By Zanny Begg
"I just love being on stage", Lucky Dube told Green left Weekly as he prepared for his third tour of Australia. "I love what I do for the people and because of the people." Anyone who has been to a Lucky Dube concert before will be able to verify this. His shows are renown for their dazzling energy and warmth. His up beat reggae is guaranteed to shake you from your seat.
Lucky Dube comes to Australia hot on the heels of the release of his latest album Victims. Speaking from South Africa, Dube says he is "totally happy with the album". Victims has been a year in the making but for Dube fans the wait has been worth it. Music for Lucky Dube is about "bringing inspiration to life". Victims brings to life the hopes, fears, contradictions and traumas of the freedom movement in South Africa.
"Soldiers for righteousness", the most political song on the album, describes the dedication of those who struggle for a better world: "We are the soldiers for righteousness/ we fight against oppression/ we fight against apartheid.../ and we are not sent here by the government that pays/ and we are not sent here by the politicians you drink with/ we're sent by the poor".
Dube's contempt for politicians is obvious, "people have been divided by politicians", he claims. "Politicians use people to get power, they just want to see who's who in the zoo... the people need to realise they are the ones who are important.".
Lucky Dube should know. In his own career Dube has had albums banned and his concerts watched by government officials in South Africa. But times are changing and Dube is keen to take advantage of the democratic space that has opened up, "four to five years ago I wouldn't have been singing about freedom and equal rights but now things have changed, if only a little. Today you hear songs on the radio about Mandela and other political figures".
Lucky Dube dedicates his album to those who have struggled for this freedom. He describes the situation in South Africa as "travelling the last mile of the struggle" and declares boldly "Forwards ever, backwards never!".
However, Dube's determination is sobered by life experience. When asked if he expected to see the end of apartheid soon Dube was more pessimistic. "Apartheid can be removed from the books but it is still in people's minds... in places like America they don't have apartheid on the books any more but it is still within the people". Becoming "one people" is possible, according to Dube, but it will be a long road and must be achieved by the action of the people themselves.
"Different colours, one people" is a catchy tune which explains this idea. "Breaking those barriers all over the world / was not an easy thing /... hey you government never try to separate the
But if Dube sees equality between black and white as an important issue, his understanding of the need for equality between men and women leaves a lot to be desired. His song "Little Heroes" is an impassioned plea against the legalisation of abortion. With a chorus of women's voices crying "mother why do you destroy me" in the background Dube asserts, "there's a lot of things to be legalised yeah / but abortion is not an important thing here".
Green left Weekly received a resounding "no" when we asked Dube if he felt a woman's right to control her own fertility was an important part of the freedom for all which he sang so passionately about. "I am against abortion", Dube responded, "because I know for a fact that there is only one man or person who can give or take life and that is God the creator. And nobody has the right to decide who has got to live and who has got to die. Everybody now is fighting for rights, women, men, everybody, but nobody fights for the children that are killed even before they are born. They are the voiceless people and because I have a voice I will speak for them".
Dube asserted many times during our interview that his music is determined by the people, so maybe the people should remind him that half of us are female and that nobody will be really free while women are still in chains.
Dube wants to get his message out "to the world". To facilitate this he changed music styles from Zulu pop to the more universal reggae in 1985. Victims continues in the reggae style fans have come to expect from his last albums.
[Lucky Dube will arrive in Perth on November 15 and will play Perth (Nov 16, 17), Adelaide (Nov 18), Melbourne (Nov 19), Sydney (Nov 20, 21), Brisbane (Dec 2) and Cairns (Dec 3).]