From the Archives
Remember when the sounds of Mango Groove ushered in the new SA?
Yolisa Mkele recalls the days when freedom was in the air and Mango Groove was on the radio
January 29 1994, and we were still apoplectic with optimism from the Rainbow Nation LSD we'd been sampling. I was seven and thus particularly receptive to the highs of those around me.
Back then, Mango Groove was a beacon on an Ellis Park or a Karoo Kunstefees stage (the photographer's memory of exactly where this picture was taken is understandably fuzzy).
The dragon named apartheid was in its death throes and the band seemed to represent what we all desperately wanted to be true - a fun, delicious mix of ingredients that were not supposed to go together.
Perhaps the potential for it was always there and somewhere along the road we missed an off-ramp. Maybe we were naive to think the dragon was dead. Whatever the case, this shot, bursting at the frames with hope, now seems like an Ozymandian reminder not to get blinded by the light at the end of the tunnel.
Photographer John Hogg says: "This was back in the beautiful days when I had less weight and more hair.
"I saw Mango Groove two or three years ago at Oppikoppi, and they are one of the few bands that can still get a party going like this!" *snaps fingers*
WATCH the music video for Mango Groove's track Special Star..
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