Interview on the South African 70s punk rock scene

 This is an edited version of an interview with the creators of a film about 70s South African punk. The rest of the interview talks more about how the film was made. I just stuck with the stuff about the punk scene.

Punk in Africa: 3 Chords, 3 Countries, 1 Revolution… and a Facebook Page

by Curt Hopkins

Punk in Africa

What is punk, and how did your understanding of it affect the way you made the film?

Punk is an attitude of showing a middle finger to everything that is deemed important to others. It is about doing things for yourself independently on your own terms. If you put a soundtrack to that approach to life, you have punk.

How did punk reach Africa? For instance it [arguably] reached the UK via the Ramones tour. Any similar event of that nature, or was it more a slow seepage?

There was no single event or incident that caused to punk to reach Africa – the birth of the punk movement was more of a process, a slow build-up against the stifling conformity of the times. In the early 70s, Southern Africa still remained the last bastion of colonialism and censorship and social disapproval of popular culture was rampant. At the time the changing socio-economic situation in the UK caused a last wave of immigration of skilled tradesmen to South Africa, where they were welcomed by the apartheid government of the time due their skin colour. This also brought with it certain cultural influences, including the NME which was sold in South Africa six weeks after publication. Punk provided a necessary release from the imposed boredom of the times.

What kind of venues were found and what kind of ecosystem existed, or developed, to nourish these bands – if any?

Punk developed at first separately in each of the three main South African cities – when the musicians from various places began to meet each other, a network of small venues and later fanzines developed. Most of the scene was rooted in live performances and few records were available. The first attempt to do a punk / New Wave tour took place in December 1979, with Wild Youth from Durban, National Wake from Johannesburg, and Housewife’s Choice and Safari Suits from Cape Town. Most of these bands also played in townships and did semi-legal downtown street gigs, as the venues that would host multi-racial gatherings were limited.

Did punks get arrested for the political aspects of either their lyrics or the default politics of two-tone bands existing?

The politics of maintaining a racially mixed band was even more difficult for them and the police essentially hounded them out of existence and more or less even out of the country, apart from banning their album, which should be as well known as The Clash or The Specials today were it not for the way the apartheid government banned their music

Actual arrests were rare, but police harassment was part and parcel of the entire scene. Bands were forced to change their lyrical content or remove songs from their releases – notably National Wake, whose lyric sheet was censored due to government interference. The politics of maintaining a racially mixed band was even more difficult for them and the police essentially hounded them out of existence and more or less even out of the country, apart from banning their album, which should be as well known as The Clash or The Specials today were it not for the way the apartheid government banned their music.

What were the audiences like? Mostly white, mostly black or mixed?

Punk was the second important multi-racial music scene in South Africa apart from jazz. Rock music is generally a mostly white audience everywhere but in Southern Africa racially mixed bands were present from the beginnings of punk. Punk also often takes on local roots and draws on local music forms, and so there was an African identity present in the lyrics, music and visual style in the punk movement in all three of the countries we looked at.

Was African punk political from the get-go – something in the structure of the societies you cover – or did it move that way during its lifespan?

It was totally political from the start. During the 1980s in South Africa, the early 90s in Mozambique or Zimbabwe today, being involved in the punk movement was already a political statement.

Who were the primary opponents of punk in Africa? Were they religious leaders, political leaders, the police?

Definitely the police and the state. The scene was too underground to really have an impact on religious society as a whole. The government were always suspicious of the punk scene in all of the three countries we cover, with security police around gigs and so on.

How was punk regarded by musicians from other genres at the time?

Southern Africa is extremely rich in musical heritage, and even most rock musicians are taken quite seriously. A lot of cross-pollination always took place between jazz, reggae and African bands and the punk scene. More African-oriented musicians such as Mac McKenzie from Cape Town viewed the punk scene of the 1980s as a vehicle to reach broader audiences and different people but retained their musical chops and brought real musical skill to the punk style.

The punk scene in Southern Africa always took a lot of influence from local indigenous music everywhere it appeared, so the bands are instantly recognisable as coming from a specific place due to their sound.

