East African rap veteran and force of nature MC Yallah enlists the lacerated vocals of Lord Spikeheart, one half of Nairobi’s foremost experimental metal eviscerators Duma, for No One Seems To Bother, a macabre call-to-arms featuring eerie, doom-laden production from frequent MC Yallah collaborator Debmaster. “This is a song where by we were expressing ourselves about how unfair life and people can be,” explains MC Yallah. “A lot of jealous people, so full of hate, killing one another, slaughtering their brethren like they are slaughtering chicken. One can sell the other for just 50 dollars, people don’t care at all, killing the innocent. Seeing all these things made me come up with this song.”
Excavating cavernous space with brick tonne bass, ticking drums and ominous synthesis, Debmaster keeps Yallah’s urgent delivery front and centre, as the MC switches between Luganda, Luo, Kiswahili and English. “Where is the love?” she questions. “I believe if we had genuine love for ourselves and each other this world would be in a better place.” Trading bars with Lord Spikeheart’s distended growls and blood curdling screams, it’s clear that, despite her optimism, No One Seems To Bother is an uncompromising transmission direct from the heart of the strife that MC Yallah draws into her unflinching portrait of a broken world.
“The video was shot in Uganda,” Yallah says of the tracks monochrome visual. “Of course, in the video you will see people drinking and smoking. Some times people smoke or drink so that they can forget about their problems for a minute, or an hour.” What we are presented with is a party at the end of the world, a defiant and dark euphoria in which visceral joy can be siphoned from hardcore expressions of difficult feelings. In the hands and on the tongues of MC Yallah and Lord Spikeheart, a terminal diagnosis of contemporary is elevated to an anthem of survival for those who struggle.
‘No One Seems To Bother’ is taken from Yallah Beibe, which is out now on Hakuna Kulala. You can find MC Yallah on Instagram, and Lord Spikeheart on Instagram.