As the debate over Eddy Kenzo’s recent comments about his songs having more traction on streaming platforms than those of the late Philly Lutaaya rages on, Jose Chameleone has also joined the fray.
Kenzo recently redid Lutaaya’s song titled Born in Africa, and when he was asked to comment on the initiative, some of his remarks didn’t sit well with industry observers.
“I redid that song, not because I wanted it to take me somewhere. I ‘arrived’ a long time ago. I have songs with over 100 million views,… I think Philly’s song has around one million views… which means Philly doesn’t have a song bigger than mine… numbers don’t lie. I respect the legendary. I respect him so much, that’s why I redid the song… to give it a push so people who don’t know about it can know about it,” Kenzo said in a media interview this past Friday.
“I’m trying to promote my country by all means. That’s a good song… He composed it while Sweden… we can’t let the song just disappear yet we have bigger platforms.”
Speaking to Isaac Daniel Katende, alias Kasuku, Jenkins Mukasa and Eddie Sendi, Chameleone said: “I don’t want to blow my own trumpet… we’ve flown private jets… when there was no Instagram. I’m older than Instagram, I’m older than Facebook. We grew up in a non-digitized generation… that wasn’t a digital generation.”
He added: “I can also buy them because I know how they do it, but I don’t want to … because I’m organic… But Philly Lutaaya!… that’s a man who sang on Vinyl… His music was played on cassette… He only released one song on the CD called Alone and Frightened… so, you can’t compare French [hair] cut [before he could complete it Kasuku said Marine, and Chameleone laughed]… people always give me their opinions, so I don’t want you to limit what I say. It’s my own opinion… so, comparing numbers doesn’t count.”
Meanwhile, Kenzo said people shouldn’t criticise him for not singing the song to match the talent of Lutaaya. He said he changed the rhythm of the song a bit to match the contemporary style. He insisted that his intention is to promote Lutaaya’s legacy. He said very few people who have redone Lutaaya’s song have his kind of reach.
He recently performed the song in Puerto Rico.