How did punk change from country-to-country as it responded to the specifics of the society, events and politics of each place?

The punk scene in Southern Africa always took a lot of influence from local indigenous music everywhere it appeared, so the bands are instantly recognisable as coming from a specific place due to their sound. The politics and DIY aesthetic of the scene remained fairly intact everywhere...

Was there a “capitol” of punk rock in Africa in the 70s and 80s?

This was split between Johannesburg, Durban and Cape Town, each of which had its own scene with its own specific influences. Johannesburg was always more innovative but the other places had strong punk movements in their own right, all with their own unique characteristics...

What kind of response did you get – from the musicians you featured, and from others – when you said you were making a documentary on punk in Africa?

In the beginning people were quite resistant as a lot of them were traumatised by their involvement and in some cases had even left the country. But on the whole people were generally supportive and keen to be of help – in the end we were able to speak to almost everyone we wanted to get into touch with, and most were extremely helpful and generous in terms of sharing their stories, lives and archival sources with the project.

How did the musicians you featured react to the finished film?

The reaction has been hugely favourable from all of the musicians featured. One striking comment has been that across the various generations, many have commented that they finally understand their place in the larger history of local music, which is of course very rewarding. Until now much of this was completely undocumented.

Read the complete article here.

Movie on 70s South African punk and other African punk

You can see what I, and others, had to say about this movie in this post.

Here I'm just presenting the movie itself and two trailers, plus a nice, long, clear discription of it.

THE ACTUAL MOVIE:  

  TRAILERS:

“Black punk rockers smoking dope with hope to cope

White punk rockers keep their head and fight for peace to rule”

(“Black Punk Rockers” by National Wake, lyrics by Khoza Brothers) 

Punk in Africa will focus on the pivotal role of punk rock music, style and subcultures in recent and contemporary political and social upheavals as experienced in four African countries: South Africa, Namibia, Mozambique and Kenya. In all three of the three Southern African societies, the punk movement played out against a rapidly intensifying backdrop of intense political struggle and open civil war; today in Kenya, a continually developing punk scene plays out today against a very similar level of societal breakdown, financial difficulty and political turmoil, while a parallel scene in the Afrikaans community uses punk as a medium to express questions of identity, belonging and political dissatisfaction.

The story told in the film covers several decades, from the early 1970s until today, and will

trace the relationships and unique features of the punk scenes in the various countries with a

strong focus on the central role of the punk movement in the anti-apartheid, anti-censorship

and anti-conscription struggles in the three major South Africa cities. Particular emphasis will

also be placed on the unique multi-cultural and multi-racial nature of the movement and how

this has influenced its political direction and African sense of self-identification until today.

The film will immediately open by establishing questions of African identity within the punk

contemporary punk scene in South Africa, leading into an animated credit sequence which

will combine visual elements of the internationally identifiable punk rock style and uniquely

African art and urban design, set to a newly recorded version of the classic political anthem

“Black Punk Rockers” originally done by South Africa’s first multi-racial band, National Wake.

This opening sequence will directly flow into the main narrative, which is primarily concerned

with the political and social impact of punk within the anti-apartheid movement. This begins

with a visit to South African rock legend Benjy Mudie, who explains the first stirrings of punk

in Africa in the early 1970s, from early music-inspired riots to the direct anti-government

campaigns of the 1980s. Through the stories of bands directly forged by this repressive

environment, such as Suck, National Wake and Asylum Kids, we examine the development

of punk rock as played out in Johannesburg’s underground music scene during the 1970s

and 80s, a story set against the backdrop of the Soweto Uprising, international sanctions

and border excursions into Angola. This will be emphasized by interviews with some of these

musicians, including founding members Gil Gilroy of Suck and Ivan Kadey of National Wake,

as well as archive materials demonstrating the political atmosphere of the time and

extensive use of rare and largely unseen rare Super 8 films and extensive photos of all three

of these pivotal and influential bands.

