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The nominations for this year’s SA Hip-Hop Awards are out, eliciting mixed reactions. Phumlani S Langa takes a look at who made the cut.
The SA Hip-Hop Awards season has begun, but it seems few are excited – or even care – about the prospect. The nominees boast a few of the names you might expect, a couple of surprises and a few who didn’t appear, but should have.
The awards are set to be hosted at The Lyric theatre and I predict the show will be styled with a corny theme like 2016’s hip-hop pantomime and last year’s Parliament session.
I’m predicting things are likely to go well for Kwesta and Nasty C, whose names make repeat appearances on the list. Nasty C’s King has been well received and Kwesta has got into the habit of releasing anthems – his hit Spirit was a definite highlight of the year. Both also had international features in the form of A$ap Ferg and Wale, respectively.
AKA dropped his Touch My Blood project this year, but didn’t submit to the awards because apparently he isn’t feeling the whole awards thing anymore. That’s cool bro, that record was pop anyway.
Riky Rick also made the cut for a few categories, even though he’s had a quiet year in rap. His video for I Can’t Believe It (Macoins) didn’t make the Video of the Year nomination, which is surprising as that video is hard, but his Stay Shining video – featuring Cassper Nyovest, Ali Keys, Professor and Major League – made the cut. It’s a cute watch, but the sample on this track bothers me. I wonder how much work was actually put into the track, as it doesn’t sound that different to other times that sample has been used.
Every year ProVerb seems to get a nod for an award. He usually doesn’t win, but I don’t get why they put him in the MVP category. His last offering The Read Tape came out three years ago. I guess hosting Idols is another way of catching rep.
Moozlie seems to be the frontrunner in the Best Female category. Her Victory project was well put together and she definitely improved in the period between her release of Victory and her mixtape Versus, which came out last year. Versus wasn’t that impressive, but it did perhaps guide her on how to improve future projects. I am still bothered when I hear people suggest that Moozlie doesn’t write. She has been rapping for a while now and I listened to Victory as a fan of the sister, a witness to her true arrival and her victory.
Boity became a rapper, like, yesterday, yet she got a Best Collaboration nomination for her appearance on a Nasty C track. She didn’t write those bars, so it was basically just Nasty, with Boity making a vocal cameo.
I find the Freshman of the Year category nominations to be somewhat puzzling. The nominees include Moozlie, Saudi, Big Zulu and Tyrant – but the first three are hardly newcomers.
As for the awards that really matter – Album of the Year and Lyricist of the Year – the selection committee got it right for the most part. It bothers me that both these categories don’t have any women in them and I believe nominees for one category should appear in the other too. How do you have the best album, but you don’t have the best lyrics? The only way that could work is if you dropped a beat tape, but other than that I’m not with it.
I guess #Trending will be at The Lyric for this forced evening of hip-hop. I’ll be praying for a few good performances and cyphers from the people who got left out of the running.
