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64.
JELA
LWP Majitu
Sloter
Rockman
& Ally G
Translated from the Swahili
by Richard Prins
Sloter, pictured in the midsts of
an East African Television interview.
JELA
LWP Majitu
Sloter
Rockman
& Ally G
Translated from the Swahili
by Richard Prins
an East African Television interview.
* * *
* * *
Richard Prins’ Brain Flavour—a ‘lyric history of Swahili Hip Hop’—is an experimental exploration of Tanzania’s millennial rap movement via first-hand accounts, recollections, and first-time translations of lyrics drawn from keystone artists.
A road movie of a work written in the second person, a riff on the possible punctum(s) of 21st-century East African popular song, a telephoto lens on a local music industry, an exploded documentary study of a cultural anadiplosis, Brain Flavour is a love letter to the artists and musicians of Dar es Salaam.
The third title in Tenement’s No University Press series, Tenement are presently running a fundraiser to support the artists included in this volume. See the Tenement website for details.
* * *
Richard Prins’ Brain Flavour (NoUP, 2026) /
(A Fundraiser.)
* * *
An excerpt (care of Tenement’s No university press /
Care of will rené’s plastic language) ...
* * *
LWP Majitu was a Swahili rap group from Temeke,
* * *
Due to ‘structural adjustment’ imposed by the IMF, Tanzania reinstated secondary school fees in the 1990s, and many students couldn't afford to continue their education.
Instead, LWP members spent their teenaged days rapping together. The core trio—comprised of Sloter, Rockman and Ally G—gained fame in the late-1990s for bringing a rough verve and hard-hitting style to Swahili Hip-Hop. Their lyrics often made humorous observations on the quirky realities of daily life in Dar es Salaam.
Tanzanian music commentator Kado Cool describes LWP as ‘ahead of their time. Their style of rapping with a terrifying voice (like zombies) and contorting themselves on stage made LWP very celebrated,’ and credits Sloter as ‘the rapper who invented this type of singing, which was inherited by other members of the group and became the official signature of LWP's vocal style.’
* * *
Police harassment was a common topic in ‘90s hip-hop, no matter which continent you were on, and one of the most indelible Swahili offerings was the song ‘Jela’ off LWP's first album. Sloter reported that shortly after this track hit the airwaves, he was rounded up in a routine marijuana bust at one of his usual hangout spots, only to be released as soon as they reached the station; an officer had recognised him and insisted, ‘Better let that one go, or else he’ll rap about us!”
‘Jela’ depicts local police as petty, corrupt, and arbitrary in their harassment of Dar es Salaam's youth. It also portrays the unsavoury conditions of incarceration, and the social stigma suffered by anyone who emerges from it. The chorus, sung by Inspector Haroun of the Temeke-based duo Gangwe Mobb, makes the message clear: ‘Not everyone in jail committed a crime / Not everyone in jail committed a crime / Some are only there because they got framed / For others it’s the same, they just took the blame.’
(Prins, 2026.)
* * *
wanaokwenda jela
wote weezi
mwingine
yeye haweezi
unakamatwa
uzururaji
wakati pande yenyewe
siyo
Sehemu ikitokea noma
hakuna mfanyabiashara
wala mtu wa ofisi
wote mnakwenda
kusaidia polisi
Watu wameshakula
kiapo
Ukileta fujo tu
unakula kichapo
Hawaoni hatari
kukupasua
hii ni noma
kwa watoto wakishua
Ukishangaashangaa maskani
utashtukia farasi mweupe
huyo katuwa
Unatiwa mkononi
unapelekwa kituoni
huko ukatowe hela
kama huna hela
unakwenda jela
unawaacha wenzako wanaingia
wanatoka wewe unakwenda
jela kusota
Wanaokwenda jela sio wote wanahatia
Wanaokwenda jela
sio woote majambazi
wafanya mahasi
hapana
Sloter nakana
Watu wakimuona mtu katoka jela
hata kumkaribisha ndani
wanaogopa
Wanaona kibaka! ataiba!
Wakati jela kuna watu wa aina
mbali mbali! Maordinary
mamentary
mapadri mashekhee
Jela watu wanaswali wanafanya
ibada kama kawida
Sio ndugu yako
kafunwa Segerea
hata kipande cha sabuni
hutaki kumpelekea?
