{"id":18555,"date":"2023-05-08T16:30:05","date_gmt":"2023-05-08T14:30:05","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.samdb.co.za\/blogs\/?p=18555"},"modified":"2023-05-08T16:40:07","modified_gmt":"2023-05-08T14:40:07","slug":"allegaarkie-vir-n-askeet-neil-sandilands","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.samdb.co.za\/blogs\/blog\/2023\/05\/08\/allegaarkie-vir-n-askeet-neil-sandilands\/","title":{"rendered":"\u201cAllegaarkie vir \u2019n Askeet\u201d \u2013 Neil Sandilands"},"content":{"rendered":"
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\"Neil<\/a><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

Before you point out the obvious, the deliberate spelling of \u201cAllegaarkie\u201d instead of \u201cAllegaartjie\u201d in the album title \u201cAllegaarkie vir \u2019n Askeet\u201d has to do only with the \u201cA\u201d and \u201ck\u201d that appear in this renewed spelling. It gives you a visual \u201cA k\u201d in both words. I am also turning 47 and this offering is my second full-length album in two years. Hence the repetition. AK47. Interpret it as you like. After all, it\u2019s an album \u2013 a creative offering \u2013 not a spelling test. If it makes purists and\/or fundamentalists hot under the collar, we are in the right place. Come sit at the table. We are serving a bit of everything.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Why record an album? This question has led to hours of thinking, rethinking, deconstruction and self-examination. It wasn\u2019t always pleasant or self-satisfying. I\u2019m not sure what knowledge has been distilled into the cup. In my opinion, it is obviously an existential issue. One of those \u201cwhy the hell am I here?\u201d type of questions. Perhaps it\u2019s like a black and white snapshot from the past. The photographer travelled long distances, the anticipation for the man with the magical technology was great, the preparation took a long time, people had to sit still in wonder, and in the blink of an eye, with a smoke explosion, the picture was taken. Over time, it becomes proof that that moment, those people, the hairstyles, the clothing existed. More or less just like that. An artifact. History.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I fell in love with music long before mastering the art of interpretation (acting). I was still very young, maybe a year old or younger. It was possibly the first joy in abstraction that I could experience as a human being. \u201cActing\u201d, I suspect, developed out of a survival instinct and as a protective mechanism, but the pure joy of existence certainly registered first in music. In the body. In the heart. It is, therefore, understandable that it took me about half a lifetime, up to my middle years, to act on this passion. The reverence. The honour. It doesn\u2019t mean I haven\u2019t thought about it for many years and secretly kept the thought or dream alive.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

You would be wrong to assume that there is a perfect moment when all the elements come together to make the creative process painless. It doesn\u2019t happen, at least not for me. It\u2019s a bit like a pregnant mother. You can make all the necessary preparations to make the birth easier, but that doesn\u2019t stop the natural progression of life. The patina of existence sticks. This album happened in between. In between all of the other things. You write in between, sometimes compose at the airport or bus stop, edit and rewrite on the way somewhere. And then the moment comes. Somewhere the child is born, the snapshot is taken. Somewhere you have considered fourteen cuts, brought people together, made recordings, and then when you look again, it\u2019s there.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cAllegaarkie vir \u2019n Askeet\u201d happened somewhere between my last full-length album, \u201cSangoma Sandilands & Jou Pa se Posse \u2013 Maanskyn\u201d (May 2021), and now. It was Covid. There is still loadshedding, theft, and corruption. There is still war somewhere. Tomorrow the SAPD will go on strike. During this time, I flew around the planet twice. I was mostly in a type of self-imposed quarantine in New Zealand and Australia where I worked on \u201cSweet Tooth 2\u201d as well as \u201cPlanet of The Apes\u201d. I was also working on projects in Mexico, Namibia and the USA. Therefore, this album is a snapshot of myself during a series of extraordinary experiences. Please know that I am fully aware of how extremely privileged I was to have had these adventures. The album is an attempt to distil these thoughts of an atomic existence into knowledge. In troubling times. AK47.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

You will notice that the album is covered in a wide cosmic net. It is almost like the planet we live on, or the cosmos itself. There are also personal, specific, small references. You can pinpoint on Google Maps the road between De Rust and Willowmore. Vast and insignificant in the same instance. At the same time vulnerable and resilient. It lends credit to influences such as CJ Langenhoven, NP Van Wyk Louw, Ingrid Jonker, Koos Kombuis, Anton Goosen, Bob Dylan, Gert Vlok Nel, Jan Blohm, Johnnie Cope & Tennessee Whiskey. There\u2019s protest, odes, passion, doubt, metaphysics, history, peeved-ness, preservation, transience, friendship, and humanity. A mixture of everything. It is the most inclusive, universal album that I could have possibly made and at the same time an unmistakable acceptance of how I have changed over time. It is for man, woman, child, and dog, and it simply says: \u201cHere we are. What now?\u201d. I don\u2019t have all the answers, but I think I have lived long enough to know a snake when I see one.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Making an album is no easy task. Usually, many people are involved, and the listener will immediately hear that there were many contributors. Albums like this don\u2019t happen every day in Afrikaans. There are guitars, string instruments, wind instruments, keyboards, drums, a vuvuzela, electronics, and even a musical saw! This also means that I owe quite a few Thank-yous to everyone who helped me during this process.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Theo Crous, my friend with whom I also worked on the previous album (\u201cSangoma Sandilands & Jou Pa se Posse \u2013 Maanskyn\u201d) and EPs (\u201cDie Groot 5\u201d & \u201cDie Groot Niks\u201d), your humanity above all else is what this album was made on. Thank you for being willing to throw away prescriptions and apocrypha and allowing us to create in the moment. Thank you for your sense of humour, brother. We made this album to please our ears, not to serve an insatiable, exploitative monster. I\u2019m betting that listeners will agree. Among other things, Theo was responsible for all the in-studio recordings and the mixing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It might be necessary to mention here that the endeavour to realize this piece of work, like with the previous ones, was subject to factors that do not fall within the realm of normalcy. Theo\u2019s specific sound has to do with analogue equipment, hardware. Old school. He especially focuses on how the musical content is recorded. Theo\u2019s sound studio has many lights, switches, and things. It\u2019s not a laptop. Recording the album during endless power outages was a hellish thing. Some days we sat and stared at each other, wondering if our reality could become any more absurd? We laughed through the madness. His spirit and perseverance are truly commendable.<\/p>\n\n\n

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\"Neil<\/a>
Neil Sandilands
(photo – Patrick Toselli)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

This brings me to the incredibly gifted musicians. Some of the recordings took place in Bellville, but there were also many people who participated from a distance. Qadasi & Maqhinga recorded from KwaZulu-Natal, Mauritz Lotz and Magda de Vries from Johannesburg, Melissa van der Spuy from somewhere in Boland, Shannon Mowday from Norway. To all of the musicians who helped to create \u201cAllegaarkie vir \u2019n Askeet\u201d (and there were many): THANK YOU! I hope you can hear that the album was made specifically to let your talent shine and that my voice and words were interwoven with sensitivity and consideration in the notes by Theo. I am very proud of the musicality of the album, and I hope you are too. I list your names here, in sincere admiration:<\/p>\n\n\n\n