By the mid-1980s, this growing underground scene was exploding in all of the major South

African cities and taking an overtly political stance. The film will explore this in great depth,

beginning with a visit to Durban and an interview with confrontational Coloured punk rocker

and media provocateur Rubin “Wildman” Rose, one of the key figures of the 1980s

underground scene as drummer in the legendary band Powerage. Numerous period

fanzines and footage of early 1980s protest concerts will also be included. Others from

Durban to be interviewed include Dianne Coetzee, a veteran of the local underground punk movement and now of Billboard Magazine, and members of the politicised all-female band Leopard and Sibling Rivalry, one of the multi-racial ska-punk bands to emerge in the 1990s.

Similarly, a visit to Cape Town will investigate how the underground organisation and distribution of this protest-oriented network functioned within the state of emergency of the time, through an interview and extensive use of the archive of local punk legend Ernie Pap, as well as tracing the emergence of the first mixed-race “goema punk” band The Genuines, with testimony from founder Mac MacKenzie and producer Warrick Sony of the Kalahari Surfers. This section of the film ends with an exploration of the peak period of political struggle in late 1980s South Africa as experienced directly within the punk movement, when the anti-apartheid and anti-conscription campaigns intersected with underground music in semi-clandestine and racially mixed venues like the Johannesburg club Jameson’s. This will be told firsthand through the personal stories of the banned and harassed group Toxik Sox, long-time punk promoter and historian Bill Botes, and X-Ray and Neil, brothers from the Indian community of Lenasia who produced one of the era’s most important underground fanzines, set against an archival background of riots, police actions and UDF protests.

With the advent of liberation, negotiations and democracy, the punk movement in Southern Africa became less overtly political in orientation but more and more diverse socially, with increased freedom of travel allowing movement across borders. In South Africa this gave root to bands focused not on pure protest but on exploration of identity and mixed musical forms, often drawing on local indigenous traditions. The film will examine this primarily through Cape Town ska-punk band Hog Hoggidy Hog, formed at the time of the first free elections and today playing increasingly African-influenced music as South Africa’s longest lived punk band. This part of the film will feature extensive road trips to both Mozambique and Namibia, where the origins of those scenes and their political context will be explored, alongside contemporary issues: in Windhoek, members of the younger band Half Price explain the local situation through songs concerned with German-speaking identity, human rights and satires of the 2010 World Cup; in Maputo, drummer Paolo Chibanga of 340ml explains the development of the Mozambican punk scene in the immediate post-civil war era and the unique local sound, rooted in reggae, Brazilian and traditional African music as approached through alternative rock music.

The film will conclude with a survey of the rise of openly stated identity politics within the contemporary punk movement, moving across both borders and ethnic and class lines. This section will dwell less on archives and instead will feature several bands playing live to today’s socially aware and often politically frustrated youth, with trips to Pretoria and Nairobi in order to examine the contemporary (and exploding) developments in the Kenyan and Afrikaans underground scenes, both of which point to new horizons and directions within the African punk identity. At the film’s conclusion, we return to Johannesburg to examine the newly formed Afro-centric punk band Swivel Foot, who incorporate kwela and township elements in their sound as part of a fiercely felt multi-cultural identity as new South Africans. As they prepare to travel to play at an all-African festival in Swaziland, the band members return us to our main theme, present throughout – an examination of what it means to be committed, punk, and African, in a time of political challenges and uncertainty. 

www.punkinafrica.co.za

http://www.spinearth.tv/feature/punksouthafrica

Labels: 70s, 80s, Africa, African punk, documentaries, documentary movies, movies, punk in Africa, Punk in Africa (documentary movie), research, South Africa

Movie about punk rock in 70s South Africa and reviews on it (movie included)

The title to this movie is misleading. Except for towards the end when they do a quick run through the years and a couple of other countries, it doesn't cover punk throughout the years or even throughout Africa, which has and has had a very interesting punk scene. Two-thirds of more of the movie covers the punk in South Africa in the 70s.

But it does do good job of covering that part of punk history. But if you're expecting to see many black faces, you will be disappointed. Punk didn't spread to the black communities in Africa until the 80s and 90s.