Usisikie jela
jela jela sio mchezo
Watu wanapata mateso
foleni ya kula
kwa malungu
kulala kwa mijeredi
Ukisikia ndugu yako
yupo polisi Chang'ombe
mfanyie mpango
atoke
kabla hajafika ngome
Wanaokwenda jela sio wote wanahatia
Je jela segadans
nondo gereza
insaidi chigome lupango
kunakuteketeza yoyote hukuma
kufika inawezana
na kusongeshwa kwa hatia au mkono
wa sheria kidogo kumteleza
Wanaokwenda jela sio wote
watuhumiwa
na si kweli
kwamba wanakutwa
na hatia, wengine wanakwenda
kwa kesi za kubambikiwa
Aisee Afanda Gerevas
libambike kesi ya mauwaji
hili lizururaji
tupate kidogo
kaulaji
Kama huna pochi
mambo ya mnoti
utazoea ndani
Ndugu jamaa marafiki
watakuweka mashakani
ukitoka jela
watakuonakama kinyau
uliyefufuka
kutoka askhera
Kumbe wapi yoyote
anaweza kwenda jela
sio kwa wezi
tunawarifu
hata kwa wale
wanaokula mali
ya umma
wabeberu
na wabadilifu wee
Wanaokwenda jela sio wote wanahatia
Outside Segerea Central Prison, Dar es Salaam.
everyone in jail
is a thief
For some
just looking suspicious
is illicit
Picked up
for loitering
when you weren’t
even there
Say a problem arises somewhere
it’s no businessman
no office flunkies
you’re all stooging
for the police
People swear their oaths
to eat
Bring noise
and you swallow a fist
Cops won't hesitate
to eviscerate
you
but that won’t happen to
no richie-rich kids
You will behold
a white horse pull up
your hands are cuffed
taken to the station
where you show your cash
if you don’t have cash
say bye to your boys
they come and they go
while you go to jail
on your ass
Not everyone in jail committed a crime
People in jail
aren't all criminals
or evil-doers
Denied!
Sloter says no!
When they see you get out
people get scared
to let you in their house
Thief! He'll rob us!
But it takes all kinds
to fill up a jail
Normies! Crazies!
Priests and sheikhs!
People say their prayers
in jail like anywhere
Isn’t your brother
locked up in Segerea
but you won't even bring him
a bar of soap?
Deaf to the word jail
jail, jail, jail
It’s no game, it's agony
lined up to eat
by a baton
then whipped to sleep
If your brother calls to say
he’s at Chang’ombe Station
better plot
to spring him loose
before they bring him to the coop
Not everyone in jail committed a crime
It’s jail
the clink
the slammer
the big house burns you down
Anyone can get hit
by justice
shoved by guilt
or the hand of the law
can slip
People in jail
aren’t perps
No! they weren’t caught
they just got set up
Hey Officer
frame a case
loitering, murder, why not
get ourselves
a meal
If your wallet
isn’t full of bills
then you rot
Your folks
hold you in doubt
and if you get out
they think you’re a cat
resurrected
from the afterlife
Anyone anywhere can go to jail
we’re not snitches
except
for the thieves
eating our riches
with a fork
you tricksters
shapeshifters
you imperial goats
Not everyone in jail committed a crime
Broadcasting monthly, Will René presents Plastic Language, a show exploring spoken word across recorded media, spanning dub, jazz, ASMR, sound poetry and a myriad more. René’s selections are informed by—but not limited to—the collection of poetry LPs held at the Southbank Centre's National Poetry Library, where René works as a librarian. Alongside LWP Majitu, this volume features special recordings made with Dry Cleaning's Florence Shaw, reading her writings and lyrics outside St. Alfege Church in Greenwich. Image by Petra Schulze-Wollgast, from Typewriter Drawings (Paper View Books, 2023).
(For the Plastic Langauge archive, care of NTS, see here.)
Order PRINS’ Brain Flavour : A lyric history of swahili hip-hop from tenement direct.
Richard Prins, a lifelong New Yorker, teaches expository and creative writing at Queens College (CUNY / Flushing, New York, NY). He is the author of the hybrid chapbook We May Eat Fruit (Ghostbird Press, 2025) and translator of Swahili poetry by Muyaka bin Haji al-Ghassaniy We Are Still in the Fort (Vanderbilt University Press, 2026) and Katama Mkangi's Africanfuturist novel They Are Us (University of Georgia Press, 2027), which received a 2023 PEN / Heim Translation Fund Grant and 2024 National Endowment For the Arts Translation Fellowship. His work also appears in The Best American Essays 2024.
