CABU GAH DIARIES: P-UNIT…..Kenya’s Cultural Icons. And The Road To Immortality.

Time after time,the World of Music offers us a personality-or group-whose music,artistry,prowess and adeptness at the game totally changes us. Changes how we talk…How we think…what we say,how we dress and how we dance. These artists are a godsend. And their art is more than just music…It becomes a cultural revolution.

 Across the World, we know stories of artists (Mostly Pop) whose music and compositions left an indelible impression on the minds of music consumers. They wowed and changed the World by the the way they danced,the way they sang,how they sang,what they sang about,the words they used in their songs,the way they dressed and the way their channeled their art.

Top on that list we have the graceful King Of Graceland,Elvis Presley,The Greatest Entertainer of All Time,Michael Jackson,The Smoothest Singer Of All,Prince,The Most Hardworking Man in Showbiz,James Brown,The First Third World Superstar Bob Marley and the Goddess of Shock,Madonna.

You can also throw in 2000-era performers  Beyonce,Lady Gaga,Britney Spears,Justin Bieber and Amy Winehouse in that list.
These artists CHANGED the World by EVERYTHING they did. Everything they said. And everything they espoused. How they’ve dressed,danced or crooned.

Michael Jackson’s Moonwalk is a cultural icon. Elvis Presley’s vocals in themselves were a message from God. And the Beatles got the World enchanted. And don’t get me started on Beyonce’s moves,Madonna’s music videos or Amy Winehouse’s references in her music.

Locally,we have a group of artists whose music,whose art and whose contribution to the Music industry CHANGED Us. They influenced how we talked, Influenced how we dressed, Influenced how we approached Women and influenced how we clubbed.
They were smooth…they were rough…They were suave…they were chic and they were Rock n’ Roll. They are P-UNIT.

From the very moment they started singing,P-Unit have managed to tap into the heart of entertainment,steal souls,change how we think, introduce jargon to our everyday speech and teach us a thousand things we never even knew.
Their songs, for instance,weren’t named or titled from a typical point of view. Neither were their lyrics. Or composition skills. They went a step ahead,they were maverick and they dipped deeper into the pool…catching much better fish and feeding us with a whole new cuisine we’d never tasted before.

After giving us “Si Lazima Tuduu” and following it up with the smash hit,”Una” featuring DNA,P-UNIT made it clear that they weren’t here to sing,rap,compose and sound like everybody else. “Una” had references,jargons and slangs we hadn’t heard before. They talked of our everyday lives…managed to infuse humor,creativity and shock in one song. Successfully.

Then came “Juu Tu Sana” and,immediately,the catchphrase “Ako Juu” or “Ako Down” became a Kenyan commonplace street speech word. To date.

And then “Kushoto Kulia”…Another song that spoke to our party culture,our clubbing tendencies and our hidden party thoughts. It was raunchy. And real at the same time. And it wasn’t long before it became a sure club-banger. And permeated the very spirit of every music loving Kenyan.

Then “Kare”. A song whose title NO ONE expected. The word “Kare’ actually never existed UNTIL P-UNIT sang a song called so. And yet again,the word was immediately incorporated to our local language culture. And became a classic sheng word…Brought to the fore by a group of artists whose work has always been to invent,create and launch new trends and dialects and culture.

And then they did “Hapa Kule” with the man who discovered them,Nonini. “Hapa Kule”,like all their songs before,once again found its way NOT JUST into our clubs but also into our homes and into our language. The street quickly picked up the words ‘Hapa Kule’ and with time,the words were sooo big that a whole TV station (KTN) even ended up having a show named “Hapa Kule”. That’s a testimony of just how big the name had become. Courtesy of the Cultural titans,P-Unit.

But it was their smash hit “YOU GUY “ that finally cemented P-UNIT’s place as the quintessential KINGS OF THE STREET CULTURE.
The words “You Guy”,to this minute,are still widely and popularly used in our streets…From Nairobi to Kisumu to Eldoret. And also,they launched another word into the Kenyan cultural market; The word,”Dendai” which was street parlance for a Woman’s big behind. Or simply a sexually attractive woman.

And as if one song containing such huge cultural words wasn’t already enough,P-Unit still brought us”‘You can Gerrit”….Which basically meant that a particular person(Male or Female) was sexy enough to be viable for sex with the observer/admirer.

These are the same people who first brought Kenya’s Number One Female Entertainer,Vera Sidika,to the fore. Kenya now cannot do without Vera. But we all know who brought her to the limelight. With that very phat ass..

And with videos and photograph poses and a dressing style that was NOT only sharp but also unrivalled and absolutely sexy in such a huge way,P-UNIT made sure that they wrerent just here to sing. Or rap. Or perform.

They were here to change US. They were here to change how we talked and how we partied. They didn’t just come to the party. They came to be THE LIFE OF THE PARTY.

We talked like them,used their words in our everyday speech,dressed like them,based our lifestyles around theirs and viewed the World of Kenyan Pop Culture through their eyes.

And the many (Local or International) Awards they’ve won-or been nominated for-are a testament to who they really are. And what a force they’ve really become.

And then this smash hit,”Weka Weka”. Good Lord! That beat,those lines,that rhyming skill,those jargons,that video,those dancing styles and all that coolness. It ONLY had to be P-UNIT.

“Weka Weka” is the work of genius. So are P-UNIT.

Michael Jackson is imitated years after his death. Bob Marley is on t-shirts decades after he left. And P-UNIT may take that route too.

Because they’ve proved that,time and again,they weren’t just music artists,they were CULTURAL ICONS.

They came,changed us,schooled us,influenced us and affected us. And they continue to do so. Hail P-UNIT! Our own Beatles.