Local artist Samthing Soweto has finally broken his silence about his music masters.
The “Nodoli” hitmaker was trending last week after fellow musicians Mas Musiq and Lawd Weezy released their song “Amalanga Awafani” without crediting him as one of the vocalists.
After the public outcry and threats to boycott the song and have it removed from all streaming platforms, the owners of the song eventually credited Sam (as he is casually known by his fans).
DJ Maphorisa, who also featured in the song, came out guns blazing on social media, calling Sam names for wanting what was due to him.
“Nang le yena Samthing Soweto wa lona wa mas*pa, akere lamorata? Nang le yena mara attitude ya hae ke mas*pa. Nang le yena, re tla bona otla bereka le mang coz everywhere atsamayang ko teng, otshwana le Sir Trill, ba tshwana, ba diagnosed the same. They plant rotten potatoes, everywhere they go ba senya. Aba itse selo and haba business minded. And look, talent won’t help you, bro,” Maphorisa said at the time.
His statement could be loosely translated to: “Stay with your sh*tty Samthing Soweto that you love so much. Stay with him and his sh*tty attitude, we’ll see who he works with because everywhere he goes, he ruins things.
“He’s just like Sir Trill, they plant rotten potatoes and ruin things everywhere they go. They know nothing because they are not business-minded.”
On Tuesday, September 10, Soweto decided to publicly address the matter, particularly about his “Isphithiphithi” album, which Maphorisa claimed he produced and freely gave Sam the masters.
“@DjMaphorisa shouldn’t lie the way he does, it’s gonna [going to] get him into trouble one day. I paid Phori for my masters. I paid the amount that he asked for at the time. Furthermore, I lied about Phori’s contributions to my project, He didn’t produce anything,” said the vocalist.
“I lied cos [because] I believed it would help my album sell. The truth is, I had very little confidence in my music selling without him as a producer. It seemed as if you, my audience, loved the idea of him being a super producer and I was not going to go against that. So I lied.”
He added that it was Mas Musiq, Kabza De Small and Howard who produced between 40% and 60% of the work.
“So yes, I lied. I lied cos [because] I wanted to sell records. I used @DjMaphorisa‘s legend to try and sell music and it worked. But I didn’t know that I’d pay for it with my hard-earned creative work and dignity.
“That I’d never get paid for my work and he’d go around telling people that he fed me,” he explained.
The multi-award-winning singer said what upsets him the most is that they use his work without his permission as they did with “Amalanga Awafani” until the public intervened.
“They use my works without permission, without contracts or consent. They just release my works without even informing me of release dates, when I ask what’s happening, they run to social media to discredit me before I can tell the truth,” he said.
“They then keep all the money they make using my voice/songs and go around telling people I’m hard to work with. This has happened to me from @TheSoilMusic days.”
His colleagues are not truthful, he said, because before working on a project, they all agree that the song(s) will be owned by the collective and once it becomes a banger, they want to claim it as their own and sideline him.
“We start all music with the understanding that these are our songs, as a collective. As soon as the song catches fire, no you are a feature. No, you don’t get to own anything, you are not signed.
“I don’t work for these guys. No one has ever paid me a feature fee. I don’t play with my masters,” he said.
He concluded by thanking all those who have shown him support and said once all the background work has been finalised, he will address the “Amalanga Awafani” issue.
Many Amapiano fanatics said they believe Soweto because Kabza De Small once mentioned in an interview with Black Crown Gin & Tonic that on their first co-joined album “Scorpion Kings”, DJ Maphorisa released it without his knowledge.
“This is how I know he’s telling the truth because Kabza on that one interview legit said Phori heard his album (that was already finished) and told him to name it ‘Scorpion Kings’,” commented @Paballo_maseko_
Others are siding with Maphorisa, saying Soweto is not as nice as he seems.