13 - Batanai - A Tale of Two Cities

Peace,
Last night I was at an incredible event at the Bassline in Newtown and saw it packed out with warm people. I haven't felt a show vibe and enery like that for a while, and it was so refreshing to feel all the solidarity among us manifest in that space.

The musical line up was dope, no doubt. But what sold it for me was the afrocentricity of the event. The diversity of sound repped on the stage, the different listeners' demographic in the audience, all were a clear symbol of what it means to be African.

I hardly ever feel like I truly belong any particular place on the continent, generally I'm on some 'the whole region is my home' type tip. But last night, in the Bassline, I was home...

My song, Batanai, speaks of the City Of Stone (Harare) and the City Of Gold (Jozi) and how I exist in spaces somewhere in between. After last night, those spaces have shrunk. Truly. These are Blessed times.

13 - Batanai - A Tale of Two Cities feat Chi

VERSE 1
It was the best of times, it was the worst of times
Picture this versatile MC trapped in a verse of lines
Complex combinations; Blessing and Curse combined
No words define the depth of how it hurt sometimes
It was sort of living in two cities opposed
On some ice capped poles s**t;
Couldn’t really have chosen between the two; omnipresent
Like the dream when you travel to far places into cities you ain’t been into
The first, behind pearl gates and Gold pavements
The second, was made of Stone with century old basements
I lived in the first, my family in the second
Both cities close to my heart with plenty invested in the First
It gave birth to my work destined
Immersed in the firm earth of my birth setting
I set the standard, many interpreted as gallant
But all it was, was understanding the delicate balance
Of two cities

CHORUS – Chi
Nyango ndiri Jo’burg kuMari Muka
Kana Harare, ndotandara
Kwese kumusha, eh
Kwese kumusha, wo
Nyango ndiri Jozi kumushando
Kana Harare, nemhuri
Kwese kumusha, eh
Ngatibatane

VERSE 2
Many years in city one I spent shaping a future
Through trials and tribulations I’d escape in the music
City 2 went through some changes and due to
Unexplainable views too strange and confusing to deduce things
City 2’s inhabitants were dying
I felt like Morpheus while my family was out in Zion
Plugging in and out the Matrix and meeting The Oracle
I made an awesome album hailed by many as historical
But horoscopes lie and heroes eventually die
And for all my trying and my aspiring
City 1’s reliance on Gold paved streets
Had me wishing daily for those old basements
So for no day since, has my mind left this city
Every emotion wells in me now, except for pity
So as time unravels what only time conceals
I find I yield to the rhymes that build
These two cities…

CHORUS – Chi
Nyango ndiri Jo’burg kuMari Muka
Kana Harare, ndotandara
Kwese kumusha, wo
Kwese kumusha, o
Nyango ndiri Jozi kumushando
Kana kuHarare, nemhuri yangu
Kwese kumusha, woNgatibatane

BRIDGE
Ah-yeh-ahMose mose, batanaiMose mose, batanai
X2

MUSICAL INTERLUDE

CHORUS – Chi
Nyango ndiri Jo’burg kuMari Muka
Kana Harare, ndotandara
Kwese kumusha, heh
Kwese kumusha, baba
Nyango ndiri Jozi kumushando
Kana Harare, nemhuri yangu
Kwese kumusha, o
Kwese kumusha…
…baba kani..