COOL JAMES

The rebirth of cool
By Wayua Muli

It's funny how it takes a James Dandu to show us what has always been right under our noses. For the last 20-odd years, Les Wanyika's old hit 'Sina Makosa' has been right under our noses, slowly becoming a symbol of all things old, outdated and slow. Now, this song is almost a national anthem, with DJs across the country making everyone pledge allegiance to the dance floor that they are on whenever this song is played. The funny thing is, James (who goes by the moniker Cool James when on stage) has not livened it up at all.

The pace is still the same, the words remain as-was, except for a little rap injected into it here and there, and a little more drum-work. But it works magnificently. "I recorded about 10 versions of that song," says the artiste. "I have a lot of love for all of them and it was a difficult decision to pick on this one but I felt that it was the one that was closest to the original."

James was inspired by artistes such as Koffi Olomide and Kanda Bongoman whose popularity he wanted to replicate. Having spent most of his adult and working life in Europe, this was a difficult task for him, but not for the reasons that you may be thinking. "I had done eight albums before I did 'African Millennium', the album that features 'Sina Makosa'," he says. "Most of my albums had been geared towards the European audience, because it makes business sense to sell music to them. When it came to Africa, I had to decide between doing the music for the love of it and not making much profit, or going back to European-oriented music and doing it for the profit." Love won the day - and, at the end of the day, there was profit too. "I realised that there was a market here for this music," he says. The song went beyond African borders, to top charts in Europe and America. "The African-Americans really loved it, because it reminded them of their African roots."

James knows as much as they do what it means to be divorced from one's roots. Born in Mwanza, Tanzania in the 70's, James Dandu moved to Sweden about 15 years ago to complete his education.

"I couldn't study mathematics there, which I really wanted to do, because I didn't speak Swedish and they would only teach it in Swedish, but I opted to go for music and ended up enjoying it." There was the added advantage that he had been singing as a child in Sweden and getting paid for it, so he was familiar with the business. Once decided, he got together with a Swedish musician to record their first release, a Euro-pop dance album. "This was in 1986, and we had a lot of success with that album," he says. In 1988, he got together with another East African - a Kenyan - to start a music group. "His name was Andrew Muturi, and we called ourselves 'Swahili Nation', he says. It made good business sense at the time, and it was great to have someone from near home to sing with. But things soon started to go awry.

"When it was just me and Andrew," James says, "it was cool. Then Andrew's brother wanted to join in and we let him, and after that another brother...I mean after a while all this family stuff started to get in the way of business. Let's just say that it was good for Muturi Nation, but it was doing nothing for Dandu Nation." Two years after setting up Swahili Nation, James left, and started a business to promote himself and his entertainment work. Called Dandu Planet, the company now owns subsidiaries that are involved in artist management, production and publishing work.

In the meantime, his work with Euro-pop continued, and pretty successfully too. "I think I am among the very few African musicians to have consecutive number one hits on the European dance charts," he says. The most successful, in his view is 'Dr Feel Good' a song he released in 1994 to huge acclaim. By then he had about seven albums to his name, and was beginning to feel the itch to return to his home continent.

"When I came back, I just wanted to find out what the situation here was," he says. Incidentally, when he came to Kenya, Koffi Olomide was in the country, performing to a largely enthusiastic audience at the Safari Park Hotel. "I saw the difference in how the audience responded to 'lingala' music and to the type or European music that I was doing. They would get on the floor and dance to mine, but there was a lot more enthusiasm for 'lingala'." James decided that he wanted that kind of reaction for himself as well, and spent some time soul-searching, consulting friends and other music producers and listening to African music in a bid to understand it. The fruits of his searching were realised in his next album. "There was a little Afro-beat in that album," he says, but it was not emphasised. "African Millennium', his ninth and latest album, was released in late 1999, and was the final result of all that he had learnt about African music. And, judging by the reaction to 'Sina Makosa' every time it plays, his dream to have his music supersede 'lingala' did come true.

Cool James is a great supporter of African music and is going to great lengths to make sure that young, talented African musicians have their turn on the shelves of the music-stores of the world. To this end, he has registered another subsidiary of his company, Dandu Entertainment, in every East African country, to seek out, produce and manage talented, underexposed artistes.

"I will put money into marketing them and their music, as long as they understand how the showbiz industry works, and how they get their payment," James says. He hopes that by managing the artistes the right way, he will show Kenyans exactly how the job should be done right. "It's time we got rid of the so-called 'promoters' who exploit artistes in this region, and educated the musicians on what their rights are, and how they get paid."

The first project off this new initiative is almost complete, and will be ready for release in a month's time. James will only divulge that one of the artistes featured is Ugandan sensation Bebe Cool, and that the album is titled 'Extravaganza Compilation'. He will market the music here and abroad, using the contacts that he has made in different countries.