Football and Music

You’d better get used to the match TV director switching to shots like this:

You will be constantly seeing this image and I can guarantee you’ll hear that noise even in your sleep.

The thing they’ve got on their heads is a Makarapa, which are miners helmet with some junk glued on the top.   From Wikipedia:

The origin of the term “Makarapa” goes back to the start of mining in South Africa, makarapa (singular lekarapa), means hard hats normally used by miners (majority being migrant workers) and construction workers. The Makarapa are just decorated to serve purposes such as being used as fan articles, an individual artwork as well as a means of promoting one’s brand in the stadiums as they attract a lot of media attention. They still also afford the wearer protection from missiles thrown at sporting matches, their original reason for being worn.

Many of the wearers take sponsorship so don’t be surprised to see a few of them with plugs for a certain giant soft drinks company.

The other item… ah you know already. It is that dreaded Vuvuzela. Which doesn’t need much more of a description. I will tell you though that they come in different sizes and if they can’t get annoying enough – the smallest one sounds like a crying baby.

So far nobody has used one of these in a World Cup song, so until then…

– I got an instant reaction/response to yesterday’s post:
In that one I was asking for anyone and everyone to contact us if they spotted anything football and world cup music related. I also featured a series of posts by pathfinderpat at Town Full of Losers (who has published a new instalment today). Additionally I “highlighted” a few songs that he originally posted.

One of the mentioned tracks was by John Kongos, a Johannesburg born musician who you will know more from the reworking of his biggest hit by the Happy Mondays. The good news is that he’s still out there, still chugging along and that his four sons formed a band named… unsurprisingly or not: Kongos.

I think it was more because they want to promote their own material, but thanks to the message I received from Jesse Kongos and for the video he mentioned I now have an idea for another post…

For now those here’s a plug for Kongos utilizing the World Cup as a device for promotion:

I am being a bit cynical I know, they are actually a couple of decent tunes.

» More music from South Africa and this time it is via Any Major Dude With Half A Heart in which like I did with Town Full of Losers tracks I’m err… mirroring here one of the songs he first featured.

This track features a player from South Africa who we’ve seen in the Premier League, but he’s not playing tomorrow because he didn’t make the final 23. Commiserations then to Benni McCarthy. Cheer us up with this track, a colaboration which uses a very, very familiar tune…

» TKZee and Benni McCarthy – Shibobo

Half Hearted Dude has this and many more SA tracks which are all worth a listen.
Plus that post is the first in a series.