May 12, 2012

The Brother Moves On


The broth-er moves on[bruhth-er or bruhth-ur] ( Archaic ) brethren; interjection noun


  • the ghost inside the magic, the stranglers of an innocent idea of bringing performance art to its knees through costume, music and storytelling
  • a playful site specific collaborative piece of performance art in the form of a band based in Johannesburg.
  • The name of this collective is derived from David Simons "the Wire" character Brother Mouzone, meaning "judicious" in Arabic, a transient assassin with that audacious yet sincere difference.
  • The Golden Wake live EP is the Brother Moves On’s debut recorded at the SABC as a funeral for the first brother to move on Mr Gold Wasegoli. The EP is due for digital release on the 21st of March 2012(Human Rights Day) and the DVD and physical formats are due for release on the 1st of May 2012(Workers Day)



A brother writes about wenu wetla

No two things can occupy the same space at the same time, at least not in the physical sense they can’t. So then as far as he was concerned no one in the world saw it as he did for no one could ever take his spot on that hill staring down, up and all the way around it. From this he further deduced that no one could listen to its playfulness as it moulds and shapes mysteries; like how exactly it is that the ocean paints the sky blue using the sun as its paint brush.

His ears would always be the instruments by which his soul plays with both celestial and terrestrial vibrations and no one could play the ear better than he did. Such was his being; the wilderness of his self, that his imagination and curiosity was a vast landscape of hidden secretes waiting to be unravelled. It would then only be a matter of time till he would come across the secrets of love.


On the palm of his hands he held it like a gem that glowed with an amber green. He played with it as though a child preoccupied with a star he had gazed at for two whole days, until on the third it fell to the earth only for the satisfaction of the child’s amusement. But soon the stone would be lost to him, and he would have to remember that his love resided in the distant spaces between the earth and his appreciations’ reach to far away galaxies. It would be at this level of wisdom and listening skill that he would move on to join the band of brothers who rested in a still, continuous, static spot of nothing but motion. He found home in their sounds and unclothed himself with the body paint they tossed to their audience. Before they came across him they had already travelled across faraway backdrops of spiritual hills – shaped by winds that whistled through its trees and they played to souls that danced around fires in trans like states. When finally they reached his ears they had to knock down the gate that opened to this dense forest, shaded by treetops that are crowned with multiple sunsets.
The forest bed however had not experienced light for quite some time and so the bandits would be its sun, angled at the forest in a perfect 90-degree angle. They brought with them promises of dispelling witches, only to replace them with their own enchanting incantations of spells that had their magic in being void of magic. Their light was of the violent sort; it dislodged his spirit from its umbilical cord that lynched it to the limitations of the physical. Such was the violence of these dudes, that under the magic charm of their sounds and motions – when his eyes closed they opened to a revolution but when he opened them they closed to a barren land of conventions and how to guides.
As they passed through him – the vast forest – he followed the lingering scent of their sounds and was led to a clearing where in the middle of the ruffled leaves stood an upright door. He went through the door and walked into a rustic old room, walled with unmatched stones and lit by a wild fire fuelled only by its desire to burn. At the centre of the room set around a table himself and an air he could only describe as God, speaking in a dialect familiar but far to ancient for him to decipher, although of course he knew exactly what conversation was being held. Around the table stood the band of brothers who rested in a still, continuous, static spot of nothing but motion. Guitars on their shoulders, drumsticks in their hands and mic’s romantically close to a kiss, they played a silent melody to the rhythm of the cosmic conversation that was under way in front of them. The lead singer noticed him standing at the door and read the amazement on his face, the singers face turned to a child like state as with the enthusiasm of one he exclaimed; “I know right!!!!!!!!”. 
16 minutes later he opened his eyes to a barren land of conventions and how to guides.

by Sifuna IZwe-Ngenkani Mdlalose.

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the golden wake