'Thank you for everything Jabba'

If you are reading this, by now you probably know that Hip Hop Pantsula aka HHP has passed away. If not, I hate to be the bearer of bad news. 

Death has a strange ominous texture to it that lingers over the palate of our lives like coffee that scorches the tongue. You may forget in time, but the lingering sensation is still there in the back of your mouth. 

Before I wax lyrical about HHP, his meaning and his finest hours let me tell you where I was when I first heard he had died. At a random fast food restaurant. Delirious from by the landslide of bad news that had steadily been flowing in throughout the day, I had decided to distract myself with work and by work I mean scrolling on twitter for ideas and searching for the fleeting relief of jokes. It was there that I found an innocuous tweet, “HHP has died. Damn that’s rough.”

I found myself overwhelmed by the urge to duck and make my way to the toilet. But I couldn’t exactly leave my computer unattended and nor did I actually have to pee so what was the point. I can’t speculate on whether I would have cried or not had I went into that bathroom, so instead, I sat on my chair. Stiff and frozen as confirmation came. 

First one WhatsApp, then another. The landslide morphed into an avalanche. I had thought it no longer possible for me to be affected by the randomness of celebrity death in the wake of Prince’s passing. Cruel in its randomness, the most virile musician that had ever lived went out cold and limp. 

But the passing of HHP had seemed particularly sad to me for reasons that I am still yet to find the words to fully articulate. The last time I had seen Jabba was backstage at the Durban July. He had been wearing a big coat made in the Basotho blanket style. It was blue and he had a fedora in one hand and a drink in another. Lucid and taking it easy from the edge of the stage I could hear him making jokes with Thandiswa Mazwai and Stoan as Bongo Maffin got ready to perform. This is the Jabba man I want to remember.

HHP was born Jabulani Tsambo and grew up in Mafikeng. A township in the North West that he, as one of the bedrocks of local hip-hop, would project onto the forefront of South African popular culture. Like most musicians his early career was marked by stop and starts. Most notable of which was making an album produced by Chicco Twala and released as Party.

But it’s his solo work for which HHP will be most remembered. His debut, as well as sophomore projects, Introduction (2000) and Maf town (2001) created a template for not only his sound but set the agenda for Motswako as a whole. HHP made a user-friendly working class hip-hop that was neither esoteric nor alienating. 

Through his music, he brought a joyfulness into a genre that was going to extreme lengths to be poker-faced. And this is his greatest triumph, reminding us that being happy is something to be. It is a strange irony then that Jabba would attempt suicide on at least three times but not a surprising one. Often the biggest fault in our stars is their inability to keep for themselves the joy they give to us.

At 38, Jabba was no doubt one of the elder statesmen of South African hip-hop and even then he was still setting trends. He is part of a golden age of South African rappers, who now on the other side of their peak are showing us how to grow old in a genre that is often seen as a young man’s game. 

To have seen him at the Durban July in full command of a crowd that was much younger than his music was a showcase in one of the more understated parts of HHP’s artistry. His adaptability as a performer. He showed early signs of this even in his music. The way he switched between languages with ease particularly on 2003’s O mang? made him a multi-lingual lyrical threat. He could start a rhyme in one language and end the bar in another. On initial listen it was jarring, but the closer you got to it, it became tantalising. 

But HHP’s greatest gift was not his ability to rhyme but instead to listen. His selection of beats was just as eclectic as his flow. He would pick-pocket the beat with his pauses and breaths between bars that you could never quite pick where he would land. And this is what made, or should I say, makes his music a delightful surprise.

Some of HHP’s music has not aged well and that’s ok. Not all sounds can time travel and reach across generations. But to those of us who listen in the key of life and lived through it, it means everything.

As I write this, the tributes and memoriams are pouring in. I imagine it will be like that for a while.  In my house Harambe, He banna and Tswaka are gonna be on high rotation. Same way they’ve always been.

In death, all that is left is memory and cliché. When we say ‘gone too soon’ what does that mean really? Perhaps we mean that there was still more left to accomplish, but after best-selling albums and a cemented legacy in South African music, it’s hard for that argument to ring true. 

Perhaps we mean we wish we had more time. I’d like to think that we mean two things: We’re glad you were around, and thank you for everything.