Motlha, ATI's Hisa Hisa Makes Heat Waves
Spira Tlhankane | Monday June 11, 2018 18:00
Even though the song was just a few days old, fans were eager to see the performance. Motlha’s manager had told Showtime before that the song was performed recently in Maun before its official release and the crowd there lapped it up.
The song Hisa Hisa is an upbeat dance song meant for club goers and party animals. The song takes a different route from his hit Mmamotse that is harmonious but laid back. At the start of the song, Motlha sounds more like Han C who is well known for making dance hits. Both have been compared and the latter was spotted in the crowd at Motlha’s show on Saturday.
Hisa Hisa, which is more of rave than house music, is then taken by the Khiring Khiring Khorong Khorong hitmaker ATI, who is not new to the genre. His verse brings back memories of that dance song called Hey You, which he did with DJ Kuchi in the past. As much as ATI is powerful vocally, this time his lyrics were quite interesting and in one of his lines, he says “Ke matlakala a motho gake ikanyege (I am a trashy and unreliable person)”.
The ‘Ere Lere’ song maker freely expresses himself both vocally and lyrically and is not afraid to say what is on his mind, be it on song or on stage. In one of the verses in the song, Motlha sings the words ‘Mene, mene, tekel’, which are the words that appeared on the wall during Belshazzar’s Feast (Daniel 5:25), interpreted by Daniel to mean that God had doomed the kingdom of Babylon.
The incorporation of these words into the song is quite coincidental, given the fact that kwasa kwasa veteran, Franco has just released his 17th album titled mene mene tekel. Franco launched his album last weekend at Trekkers. Motlha and ATI’ Hisa Hisa, combines both artists’ vocal abilities and their Setswana lyrics into one well-packaged entity. Perhaps the most appealing aspect about the song is that it is mostly dominated by Setswana lyrics.
With many artists making it fashionable to sing in Setswana, maybe both the local language and music will grow and reach deserved recognition.