What you didn't know about Gidi Gidi

                                  Gidi Gidi is one of Kenya's renown rappers

It is hard to guess he grew up in Dandora slums. Here is a man who, living in the sheng’-dominated area, crafted a name for himself as one of the best vernacular rappers.

His is a name that rings a bell and so under the same breath with other celebrated famed rappers of the day such as Hardstone, Poxy Presha and Ndarling P. Sixteen years on, Gidi Gidi is still at the helm of the local entertainment world, even so on a different jersey.

Most teenagers with passion for music, back then, would entertain party goers at Florida 2000 Club, Kenya’s longest standing international disco joint, then popular with Sunday Jam Session talent search shows. On one particular day, those in attendance among them pioneer producer Tedd Josiah spotted an Aquinas High School student with a microphone. Gidi Gidi was his stage tag name.

His lyrical punch lines were too good for a starter, edging a rival in a rap battle; a rival in the name of Maji Maji, the only contestant who would match his rapping skills that evening.

The two rappers dazzled Tedd and right there, he asked them to team up and become a rapping duo. And from this unpredicted union was born a hip-hop duo that would shake the continental music scene for years.

Back then, in the late 90s, few young singers appreciated doing songs in their local dialects. Hardstone had his song, Uhiki, done in Kikuyu while K-Shaka had Nyabaga Kodo Gakwa, in Luo. That was almost it.

The duo’s known debut hit Ting’ Badi Malo was recorded under Tedd’s Audio Vault Studios (now, Blue Zebra Records) in 1999. They released their debut album, Ismarwa, a year later. The album was a real life narration, with most of the tracks’ themes centering on their humble begging in the slums.

Ismarwa, and in particular the hit song Ting’ Badi Malo was a massive success. The two young rappers turned overnight celebrities in urban Africa besides becoming household names all over Kenya. But despite the album’s airplay success and popularity, there was little financial gains the two boys could show for it, a derailment they always recall with bitterness, hipping the blame on their promoter and sales manager.

Two years later, they were back with their second album, Unbwogable, whose cover track even enjoyed more media success and finally became a political anthem, popularising the dholuo dialect Unbwogable all the way to Wikipedia. In fact, the politically motivated rendition of the Unbwogable hit was the force behind the 2002 political euphoria, the political wind that is now engraved in the country’s political history.

“Even with the recognition of the song, Unbwogable, and people adopting the name in their conversations, we never made money that could equal its popularity. The song was worthy than that,” says Gidi Gidi, whose real name is Joseph Ogidi.

But the song provided a major breakthrough for Gidi Gidi and Maji Maji. The reputable Gallo Record stable, an international music stable with a branch in South Africa came calling with a major recording deal, the first of its kind for a local youthful group.

The deal too had its demands. Gidi Gidi had to shift from the dholuo dialect driven style to an international urban appeal afro rhythm tune. In the turn of 2003, the group released their new sound album Many Faces. Their image had changed. Gidi Gidi and Maji Maji were facing a daring transition face.

“Artistes don’t have to twang in their songs to sell. We had sold-out concerts globally yet we sang in languages people could not understand. Nigerian music is accepted across Africa because even as they sing in pigeon English, you can still hear their accent and feel their original beats,” Gidi Gidi advices.

Besides clinching a performance in the Big Brother Africa, Season 1 then, and a few local accolades and a handful of concerts across the continent, their fate now seemed sealed as their fame began to decline. Worse so, their move from Blue Zebra into the South African deal prompted Tedd to sue them. Maji Maji got married and over committed. Gidi Gidi joined a UN subsidiary body and later moved into radio. Suddenly, Gidi Gidi and Maji Maji was going down, faster than their overnight rise. The showbiz industry had received a major setback with its major export taking a bow.

“It is funny that both of us ended up in radio. We were in touch but you know, we could not be the same guys any more. I joined radio and when I asked him what he was up to, he told me he was in radio too,” narrates the Masters student in Business Administration at Strathmore University, and who works for Jambo Radio.