Closely related to the concept of mental strength is syncretism. There were DJs who were enacting these two values in the hotels and clubs by animating these sites with the latest release.32 They really helped to construct the shareable culture of hiplife as an incipient Ghanaian musical genre. Their success in this cultural enterprise resided in the fact that they developed a huge following for themselves, a sign that they succeeded in constructing the right interpretive cues that made it possible for them to share the same cultural meanings with the audience. Most notable among these DJs were Bombaata, Wofjay and Loving C.
3.3.1. Bombaata
He was known in private life as Kwabena Adjei but picked the name Bombaata, obviously to take advantage of the huge popularity of the US-based hip hop artist and DJ, Afrika Bombaata. Bombaata was the permanent DJ in Dimlite, a popular club in Kumasi in the early 1990s, and he
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Wofjay and Loving C explained that patrons went to the clubs and hotels just to go and listen to the latest song in town from abroad. The craze for latest songs helped to heighten the youth’s search for foreign culture.
66 was known to have started the English rap competitions in 1990 to satisfy the taste of the youth especially students who were looking for foreign taste in music. Loving C, privately known as William de Bordes and here represented as WB, one of the pioneers in organizing English rap competitions in Kumasi, when asked who initiated the English rap competition in Kumasi enthusiastically replied:
WB: Initially, it was myself, Bambaatta. Bambaatta and Jimmy they were older than I was. We were students and we were more in tune with what was happening within the students’ world but they were out of school. So we said that let us put the students together to organize rap competition or something and let us see how creative they would be. So we remember, I remember very well in those days that we told the contestants to stick to their own lyrics. They were supposed to write their own lyrics and not to rap any other…It was in English
Bombaata took advantage of the search and quest of the youth for foreign culture and mental strength. The question is: why were the youth clamouring for these values? Urban (2001: 57) explains, “the items come to be evaluated, over time, through internal dialogue and debate, as new and better, yes, better – with respect to the cultural elements they come to replace”. Barfour, 17, Emmanuel 16 and Reggie, 16, make it clear that they prefer the American culture to that of Ghana because it makes them more confident in life – a show of mental strength. They lament the seeming lack of confidence and productivity in the African culture and Barfour, BF, sums up their frustration by saying:
BF: When you watch hip hop stars, they would, like when you watch them, you will see that they are confident in what they are doing so you would like to be like those people.
Bombaata did not only identify this metacultural evaluation on the part of the youth but also provided expression to such metacultural perspective by flavouring these competitions with “wannabe” shows. These were look-alike competitions in which; for example, rappers were to rap and perform like 2Pac or MC Hammer. Wofjay followed him.
3.3.2 Wofjay
Known in private life as Wofa Adjei, he shortened his name to the pseudonym Wofjay to make it more appealing to his audience, who were more disposed towards big names in the American music
67 industry. The name itself was a hybrid of local and foreign components: the local Wofa (Uncle) became, “Wof”, was added to the adulterated form of Adjei, “Jay”, which had a foreign appeal following short forms of names of artistes from the US namely Micky Jay for Michael Jackson and Teddy Pee for Teddy Pendergrass. Such types of hybridity constituted cultural interpretive cues for the youth of the time because his name had both local and foreign appeal. He started DJ-ing way back 1976. Then Loving C came next.
3.3.3 Loving C
William de Bordes was known in entertainment as Loving C. This was the time when turning initials into nicknames was in vogue for names of artistes like Pee Tosh for Peter Tosh and Bee Marley for Bob Marley. Loving C got into DJ-ing in 1991 and became the resident DJ for Nsadwaso, the night club for City Hotel. He was cast in the mode of Grandmaster Flash of the United States of America: handled the turn table, did the scratching, cutting and rap (Rose, 1994) in between and on the rhythm being played. Again, he also offered that sense of innovativeness of youth self expression. Another point of attraction was his branding: wearing the tie, supposed to be a foreign symbol, which had the colours of Ghana flag in it, clearly a local symbol against the background of a foreign one. All these combinations of symbols were calculated to have a good cultural shareability. He and Wofjay succeeded in turning these English rap competitions into another major inter-school competition apart from the inter-school sports festivals. Let us also have a look at how these cues influenced the selection of sites.