Boone Saloon – 1-18-07

Kevin Mayame singer and dancer for Afromotive

VI: You dance in Asheville?
Mayame: Yes that is the first reason I came to Asheville, to dance with Balliwaba, and it means like a painter.
VI: Dancing like a painter
Mayame: Its Africa dance and the US culture. Three people from Africa were in the company.
VI: How did you get the band together?
Mayame: The bass player Ran Reardon and another person Jerimy Long had a store in Asheville and they liked to get together for drum circles. And we decided to form a fusion.
VI: With Afrobeat in mind?
Mayame: Yah. The root is Afrobeat, that’s where we got inspired.
VI: Have you heard of Antibalas Afrobeat?
Mayame: One of the big moments in my life was watching Antibalas at the Orange Peel. After that band I said I wish I could be in a band like that, and it happened like 6 months after that.
VI: You played with Erykah Badu?
Mayame: She came to improvise on what of our tunes. The tune was Afrobeat Disco from Tony Island, the drumset player of Fela Kuti, she came on stage and she definitely digged the music. We didn’t expect that she would come on stage to sing with us.
VI: That will make your day. You are from ‘Coate de Ivory’ in Africa?
Mayame: Yah. We are on the west we have Liberia, Guinea, Sierra Leone and in the east we have Ghana, the north we have Mali Butchonasu.
VI: You are 28 and you moved here in 2004?
Mayame: Yes.
VI: You lived in Africa during the Gue’i administration?
Mayame: No, because Gue’i passed away in 2000.
VI: But you lived there when Gue’i was in power?
Mayame: I lived in the city that was 35 minutes from the village Gayuva. We played New Years Eve 2000 in this Ivory village. I was there when all those things happened; I left in early 2003 to move to Maui because we couldn’t live in Ivory Coast because it was like Gunjle.
VI: Gunjle?
Mayame: It’s like no law, people do whatever they want to do; the rebels can shoot whoever they want. The city where I had been living is a place where it got hit badly because the same time when the fighting happened in 2002 the president Gayuvere when he died, people were angry…nobody knew who kill him, and everybody accused the government.
VI: He was found in the streets right?
Mayame: Yes.
VI: There’s two stories to that right? Some people thought they just put his body there to make it look like he caused the riot?
Mayame: Yah, he got killed at his house; they just took his body and threw it on the side of the street.
VI: Was he a good guy?
Mayame: With politics you never know who is good and not good. During the time that he was everything was fine until he decided to be elected. When he came in 2000 he said on national TV he said “I just came to sweep the house”. Clean and organize democratic election but after 6 or 7 months he tried to become a candidate for an election and that’s when everything started to get fucked up. He was like a camellia, changed color because that wasn’t the thing he told us. The whole politics thing….you don’t know what is true or not.
VI: Well put. I read up on some African rhythms, what is Abissa?
Mayame: It is a dance, a generation dance, people now do this as a “happy” dance and they do this once a year and it is in Basan the first capital of the Ivory Coast. We have so many dialect that have the same root, but it carries its own culture. Abissa happens in November in the Ivory Coast. It’s like one week of ‘Fe de geracio’, the show of generation. They have every year an age section, and when you get 18 or 19 you have to do it to be in the generation.
VI: Like a right of passage?
Mayame: Yes. Very big ceremony. It’s like a strong dance, like this is your time, after that you will be come a man.
VI: What do you think of Booty dancing? Do they have that in Africa?
Mayame: (laughs) In the south of Africa we have Mapouka, a dance that is from the tradition, similar to the booty dance.
VI: Gbe’be’ rhythm?
Mayme: Gbe’be’ is from the Midwest Ivory coast. Its one of the rhythms that is very difficult to understand. It has one instrument you have to listen to very carefully. (shows me the rhythm…) Dede dede dede… Very good rhythm.
VI: Bete?
Mayame: That is the tribe who plays Gbe’be’. Because of a lot of different tribes coming from one main tribe they take the whole thing and come from the root, but some little variation, they just change the way that they want. That’s why we have so many dialect, you can tell its from one place but that’s how Bete’, yamwa, magabe…
VI: Zigilibithi?
Mayame: That’s another dance. The guy who brought that on national TV passed away in 84’. I don’t know very much about its meaning, it’s kind of like, in Africa we say Banyo, and Banyo is like a beautiful name, you just show your beauty. I see that when I watch Zigilibithi, because the guy is like a model.
VI: Show your beauty with the Zigilibithi….Laba-laba? I like that name.
Mayame: The dance of the duck.
VI: That’s like our funky chicken?
Mayame: The guy who sing that is from Bete.
VI: Polyhat?
Mayame: It’s like you dance with your waist. Polyhat is the same dance as the “duck dance”
VI: So it’s like the Laba-laba but you move your hands and throw in some belly dancing. . You are playing with Kalakuta Moziak, Fela Kuti’s old guitar player?
Mayame: I was really glad to learn from him. I am from part of Africa, I don’t know all the culture of everything in Africa. It was good to see somebody that was there, so I just asked questions and learned. He said you already got it, but you have to learn the language, the Afrobeat language. He say he’s impressed to see some body form the Ivory Coast measure and push it.
VI: What is Rapdogba? You have gangsta rap over there?
Mayame: Like I said, Ivory Coast is like…you not going to believe when you go there. Go to see…no. People think its all jungle and forests but no. My country is the richest country in West Africa.
VI: But you guys have the most problems, or maybe not the most-
Mayame: The problem I can see just started in 2002. I don’t know why. The more you learn, the more people have ideas and then you can do whatever you want. In polotic the more you try to be smart, you can’t resist against your colonizator, if you try to resist him then he will find your brother just to tear you down.
VI: Did you see that movie “Blood Diamonds”?
Mayame: Yah. People get shot and all that stuff like that (sigh).
VI: My understanding of Afrobeat is funk + jazz + African rhythms and usually with a political message. Do you have a political message?
Mayame: We don’t want to go thru deeply in politics. That’s why we bring Nu-afrobeat. We definitely have some political song but we don’t try to be a political band because the time from Fela Kuti to now is different. In the seventies you can say whatever you want but right now, they have some things you can’t say.
VI: I don’t know, I watched this Chris Rock show last nite-
Mayame: What I’m saying is that this time between Fela Kuti and now is not the same, we can’t copy him. We just want to bring our own style. We have good messages on most of our tunes, a thankful message. It makes them think, instead of accusing you of something or like that, just bring the idea on the table. Just put the idea on the table and everybody who kill, they will know you are talking to them. I don’t see myself being a politic singer. I don’t want to be for one person or the other because if I do that then I become a politician.
VI: Pure idea with no politics. Anything you want to say to NC?
Mayame: We have a good time living in Asheville. It kind of brings me back home. I can guarantee that the audience won’t be disappointed because what we bring to them will be of good taste.

Interview and photos: Kent Kessinger