AKA came out of the ‘cold’ box to serve lemonade

Purists are often criticized for not moving with the times or embracing change, especially in music. For a long time… artists from the African continent failed to break into the global market despite selling out stadiums and millions of records across big music markets in Nigeria, Tanzania, and Ghana.

The Billboard Hot 100 is a reputable standards record chart in the world, in the last five years, the Afrobeat sound has been dominating music charts globally which brought about collaborations between American and African superstars such as Drake and Wizkid, Beyonce and Shatta Wale, Chris Brown and Davido. Amapiano is currently basking in the global spotlight, which saw some South African rappers shift gears to slide into the Amapiano lane.

AKA is one of the artists who have remained loyal to hip hop and has a crystal clear understanding that GOATs don’t follow trends but dictate the pace of everything around them. SA hip hop had to take a backseat when Amapiano started dominating the charts and put South Africa on the world stage, sparking conversations around whether or not South African artists should copy their Nigerian counterparts who laced rap rhymes and sang over Afrobeats to break into the world charts.

AKA’s recent collaboration with fellow rapper Nasty C on Lemons (Lemonade) is proof that SA hip hop has returned from a forced vacation it had to take when Amapiano came on the scene and dominated social media during the COVID-19 lockdown.

AKA and Nasty C referenced trends from every corner of the world in each of their verses to highlight how connected the globe has become while re-inviting us back into their respective spaces and reading from the current chapters of their lives.

AKA addresses the recent tragic loss of his fiancée Nelli Tembe who reportedly jumped off the 10th floor of a hotel building in the opening verse, and the dark time he went through following her sudden passing that sent the rapper’s career into a tailspin with many blaming him for Tembe jumping off the building.

Without mentioning names, he speaks of a beautiful woman using British slang along with an idiom, “peng ting, a sight for sore eyes” and how some had turned their back on him while he was grieving for his fiancée “dark days, friends were few, it’s alright, turned that pain to fuel and survived, oh, oh, now I’m stronger.”

Keeping with the theme of beautiful women AKA mentions actress and dancer Lorcia Cooper who became a household name by starring in roles on popular television soapies such as Backstage and Scandal. AKA also gives a brief update on where he has been in the past year with a play on words using Lorcia Cooper’s surname and the title of a popular TV series she appeared on.

“Backstage in the coupe-like Lorcia,” the line also indicates he has been taking time out watching everything quietly from an area that is out of the audience’s view, he doesn’t forget to make mention of being well off and living comfortably while he was out of sight by mentioning a car, a ‘coupe’, a two-door vehicle often associated with having money or loosely put being rich. Although he was in ‘pain’ due to the ‘dark times in his life with his public image dented by the controversy surrounding his fiancée passing he was in a good place financially.

Basketball legend Michael Jordan is an iconic figure in both business and sports. But his name is synonymous with hip hop and popular culture due to the success of his clothing label, he is the epitome of greatness, and he is considered to be one of the best players to set foot on a basketball court. The ‘VictoryLap’ hitmaker touches on being a champion, embodying Jordan’s greatness in his music, “Spin moves in the paint like Jordan” once again reminding us of his contribution to South Africa’s hip hop industry and shifting the needle the same way Michael Jordan made an impact in basketball, “I’ve been on top for a long time,” stating his name is top of mind and has been relevant through different generations like corn snacks/chips Big Corn Bites “Champion ‘chips’, I’m a big corn bites”.

True to AKA’s hit-making formula of mentioning a woman his romantically involved with in a song, he mentions the star sign of his current girlfriend Nadia Nakai “Girlfriend on her bullshit that’s Taurus, Star signs, pulls up and shine at Nostra,” highlighting the bottle sparklers culture in nightclubs across the world. Paying homage to clothing brands in the chorus and mentioning how a South African clothing brand like Galaxy Boy solidifying their name in street and luxury wear, “Galaxy Boy that’s culture,” taking a dig at his old foe Cassper Nyovest who rode the Amapiano wave when hip hop was on the decline and called him a culture vulture, “Thank God they showed they true colours switched up piano like vultures”.

The Versace brand got another mention in an AKA chorus, he made sure his audience knew he is still draped in 100% cotton from the Italian fashion company, he also namedrops individuals that exemplify greatness in their disciplines like the late artistic director of Louis Vuitton’s menswear collection Virgil Abloh and his fashion brand Off-White which has been endorsed by creatives such as Black Coffee in the entertainment industry. Champagne is the holy water of hip hop, referencing Jay-Z’s Armand de Brignac known as Ace of Spaces in the streets in his chorus gives flashbacks of HOV boycotting Cristal after he accused the managing director of Champagne house Louis Roederer, Frédéric Rouzaud of racism and starting his own champagne brand.

Nasty C narrated his big move from South Africa to America skillfully in the second verse.

“Nice ting with the lips and the curves in my corner, a ten on my lap, Maradona,” the late football legend Diego Maradona wore the number 10 jersey, a number donned by the best football players, but ‘ten’ is also used to rate the beauty of a woman. The ‘Juice Back’ hitmaker touched the right rap lyric strings, from mentioning beautiful women, high-class alcohol, cars, and sexual in your window.

“When I made her gag I was going for her tonsils, when I met her dad, I told him I’m an apostle,” speaks of oral sex and being an apostle — a person tasked with establishing churches, which is a sacred place that is not always associated with anything sexual. This sets the tone for the entire verse comparing two contrasting ideas.

Nasty C spoke on how the Covid-19 lockdown disrupted his plans to move to California in an interview on Mac G’s Podcast and Chill, although he didn’t move at the intended time he lived between the USA and South Africa for a while. “Always out the country I guess I’m a Zai Zai”. Using a derogatory term, widely used in KZN slang to describe foreigners. He flips it by pointing out that he is now a foreigner in the USA shining the light on uprooting your life from a native country in search of better opportunities in a ‘foreign’ country, which is the case with a lot of people that are in South Africa from neighboring countries.

The 25-year-old rapper compares police in America to the South African Police Service (S.A.P.S), mentioning how easy it easy to lose your life at the hands of a police officer in America versus how a ‘bribe’ described as a cool drink in the next line can get you off the hook. “When they pull me over I’m black I might die No SAPS, cool drink, hi five SA”.

The Illovo-born rapper who is now based in the USA pays respect to the coastal province he is from talking about the great weather thanks to the Indian ocean and living on the road because of his career. A pepper steak pie is a staple meal for late-night party hoppers. Although Nasty C has been putting out hit records for over ten years but still looks relatively young and he addresses that with a play on the old saying about black people aging gracefully because of the pigment of their skin. “Tides, Durban, the ever-great side, living on the highway, pepper steak pies, but black don’t crack so I bet I age fine.”

AKA announced he was dropping an album later this year after the release of Lemons to Lemonade, a song title that tells whoever is watching that he has turned a bad situation into a positive one or as Nasty C would have it, turned pain into champagne.