THE undisputed king of Zimdancehall — Winky D’s music, fashion sense, lyrics and album titles are antenatal with veiled denotations that usually go over the heads of many, only for the fortunate ones to catch up later.
What makes his message hard to understand for many is that he rarely gives interviews to the media. The stage and studio are the only portals to whatever message he is disseminating and there is no other platform where he can break it down to his fans.
At his recent show at the Castle Lager Braai festival, Winky D stepped on stage, clad in a steampunk; a subgenre of science fantasy or science fiction that uses aesthetic design and technology inspired by 19th-century steam-powered machinery.
In fashion, steampunk is a design style inspired by Victorian-era industrialism. It’s embedded in themes and topics such as racism, classism and slavery.
Winky D has always stood against classism and social injustice in the country filled with gross injustice, massive corruption and looting and a high rate of inflation and unemployment.
Winky D first wore the steampunk in the musical video for Happy Again, which highlights how class and race came between his love relationships with the King’s princess.
When he launched Gafa futi (Chi Extraterrestrial) in 2016, Winky D explained…
“The album promises new higher intelligence and science to music. It is extracted from the universe’s many blackholes, sent through multiple worm holes, decrypted by the earthling encryption key Winky D, I give you GAFA FUTI audio files.”
- Religion: Overcoming doubt and unbelief
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- Religion: Overcoming doubt and unbelief
- Winky D dominates Trevor’s In Conversation
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On the album sleeve, there was a striking Wow! Hint with an encryption key 6EQUJ5 meant to reveal high science works of Winky, Chi Extraterrestrial.
Last week in a video, the Gafa announced that he will be launching a brand new album on December 31 at the Harare International Conference Centre. In a scientific style — the artiste depicts Archimedes of Syracuse — a Greek mathematician, physicist, engineer, astronomer, and inventor from the ancient city of Syracuse in Sicily.
Whilst taking a bath, Winky D is ecstatic to find a lasting solution to a problem and leaves the bathtub in a flash in a ‘Eureka moment’.
Myth has it that Archimedes was looking for a way to measure the volume of an irregular shape, while he was pondering the matter, he happened to go and take a bath. On getting into a tub he observed how as his body sank into it the water ran out the tub.
Realizing that this was how he could solve the problem, he jumped out of the bath and rushed home naked, shouting he had found the solution, yelling in Greek as he ran ‘eureka, eureka, aptly meaning I have got it.
The show set for the crossover is themed ‘Stop Intolerance’ which is the unwillingness to accept views, beliefs, or behaviour that differ from one's own.
Tocky Vibes, Holy Ten, Saintfloew, Enzo Ishal and Nutty O are the artistes who will perform alongside Winky D, a rare move by Winky D who at many times has been criticized for not working with other artistes.
“This December 31, a seed of unity will be sown at the HICC.” Says a narration in the promotional video.
Winky D is sending a loud message of unity and togetherness in the industry and the best way to do so is to start from the grassroots, and deliberately start with the new school artistes.
Winky D depicts this new generation of artistes as a fresh and fertile ground where the seed of unity will be sown, germinate and sustained. Winky D is also using this platform to light the torch for the next generation.
It's Winky D’s eureka moment to stop intolerance and spread unity in the industry, December 31 we shall be introduced to the new album, new messages and new science of music.