But it is quite interesting hearing how these white South Africans learned about punk rock in a country with a very conservative government strong on censorship, and how they tried to start and promote a scene that was looked down upon and blocked in many ways.

Many articles are edited, but can be read at the link above them.

From IMBD:

Three chords, three countries, one revolution...PUNK IN AFRICA is the story of the multiracial punk movement within the recent political and social upheavals experienced in three Southern African countries: South Africa, Mozambique and Zimbabwe.

From Film at Lincoln Center:

In 1976, as the Soweto Uprising was moving the anti-Apartheid struggle into a more militant stance, another revolution of sorts was starting in cities across South Africa. Inspired from abroad, but entirely filled with its own unique anger and outrage, punk rock exploded into a country where the Rolling Stones were banned from the radio. In their clothing and hairstyles, their lyrics and their decibel levels, these bands—with names such as Wild Youth, Gay Marines and National Wake—rocked the staid South African society with challenges to everything from censorship to lifestyles, and from religion to racism. Deon Maas and Keith Jones’ fascinating chronicle captures the development of what became a second front in the battle against the Apartheid state, while also looking at punk music in neighboring Zimbabwe and Mozambique and the role it’s playing in those societies today.

From the podcast, Afropop Worldwide:

When you think punk, a few locations tend to come to mind- New York, London, LA.  But Durban? Jo’Burg? South Africa?  In this program, we are taking a trip to a time and a place where punk had a very different meaning, exploring the music and the legacy of the mixed race bands that challenged apartheid. Little known to the outside world, and often overlooked even within South Africa, groups like National Wake, The Genuines, and The Kalahari Surfers used music to articulate their disgust with the society around them, calling out the conformity, repression, and political hypocrisy that defined the apartheid era. As time went on and theory was put into practice, the music became increasingly adventurous, drawing from the full diversity of South Africa’s musical culture, and fusing it to the raw energy of punk.  In doing so, they created a model that continues to inspire bands to the present day.

From Black Grooves:

Identities were constructed and reduced to the color of one’s skin by the government during the apartheid-era in South Africa. The South African government recognized the power that music held in influencing audiences, so they began controlling the radio stations, stopping music from crossing at country boarders, and monitoring performance spaces. Steve Moni, a punk rocker from South Africa, said that his music “made people think. People weren’t used to thinking, people were used to waiting to be told what to do and waiting for permission.” Approximately the first hour of PUNK IN AFRICA documents musicians’ experiences using punk rock music as a political statement from the 1970s Apartheid-era to present day South Africa. The last twenty minutes are divided into a short section on Mozambican punk and another section on Zimbabwean punk music.

Beginning with bands from major cities, such as Suck from Johannesburg and Wild Youth from Durban, this documentary recounts the fears and uncertainties of performing such politically rebellious music in a time when politics cost people their lives. National Wake, a multi-racial punk rock band, was composed of two white men and two black South African men. One of the man recounts the story of their band for the other three who either disappeared or were killed after the band dissembled. In a touching moment in PUNK IN AFRICA, this member returns to Soweto to visit the family of the two late black South African brothers from National Wake. Without missing a beat, the documentary does not fail to include important historical information linked to place and space in South Africa. Soweto is recognized as the home to the Soweto Uprising when many of the school children protesting the use of English and Afrikaans in the classroom were killed and injured by the army. 

While seeming tangentially related at first, the last two sections on Mozambican and Zimbabwean punk document the dispersion of punk throughout southern Africa. Providing a reversal of the situation in South Africa, the frustrations of trying to find a locale to perform at in Mozambique is still a common frustration for punk musicians in 340ml. The Rudimentals, “used to play music to conscientise people, to make people aware of what was happening in the country,” but refusing to be involved in a political system that abused human rights the members fled to South Africa to perform there. Once in South Africa, the Zimbabwean consulate in South Africa was foreclosed and the government made it nearly impossible for the lead singer to get his passport back. The struggles to perform music that refuses to conform to the injustices surrounding them in Zimbabwe and Mozambique mirrors the struggles in Apartheid South Africa, and by the end of the film the viewer realizes the close links between the punk music in each of these different southern African countries.

