Here’s a song which is anything but sensible.
Written in FOUR different languages…English, Zulu, Afrikaans, and Portugreek (which is not a language at all), I originally wrote it for Leon Schuster.
He called me one day over six years back in a highly inspired state of mind and said: “Donny! I want you to write me a HIT SONG! I mean a BIIIIG hit DANCE song!”
“Certainly my Boet!” I replied; “What colour?”
I probably didn’t say that, but he has a way of firing me up, so I sat down and wrote this infectious little ditty which is easy to dance to but means absolutely fek all!
I must say that I threw the kitchen sink at it, made a rousing demo, then sent it off.
And never heard a word from him.
I suspect he didn’t hear it, but such is my less than confident nature that I won’t follow up with a client once I’ve sent them a song. If I hear nothing, I take it as a rejection.
Fast forward nearly seven years, and I get a call a few weeks back from a guy who’s making a documentary about Leon, and wants to know if I still have the music I’ve produced for him over the last thirty years or so. He may want to use some of it.
Indeed I do.
So I sit down one day recently with the other half of my duo, Leigh MacMillan, and start ploughing through the many, over full, hard drives I have on my various machines, looking for anything Shuster. An adventure of epic proportions I must tell you, because only about 20% of what I’ve ever written for him has ended up in his movies.
I tend to overdo things.
Anyway, during our travels down that very dodgy sonic back road, we stumble across the demo of this song. A song I had completely forgotten about.
My side-kick responds very positively to it, and declares that it MUST be the next release for our duo WET PRIVILEGE.
But before you listen to it, you must hear the back-story to the ridiculous “Portugreek” phrase which I’ve been sprouting for years, to the amusement of most who hear it.
“Sparramamoobos bollasipristi stevros sa ellenakakas sa paraveski bulldos!”
Leon loves it so much that he has often phoned me at night, with friends, and asked me to say it over the phone. My kids also learned it, and others, but it's always been well received.
This is the story behind the phrase. My dear friend Justin Browne and I conceived it, probably in a fairly chemically enhanced state, when were at university in Durban together back in the early 70s. We also started a band, and enjoyed some pretty bizarre and unruly behavior together.
Justin went on to become a fairly prominent lawyer in this country, and now lives in the UK.
I went on to become a fairly prominent misfit.
So here’s the latest release from WET PRIVILEGE.
It’s called PARAVESKI BULLDOS.
Being a dance arrangement, it obviously sounds much better on speakers or headphones.