Back to Rehearsal.
Care of will rené’s plastic language) ...
* * *
LWP Majitu was a Swahili rap group from Temeke,
one of the poorest districts of Dar es Salaam.
* * *
Due to ‘structural adjustment’ imposed by the IMF, Tanzania reinstated secondary school fees in the 1990s, and many students couldn't afford to continue their education.
Instead, LWP members spent their teenaged days rapping together. The core trio—comprised of Sloter, Rockman and Ally G—gained fame in the late-1990s for bringing a rough verve and hard-hitting style to Swahili Hip-Hop. Their lyrics often made humorous observations on the quirky realities of daily life in Dar es Salaam.
Tanzanian music commentator Kado Cool describes LWP as ‘ahead of their time. Their style of rapping with a terrifying voice (like zombies) and contorting themselves on stage made LWP very celebrated,’ and credits Sloter as ‘the rapper who invented this type of singing, which was inherited by other members of the group and became the official signature of LWP's vocal style.’
* * *
Police harassment was a common topic in ‘90s hip-hop, no matter which continent you were on, and one of the most indelible Swahili offerings was the song ‘Jela’ off LWP's first album. Sloter reported that shortly after this track hit the airwaves, he was rounded up in a routine marijuana bust at one of his usual hangout spots, only to be released as soon as they reached the station; an officer had recognised him and insisted, ‘Better let that one go, or else he’ll rap about us!”
‘Jela’ depicts local police as petty, corrupt, and arbitrary in their harassment of Dar es Salaam's youth. It also portrays the unsavoury conditions of incarceration, and the social stigma suffered by anyone who emerges from it. The chorus, sung by Inspector Haroun of the Temeke-based duo Gangwe Mobb, makes the message clear: ‘Not everyone in jail committed a crime / Not everyone in jail committed a crime / Some are only there because they got framed / For others it’s the same, they just took the blame.’
(Prins, 2026.)
* * *
We ...
usifikiriwanaokwenda jela
wote weezi
mwingine
yeye haweezi
unakamatwa
uzururaji
wakati pande yenyewe
siyo
Sehemu ikitokea noma
hakuna mfanyabiashara
wala mtu wa ofisi
wote mnakwenda
kusaidia polisi
Watu wameshakula
kiapo
Ukileta fujo tu
unakula kichapo
Hawaoni hatari
kukupasua
hii ni noma
kwa watoto wakishua
Ukishangaashangaa maskani
utashtukia farasi mweupe
huyo katuwa
Unatiwa mkononi
unapelekwa kituoni
huko ukatowe hela
kama huna hela
unakwenda jela
unawaacha wenzako wanaingia
wanatoka wewe unakwenda
jela kusota
Wanaokwenda jela sio wote wanahatia
Wanaokwenda jela sio wote wanahatia
Wengine wanakwenda kwa kesi za kusingiziwa
Wengine sawa sawia kweli watuhumiwa
Wanaokwenda jela
sio woote majambazi
wafanya mahasi
hapana
Sloter nakana
Watu wakimuona mtu katoka jela
hata kumkaribisha ndani
wanaogopa
Wanaona kibaka! ataiba!
Wakati jela kuna watu wa aina
mbali mbali! Maordinary
mamentary
mapadri mashekhee
Jela watu wanaswali wanafanya
ibada kama kawida
Sio ndugu yako
kafunwa Segerea
hata kipande cha sabuni
hutaki kumpelekea?
Usisikie jela
jela jela sio mchezo
Watu wanapata mateso
foleni ya kula
kwa malungu
kulala kwa mijeredi
Ukisikia ndugu yako
yupo polisi Chang'ombe
mfanyie mpango
atoke
kabla hajafika ngome
Wanaokwenda jela sio wote wanahatia
Wanaokwenda jela sio wote wanahatia
Wengine wanakwenda kwa kesi za kusingiziwa
Wengine sawa sawia kweli watuhumiwa
Je jela segadans
nondo gereza
insaidi chigome lupango
kunakuteketeza yoyote hukuma
kufika inawezana
na kusongeshwa kwa hatia au mkono
wa sheria kidogo kumteleza
Wanaokwenda jela sio wote
watuhumiwa
na si kweli
kwamba wanakutwa
na hatia, wengine wanakwenda
kwa kesi za kubambikiwa
Aisee Afanda Gerevas
libambike kesi ya mauwaji
hili lizururaji
tupate kidogo
kaulaji
Kama huna pochi
mambo ya mnoti
utazoea ndani
Ndugu jamaa marafiki
watakuweka mashakani
ukitoka jela
watakuonakama kinyau
uliyefufuka
kutoka askhera
Kumbe wapi yoyote
anaweza kwenda jela
sio kwa wezi
tunawarifu
hata kwa wale
wanaokula mali
ya umma
wabeberu
na wabadilifu wee
Wanaokwenda jela sio wote wanahatia
Wanaokwenda jela sio wote wanahatia
Wengine wanakwenda kwa kesi za kusingiziwa
Wengine sawa sawia kweli watuhumiwa
Yo ...