While this film focused mainly on racial issues within these punk groups, a discussion on gender in these bands was lacking. While two females were pictured in the bands, they were not interviewed and their presence was not acknowledged. Regardless, the ability for music to be used as a resistant force against government-enforced oppression and injustice is seen through various southern African punk music groups in PUNK IN AFRICA.

From Variety magazince:

by Dennis Harvey

South African punk band, National Wake

An interesting if accidental companion piece to recent docu hit “Searching for Sugar Man” — in which a U.S. musician unwittingly helped fuel anti-apartheid sentiments in 1970s South Africa — “Punk in Africa” chronicles the more overtly rebellious influence of punk music in that nation (and some neighboring ones) a few years later. This aptly raw, energetic survey of a very DIY scene should appeal to programmers looking for an arresting intersection of music, politics and underground culture. 

The focus is primarily on South African bands that began springing up in the late ’70s, inspired by the punk movement elsewhere, though the pic notes that short-lived local metal band Suck set a model for anarchistic impudence several years earlier. Acts like Wild Youth, National Wake and Kalahari Surfers followed the lead of many hardcore ensembles abroad in offering ramalama rock with lyrical rants against the prevailing conservative regime.

Sassing Reagan and Thatcher was quite different from critiquing Botha’s white-supremacy government, however, and secret surveillance, police raids, harassment, the threat of prison, etc., were serious issues for these groups. Their increasingly multiracial makeup also led to mixing indigenous idioms with punk styles in a lively alternative music scene that survives today, long after apartheid’s fall. Organized geographically — chronicling punk activity in Durban, Johannesburg and other cities in South Africa — the pic moves on to more succinctly limn similar movements in Zimbabwe and Mozambique, where musical agitation against the powers that be retains varying levels of risk. Briefer still is an eye-blink peek at punk’s impact elsewhere on the continent.

Co-helmers Deon Maas and Keith Jones draw on a colorful array of interviewees — albeit one whose gender makeup suggests these particular punk scenes weren’t all that empowering for women — and a rich archive of videotaped performance footage.

From Ink19:

No matter how you slice or dice it, no matter how much reggae or ska you sprinkle in the mix, punk rock is a white man’s gig. This documentary takes a look at the punk scene that sprung up in South Africa shortly after the British punks took over the late ’70s. Their influences were a hybrid of the local native music, the sounds of India and rare import 45’s. Apartheid was still in force as colonialism hung on to a rapidly shrinking ship, and like all times and all places, there was a disaffected youth ready to do something, anything, to defeat boredom. Defeating apartheid was as good a cause as any and while punk rock was a small force in its dissolution, it WAS on the right side of history.

Perhaps you’ve never heard of these bands: “suck” or “The Safari Suits” or “Screaming Foetus” but they were the headliners. Archival footage and present day interviews show a scene not unlike DC or Milwaukee or Portland: there were motivated skilled people who “got” the deal but resided in the obscurity of so many lost bands. Middle aged men now take us on a tour of clubs that are no more in places that went from creepy to gentrified; their baldness and white beards are signs of survival, not revolution. The footage is fun, but females and blacks are rare to non-existent and the message here is pure nostalgia. The scene has died away, the walls between black and white are partially down but at least no longer entrenched in law. And while this film claims to cover bands in South Africa, Zimbabwe and Mozambique, the last two countries are mere afterthoughts.

The punk movement galvanized the youth of the ’70s, it was political, exciting, and technical skill was unnecessary. These bands are competent, yet none of them jump out sonically. As musicians, they are dedicated, committed, and likeable, and you can’t say they weren’t a positive force in the necessary social changes in South Africa. Did you miss any truly great bands? Maybe, but punk wasn’t about being great. It was about getting out and DOING it, and these guys DID it. They got beat up, arrested, drunk, high, and laid. Did you?

Labels: 70s, 80s, Africa, African punk, documentaries, documentary movies, movies, punk in Africa, Punk in Africa (documentary movie), research, South Africa