psychologist Robert Firestone’s theory of the fantasy bond, a mechanism that keeps individuals and societies stuck in inertia, unable to move from where they are to where they would prefer to be. Manifesting in ways such as conflict avoidance and repetitive patterns of self-sabotage, the fantasy bond is an illusory connection to one’s family or community of origin that is bereft of authenticity or genuine intimacy.
When you look at the themes explored in Mshike Nare and, indeed, the entire album – joblessness, poor healthcare, Africans still existing as the wretched of the earth, extrajudicial killings, neocolonialism and corruption – you realise that Kenyans have been going on about these problems since independence. The fantasy bond causes one to live in a comfort zone. Any movement towards improvement feels terrifying and threatening. Mediocrity feels safe and comfortable; it is the only thing allowed.
The second song, Tokota, features rappers Shazzy B, Elijah Moz and L Nesss. Its easy, chilled, and mellow beat belies vocals that transmit stealth, cunning, villainy and edginess. It would do well as a soundtrack to a heist movie, the type packed full of mayhem and mischief and the villains always win.
Presented in a reggae beat swirling with futuristic strains, the varied ranges and textures of voices come together stunningly. Shazzy Bs syrupy sweet rap relays the disgust with the political class. Elijah Moz’s rough, raspy, growl purveys the aggressiveness and hostility of the protestors; L-Nesses angry, raging, strident, unequivocal, demanding voice stabs you with its urgency. Monaja’s voice, which carries the chorus, feels like an exhortation, a veritable war cry. The sampling of the chant that was commonly heard during the demonstrations last year – “We are peaceful” – gives the song a startling immediacy. It reminds us that despite everything that happened last year, nothing has changed. Of which Elijah Moz ominously predicts, “So be ready for the hurricane.”
The skits that pepper the album reveal the concerns at its core – they are the same concerns that drove the protests. Family, survival, basic human well-being and dignity. Through the conversations which feature Chale Slim and Lisi G, we hear about pregnant women who lack money to deliver in hospital, men trying to take care of their families in harsh economic times, university graduates unable to find jobs, medical bills impoverishing middle-class families overnight. The protests did not emerge from idleness and mindlessness; the material conditions that Marx outlines as the foundation for revolutions sparked them.
Tunachachisha has a fast-paced, intense beat, the sporadic and staccato pacing of the instruments subliminally evoking gunshots. The sound is hostile, belligerent, and aggressive. Featuring Chale Slim and Jan Christian, Tunachachisha blasts fear out to the enemy. It aims to grip them in the stomach, make their blood run cold. The plaintive sound of the flute weaving in and out, and the voice that sounds pained but decisive provides contrast to the robotic beat. The refrain tunachachisha is yelled out with increasing pitch.
Mguu kwa lami, vitoa machozi,
Tuna cha cha chachisha
Barabarani, kusaka haki,
Tunacha cha cha chisha
The music sounds like prisoners singing in tandem as they toil. The beat feels like a war march; soldiers determinedly moving to the frontline even as those ahead are mowed down. It transmits determination, resoluteness – no retreat, no surrender. It’s a catchy tune, one you find your shoulders bopping to. The personas in the song are demonstrators, narrating their experiences. With themes that include disgust at politicians bragging about their ill-gotten wealth, Tunachachisha expresses fearlessness, resolve, and the inevitability of change.
June 25th does not just capture the fighting, it also brings in the thematic counterpoint of love. Bembeleza is a soft, beautiful, somewhat sad love song. The persona’s heart has melted; it is lying wide open. He comforts his beloved in her time of distress, telling her that he will not leave her. It is plaintive and soulful. It will rip your heart out.
The layer of voices and chords that echo against each other in Bembeleza’s first verse give it a sacral, hymnal and spiritual sound. The vocal style in the second verse is radically different; it is nasal and guttural. Midway, Monaja turns to Kimeru, giving variation to the sheng. Bembeleza is healing and soothing; a veritable spiritual experience.
Just when the listener has dropped their guard and allowed themselves to be held in the soft, tender arms of love, Hii Furaha comes crashing in, ripping them out of their day dream. Featuring Nafsi Huru and May Wan, Hii Furaha is intense, fast paced, and frenetic. May Wan’s riffs and echoes on the chorus, “Hii furaha, siwezi kuzuia, zuia, zuia, zuia, zuia”, sparkle.
