Mthembeni Ndevu, better known by his stage name, Emtee, recently visited Namibia for Gazza’s ‘Pumumu’ album tour and the launch of his sophomore album titled ‘Manando’.
The rapper sat down with The Weekender to share his musical journey…
A pioneer of the African trap sound, his impact on the African musical landscape cannot be ignored. He is relatively soft-spoken in person but his face lights up and his whole mood changes when speaking about the thing he’s absolutely passionate about – music.
The rapper was born in a small town called Matatiele in the Eastern Cape but moved to Soweto when he was still young.
He says his road to success has been a rocky one. In fact, when he started he had no funds to get into the studio.
“I used to walk to the studio. That is why it is amazing for me to be able to make music and have so many people support and relate to it,” he said.
He added that growing up, he was inspired by kwaito legends – Mandoza and Zola. “I was always updated with the latest music so I was the go-to person,” he added.
When asked about the African trap movement, Emtee revealed that African trap is a music genre that he and labelmates Sjava and Saudi pioneered.
“It is basically trap music but with a lot of our own authentic stories. We are trying to give the world a bigger picture about Africa and let the world know that we have our own ghetto stories to tell and our own ghetto heroes to celebrate,” Emtee said.
On the making of his latest album which has 20 songs and only features only artists from Ambitiouz Entertainment, the record label he is signed to, Emtee had this to say: “After my first album, I realised that an album should be entirely about the artist releasing it so the majority of the content on the album needs to be about them and the experiences they go through. That is the approach I took,” he said. Emtee mentioned that he only worked with his labelmates on this album because he believes that the time for him to feature a lot of artists on his projects will still come.
On starting the African trap movement, Emtee said that it was an effort to give a platform to young people to launch their musical careers. “The African trap movement is not just about music; it is a team of young ambitious guys trying to achieve their dreams. That is why we don’t only have musicians but aspiring photographers, designers and other young creatives in various fields,” he said.
Emtee revealed that he has worked on a documentary about the movement which will be released soon. He added that in the documentary a lot of people will learn about his day-to-day life and it is going to be raw and uncensored.
The Weekender also caught up with Saudi, who revealed that he will be releasing his debut album before the end of the 2017.
“I am starting to be known as the feature guy, but my fans can expect a full body of work from me before the end of the year which will be released under Ambitiouz Entertainment,” said Saudi, adding that his album will be about about narrating a story of a young South African boy from the township.
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