Africa Is a Country

Music Break

Africa Is a Country Podcast
African Five-a-Side Podcast

Music Break

By
Sean Jacobs

I first saw Kesivan Naidoo play at the Independent Armchair Theater in Observatory. I was living around the corner at the time. He played drums in Tribe, a band fronted by pianist Mark Fransman. Much has changed since then. Naidoo is now sought after and fronts his own bands. These include Babu and Kesivan and the Lights. The video above, from a 2008 performance in Grahamstown in South Africa’s Eastern Cape, shows Kesivan and the Lights taking on “Timelessness,” a composition by the late Bheki Mseleku.

And since it is Sunday, here’s a link to a 15 minute Youtube video of Kesivan and the Lights being joined on stage by trumpeter Feya Faku. BTW, that’s Fransman on the piano.

Further Reading

After the uprising

Years into Cameroon’s Anglophone conflict, the rebellion faces internal fractures, waning support, and military pressure—raising the question of what future, if any, lies ahead for Ambazonian aspirations.

In search of Saadia

Who was Saadia, and why has she been forgotten? A search for one woman’s story opens up bigger questions about race, migration, belonging, and the gaps history leaves behind.

Binti, revisited

More than two decades after its release, Lady Jaydee’s debut album still resonates—offering a window into Tanzanian pop, gender politics, and the sound of a generation coming into its own.

The bones beneath our feet

A powerful new documentary follows Evelyn Wanjugu Kimathi’s personal and political journey to recover her father’s remains—and to reckon with Kenya’s unfinished struggle for land, justice, and historical memory.

What comes after liberation?

In this wide-ranging conversation, the freedom fighter and former Constitutional Court justice Albie Sachs reflects on law, liberation, and the unfinished work of building a just South Africa.

The cost of care

In Africa’s migration economy, women’s labor fuels households abroad while their own needs are sidelined at home. What does freedom look like when care itself becomes a form of exile?

The memory keepers

A new documentary follows two women’s mission to decolonize Nairobi’s libraries, revealing how good intentions collide with bureaucracy, donor politics, and the ghosts of colonialism.

Making films against amnesia

The director of the Oscar-nominated film ‘Soundtrack to a Coup d’Etat’ reflects on imperial violence, corporate warfare, and how cinema can disrupt the official record—and help us remember differently.