Set to a decidedly ’80s sound (it brings to mind Technotronic’s Pump Up the Jam), Hii Furaha sounds like hypomania, euphoria, exuberance, excitement, ecstasy, an explosion of happiness. It is a happiness that you side-eye, however, because of how frenetic and ungrounded it is. It is so fast paced, it could give you a headache. It feels like a temporary high following which will come a crash. It holds no equanimity. This dizzying ungroundedness is part and parcel of the fantasy bond; one’s feet are not on the ground, they are in the realm of fantasy and illusion.
The energy and intensity dip in Masufferer. Featuring Dambwe La Hip Hop, the song has an oriental feel, with what sound like xylophones, jingles and wind chimes playing at the beginning. The song tries to offer hope and a vision of a more functional continent where systems benefit all. It speaks of unity, of what is possible if the massufferers (the unwashed masses, the hoi polloi) of the continent come together to build one Africa.
Of the album’s ten musical tracks, Alafu is the most inspired. It quickly becomes an ear worm, its haunting sounds replaying in your head days and weeks later. Its power is not just in expressing national and individual anxieties, but also in attempting to lay out a road map. It is one of the most popular of the album’s tracks, remaining at number one for five weeks on Pawa Radio’s Top Ten and currently occupying at number two.
Alafu is thickly layered in its emotions, its explorations, its themes, its voices, its instrumentation, its aesthetics. The sadness, hopelessness and despair of the wandindi and flute contrast with the determination, assertiveness, and resoluteness of the voice in the verses. The strong, hopeful, confident clanging piano chords, belie the sadness and fear in the chorus.
Alafu is hymnal, sacred, solemn, stately, sombre, sad, reflective, contemplative, nostalgic, majestic and grave. Underlying all this is a spectral, rhapsodic, otherworldly beauty. If a song could be said to contain an innate nobility, this one does.
There is a loneliness to Alafu too; people might all come together as one body to fight but what happens when they go back to their individual corners? What next? This is the question it wants its listeners to contemplate. The second verse, which comes in on a sharp crescendo, is particularly rousing:
Wasanii hasa ni wenye wataoffer jibu la swala
Kwa kuinject, na kuinfect minds za watu na fikra chanya
Ni kuinvest kwa interest ya mraia zikiskiza bana
Wajirespect wasiexpect maisha mzuri wakishika mkwanja
Ni BS ya maCS, wanasiasa na giza mbaya
Hii ni test na ni best kutumia kichwa kwanza
Mtajistress kwa hii messs, ganji mkisakanga
Hii ni test, msiguess strategy mkipanganga
Ni business, ndio mwitness success ni miaka kadha
Answering his own question, the persona’s recommendation about what needs to be done is simple. The work is to thoroughly conscientise and awaken the masses (tuchanuane juu chini), get everyone aligned and resonating with the frequency of the movement, keep moving forward, get everyone aboard the freedom train.
The injunction is bold. That, borrowing from the spirit of the uprising, the work of social transformation is not a one-person show. Things are not to be left to the activists that were at the fore; we all have work to do. It invites us to look at ourselves as evangelists charged with a mission following the events of June 25th. In this time of hopelessness and confusion, the work is to spread the gospel of possibility.
The album ends with Ukombozi, a track laid out in two different versions: a boom bap and an acoustic version. First released during COVID, the sadness, pain, and hopelessness replete in Ukombozi conveyed the spirit of the time.
In the boom bap version, Monaja’s voice stands out as the main instrument. The lyrics chronicle the life of a person that has become accustomed to suffering, inequality and predation, backed into a corner and no longer afraid. His only way out is to reach for his freedom. This was very much the sentiment conveyed by the Gen Z protests.
The song is delivered in a monotone, with a flatness of emotion. You understand how a person, seemingly submissive and quiet, can in an instant be thrown off the edge into madness and violence. It conveys this pattern often seen in revolutions, where people have been stoic and long-suffering, but then they suddenly snap into revolt. The Gen Z protests were the Kenyan snapping.
The acoustic version of Ukombozi is not sad and pained, but haunting, spectral and scary. The voice is more deliberate, determined, and intentional. The song is less a prayer or a plea for help, and more a realisation and an understanding of the way forward. There is weariness, but also mounting anger and clarity. The guitar that peters out at the end, leaving haunting strains, lets us know that business is not finished; work awaits.
The protests were an indicator that Kenyans are ready to get out of their fantasy bond. In pushing against the political class and invading parliament, they were making clear that the nation had evolved to a higher level, that it was the political class holding them back.
Monaja’s album does not offer any advice, it does not attempt to move the people in any particular direction. The preponderance of rage and violence within it are an indicator of what is needed to achieve success in bringing about social change, however. Anger, disgust, fury. Channelled in a particular direction, towards a specific, constructive goal.
