Først noen fakta:
AZANIA 3000 er et samarbeid mellom Sweat.x og Gazelle. Sweat.x er prosjektet til rapper Spoek Mathambo aka “The Kool disco Okapi” fra Soweto og Markus Wormstorm aka “The LAN lord” fra Cape Town. De fant hverandre på filmsettet til en kortfilm de begge var med på.

Gazelle startet opp som et prosjekt av fotografen Xander Ferreira i 2006. Ved å mixe reggae, dub og electro skapte han et ”fresht” lydbilde av den urbane afrikanske musikkscenen. I januar kom Gazelle ut med sin første fullengder; ”Chic Afrique”.


Vi satt oss ned for å snakke med Xander Ferreira og Spoek Mathambo om Azania 3000 og det å slå gjennom internasjonalt om du er fra Sør-Afrika. Etter ønske fra artistene, vil intervjuet publiseres på engelsk. Vi beklager vanskeligheter dette måtte medføre.


MN: Congratulations on an awesome gig.

XF: Thanks. I think we had a great time onstage.

MN: Are you enjoying Norway so far?

XF: We just got here, so we haven’t been able to enjoy it so far.

SM: You got a beautiful country here, everything I saw on the way here from the airport was so beautiful. Not to forget the girls, they are amazing.

MN: Where did the idea of collaboration come from?

XF: There is a pretty small scene in South-Africa, and it’s pretty hard to break through. The idea of collaboration started when we discovered our groups had very similar fans. The people listening to Gazelle were also listening to Sweat.X and vice versa.

SM: Well, we are friends and we did this to put ourselves on the map. It is easier to spread our music when we can do it together. When we started our collaboration we barely knew each other in person, we knew each others music. I like Gazelle’s music a lot, on stage today he did some of my favourite songs, which makes it interesting to collaborate. We also try to make a bigger scene out of South-Africa, showing that we make great music too.

XF: We also think it’s easier to make new fans this way. There are not a lot of people doing collaborations these days.

MN: You certainly gained some new fans today. Where are you going next on your tour?

XF: We are leaving for Berlin in some hours, and then Copenhagen. We are doing fairly many concerts in Europe this summer. Not all of them as Azania 3000. We also do many separate gigs in countries where people know us from before.


MN: Norwegian media named you “this summer’s big surprise”. Any comment?

XF: They are probably right. People seem to be bored of all the same type of music that plays on the radio these days. We are in an offensive position, showing off our colours and people seem to be happy about getting something fresh and different. We are happy to be set up as a big act, and according to the reception we get, it seems people start to understand we can also be a main-act.

MN: Can we expect to see you back in Norway any time soon?

XF: For sure. We love to follow our own footsteps. A lot happens around us after we leave the country, and it’s good to come back when we’ve had the time to grow on people. Although the papers I have to sign to get in to Norway are a mess. I felt like I had to sign some kind of refugee paper to be allowed entrance.


Dersom du ikke var på Oslo Live for å se Gazelle & Sweat.X er det ingen grunn til å fortvile. Skal vi tro artistene selv, blir det mange gjensyn med Oslo og Norge.


Gazelle på MySpace