By Dennis Asiimwe
Sheebah is unmatched in her capacity for track down music that works for her vocals. For a while there, we thought with her parting from Jeff Kiwa as her manager, this ability would be lost, but it seems she can still identify a bit of music that works for her.
Of course, she could still be collaborating with Jeff – the world of music is a lot like the world of politics: there are no permanent enemies.
That is a long winded way of talking up the musicality of Kansalewo.
I love the big band feel that the production for this song has. Sounds like there’s a whole and in studio executing this session, complete with a brass section you would be forgiven for thinking Afrigo Band was backing her on this track.
The harmonies are also emphasised on Kansalewo – oddly enough, while Sheebah’s music always has great harmonies, they are often overlooked, because they are wonderfully subtle.
There’s a maturity to Sheebah’s voice that works in tandem with her harmonies.
She doesn’t have much of a voice, but she uses what bit she does have well, giving it excellent tone and personality. It makes her delivery comfortable, and confident, and makes for pleasant listening.
Increasingly, of course, as she gets older, Sheebah’s music will get a less frantic and more introspective.
Kansalewo is an example of the direction she is heading in, and the song’s groove emphasises this even further – an interesting mash up of zouk and dancehall.
Heck, even what she is singing about is changing, mellowing out, with a sage feel to it that would have been impossible to imagine five years ago.
Kansalewo is folksy, almost Kandogo-Kamu-ish at heart. And hilariously, that’s actually a good thing.
