Apart from what were generally considered Kenya super groups of the 60s coming into the 1970s– the Ashantis Band, Air Fiesta Matata, the Mighty Cavaliers and the Hodi Boys, who rocked the bigger venues in Nairobi –the Kenyan capital was equally teeming with both Kenyan and other musician wannabes waiting for the big break.
Virtually every street in Nairobi had a live band. From Racecourse Road’s Rwathia Day and Nightclub to River Road’s Congoni Day and Night Club.
From Camay Nightclub and the Sombrero (strip) Club on the same stretch of asphalt starting on Sadler Street (Koinange Street) to Government Road (Moi Avenue).
The name of this street morphed from Kings Way to the current Moktar Daddah Street.
Rading Omolo’s Bird Cage was perched on the first floor of the building next to Ambassadeur Hotel on the corner of Duke Street (Ronald Ngala) and Government Road (Moi Avenue). From Victoria Street (Tom Mboya) to Crawford Road (Milimani) and White House Road (City Hall Way) bands were rocking patrons of every persuasion, race and pocket.
Even in earlier times Buckley’s Road (Bunyala) had a club owned by a lady called Aggy’s where the staple was Dixieland jazz and related art-forms.
Work was steady and the crowds gathered to listen and dance. There was the music of true expression as well as the commercial variety to get patrons up and dancing to shake off the beer but not too much to keep them sober.
There could not have been a better time to be a Nairobi musician than the early 1970s.
Then as the decade kicked in in earnest the bubble burst. The culprit came in the shape of a five letter word – Disco.
No more bands. Just a bloke and two turntables and tons of recorded music, mostly foreign. A switch here, a button there to work the lights and they were good to go.
Musicians lost jobs and started looking for day jobs. Nairobi began to lose its soul.
Only the major groups or those sponsored found consistent work. Those coming out of school with great ideas were soon exposed to the realities and the vagaries of globalisation.
Even the bigger multinational African groups like the mostly Ghanaian Osibisa took to touring and they still do as we speak minus, of course, some members whose mission on earth was done.
There was, though, an interesting time, when Duke of Yorkers (Lenana) and Nairobi International School chaps led by Barrack Achieng (bass) with Job Seda (Ayub Ogada) (percussion), Noel Drury Sanyanafwa (drums), Jack Odongo (keyboards) and Gordon Ominde (Golden Simone) on guitar walked the hard rock path a la Deep Purple with an unlikely name - Black Savage.
Ogada later became the fulcrum of a band started by the African Heritage fashion house and they carried the name. What they played was an eclectic repertoire ranging from reggae, fusion to jazz.
Not mainstream but there was a loyal following.
The turnover of band members was also massive.
Others who passed through by way of the African Heritage band included Tony Ndung’u (vocals), Ugandan flutist Samite Mulondo, Gido Kibukosya (bass), Noel Sanyanafwa (drums), Wally Amalemba (drums), Goro Kunii (alto and tenor saxaphone), Sammy Kasule (bass), Sam Eshikaty (guitar), Francis Njoroge (keyboards), Jack Odongo (keyboards), Shaban Onyango (drums) and Ali Magobeni (guitar).
Some of these members notably Njoroge, Kasule, Magobeni and Onyango also joined Taso Stephanou’s band Makonde which, clearly was way before its time.
Their album Mola Are You There on the EMI label was as innovative as anything that had come out of Kenyan minds. Sadly it was at the wrong time.
