The Pam Awards came, reminded us why we used to rag on Kazoora so much and then, their work being done, left.
Make no mistake; their work IS done. I have searched to find any tanglible, measurable practical benefit PAM awards have beyond lining Ice Mulindwa’s pocket and the only one I have found it this: they enable unscrupulous singsong boys to dupe tone-deaf or out-of-touch sponsors into paying more money.
And of course with all these awards coming in, artistes increase the amount of money charged for performing at shows and for the next album. After their success at the PAM awards, Bobi Wine now charges Shs 4 million, Juliana Kanyomozi Shs 5 million, while Blu3 charge 3 million for a performance. (Story here).
Which might mean that you the ticket-buying punter, and yes, you are the victim here, has to fork out more of your hard-earned (or in cases, hard-borrowed) cash just because the arbitrary, random, dart-at-the-door guesswork of the panel decided to make your favourite minstrel more expensive. Now you have to pay more to see him drunkenly lip-synch while the harpies around him jerk their hips in what is only unison for the first few seconds.
The problem with the PAMA Wards, (besides the whole being a shallow, indulgent, bewildered, misguided and pointless orgy of ego stroking thing) is that the categories make no sense. Any true musician or music fan will tell you that genres these days are so fluid that it does more harm than good to box a song or singer in one category.
They would also tell you that Fela would never ever recognise Weasel and Radio as fellow Afrobeat musicians, and that Folkpop is just a silly silly silly word.
They would also ask you to warn them well in advance before you let Bebe Cool or Kazoora speak so they can turn off their TV and/or run out of the room screaming and finally, they may ask for the number of the third queen dancer on the left—you know, the one with the you-knows.
Yes, I’m hating. But you know I’m right.
Anyway, For Tumwi:
Mr E. Bazanye 