East or West, South or North, there is no place like home. That is what the veteran Zimbabwean ace musician, Thomas Mapfumo, seems to be proving now. After a 14-year absence, he and his band, The Blacks Unlimited, rocked until dawn at Glamis Arena, an open-air stadium packed with some 20,000 fans of three generations. Mapfumo moved his family out of the country in 2000, to escape the dictatorial regime of Robert Mugabe. Mugabe and members of his ZANU-PF party were frequently taunted in Mapfumo’s songs and statements. But since the ouster of Mugabe’s regime last November, pressure was mounted to get Mapfumo back to the country and in front of the audience that loves him dearly.
It was quite vivid that the guy had been home sick. Hear him, “I thought may be, I wasn’t gonna be able to come back here while I was still alive. But by the grace of God, I’m here.”
For his fans, who used to adore him on stage, seeing Mapfumo live at Glamis Arena was like a dream come true. Young Zimbabweans who got interested in his music mostly from their parents’ CD players and in public transport vans, or kombis have now grown to maturity. The box office sales
The ensemble of 17 musicians and dancers, who came from far and wide was decidedly all-Zimbabweans. The rehearsal of the songs for the show, which went back to the days of Mapfumo’s 40-year repertoire, was a bold statement. While in self-exile, Mapfumo bands rarely exceeded eight musicians. The Glamis Arena concert was calculated to be a return to the glory days of The Blacks Unlimited in the 1990s.
Although some veterans featured in the lineup for the show, but the band was made up mostly by younger musicians. The message is unmistakable – Mapfumo is back with a bang.