don’t go thinkingeveryone in jail
is a thief
For some
just looking suspicious
is illicit
Picked up
for loitering
when you weren’t
even there
Say a problem arises somewhere
it’s no businessman
no office flunkies
you’re all stooging
for the police
People swear their oaths
to eat
Bring noise
and you swallow a fist
Cops won't hesitate
to eviscerate
you
but that won’t happen to
no richie-rich kids
You will behold
a white horse pull up
your hands are cuffed
taken to the station
where you show your cash
if you don’t have cash
say bye to your boys
they come and they go
while you go to jail
on your ass
Not everyone in jail committed a crime
Not everyone in jail committed a crime
Some are only there because they got framed
For others it’s the same, they just took the blame
People in jail
aren't all criminals
or evil-doers
Denied!
Sloter says no!
When they see you get out
people get scared
to let you in their house
Thief! He'll rob us!
But it takes all kinds
to fill up a jail
Normies! Crazies!
Priests and sheikhs!
People say their prayers
in jail like anywhere
Isn’t your brother
locked up in Segerea
but you won't even bring him
a bar of soap?
Deaf to the word jail
jail, jail, jail
It’s no game, it's agony
lined up to eat
by a baton
then whipped to sleep
If your brother calls to say
he’s at Chang’ombe Station
better plot
to spring him loose
before they bring him to the coop
Not everyone in jail committed a crime
Not everyone in jail committed a crime
Some are only there because they got framed
For others it’s the same, they just took the blame
It’s jail
the clink
the slammer
the big house burns you down
Anyone can get hit
by justice
shoved by guilt
or the hand of the law
can slip
People in jail
aren’t perps
No! they weren’t caught
they just got set up
Hey Officer
frame a case
loitering, murder, why not
get ourselves
a meal
If your wallet
isn’t full of bills
then you rot
Your folks
hold you in doubt
and if you get out
they think you’re a cat
resurrected
from the afterlife
Anyone anywhere can go to jail
we’re not snitches
except
for the thieves
eating our riches
with a fork
you tricksters
shapeshifters
you imperial goats
Not everyone in jail committed a crime
Not everyone in jail committed a crime
Some are only there because they got framed
For others it’s the same, they just took the blame
Plastic Language / NTS
Broadcasting monthly, Will René presents Plastic Language, a show exploring spoken word across recorded media, spanning dub, jazz, ASMR, sound poetry and a myriad more. René’s selections are informed by—but not limited to—the collection of poetry LPs held at the Southbank Centre's National Poetry Library, where René works as a librarian. Alongside LWP Majitu, this volume features special recordings made with Dry Cleaning's Florence Shaw, reading her writings and lyrics outside St. Alfege Church in Greenwich. Image by Petra Schulze-Wollgast, from Typewriter Drawings (Paper View Books, 2023).
(For the Plastic Langauge archive, care of NTS, see here.)
Order PRINS’ Brain Flavour : A lyric history of swahili hip-hop from tenement direct.
Richard Prins, a lifelong New Yorker, teaches expository and creative writing at Queens College (CUNY / Flushing, New York, NY). He is the author of the hybrid chapbook We May Eat Fruit (Ghostbird Press, 2025) and translator of Swahili poetry by Muyaka bin Haji al-Ghassaniy We Are Still in the Fort (Vanderbilt University Press, 2026) and Katama Mkangi's Africanfuturist novel They Are Us (University of Georgia Press, 2027), which received a 2023 PEN / Heim Translation Fund Grant and 2024 National Endowment For the Arts Translation Fellowship. His work also appears in The Best American Essays 2024.
Back to Rehearsal.