From Splashy Fen to a backyard in Fort Beaufort...

Now that sleep has been accomplished successfully after a most incredible South African journey for Cape Afro-Rockers Soulja, let us capture your imagination and most precious time with a report back on the past few days...

It seems like eons ago since we left Cape Town in the freeze of a 3 O'clock Thursday morning in a single vehicle and trailer for what was to become one of the most cramped and arduously procedural escapades we may ever have had to endure. But like soldiers, we had to advance, steadily, through the windings of the Hex River Valley to the bore of the Karoo on the way to Graaf-Reinet and then finally through the threatening storm clouds hanging above Southern Natal. From Maclear it was a hellishly painful drive on a dirt road 3 hours away from Matatiele, where the night was to be spent. Fatigue reigned supreme and Soulja's were beginning to slur words, though not from any mind inducing substances, but purely from the long drive captured in one whole day...and a very, very black sleep followed in an abattoir of all places...

Waking up to the boisterous babbling of randy cocks strutting their stuff to a cage full of single hens just outside our door did not match the sight of a poor little chick who did not make it through the bitterly cold night - Lee, our vegan lead guitarist was mortified at the sight of this strange vision that lay before his eyes as he awoke in this brutal, yet magical part of South Africa.

After a most wonderful brekky cooked up by our hosts, we repacked our vehicles, and marched westward towards Underberg, where thousands of people had already descended in the name of a single festival called Splashy Fen, now held over the Easter Weekend. It was Friday, which was met by it's evening of the best SA Rock on the Blunt Stage hosted by Blunt Magazine of course.

From Sibling Rivalry, What Now?!, Stick Up Kid, Mr Smug to Waverley, it seemed like the atmosphere and sound was readying itself for the onslaught of what was to come...and it did...

It's 8 O'clock and Soulja hit the stage. While Prime Circle were rocking through their set on the Bamboo Mountain Stage, we began our charge...From the tremors of "Never Not Guilty" through to the manic opening bars of "The Song Remains the Same/FailureSummerSong", this set has already blasted off to Pluto and back again. Warren on vox can't stop smiling at the amount of fans that have amassed in front of the stage. We give them more. "Plan my Attack" steadies into "War/No More Trouble" and then the Marquee erupts as we jol through Lee's opening licks of "Amandla", aided on drums and mini bongos by Stuart aka Flashback McLaren, who at this stage thinks he's playing at a Johnny Clegg gig. SAB Black Label six-packs are jettisoned into the can-hungry crowd along with some beanies and shirts. These festival revelers who seem to be almost possessed are making more noise than ever now. Curve on bass joins them with writhing movements on stage that emulates his booming bass guitar. A new skanky afro-energized tune called "To be Free" gets them oscillating now...But it was the new tunes that really shone for us, and seemingly the audience as well - Greg's (Rhythm Guitar and backing vox) punky penned steamtrain of a tune called "Lost and Lonely" then proceeds to blow a hole right through the fixation of the crowd so that an airy space is created for the beautiful ballad "Like a Spider" written by our frontman. With only three minutes to spare and another three songs to play, a quick decision was required. Soulja then broke into "Fok Amerika" which was played at frenetic pace, and the stage was left vacant for The Narrow and Marlowe to take over, afterwhich Pestroy totally blow our brains apart with some of the best hardcore stuff we've ever heard. You guys ROCK!!!

Backstage we are greeted by BluntEd who showers us with mags and gifts from Lizard. The rest is history and this is also a fitting place to say a word of thanks to all that made this supremo festival possible for ourselves, and the ticket buyers. Band thanks go to festival director Peter Ferraz, Festival Manager Pedro Carlo, wonderfully and refreshingly professional Stage Manager Albrecht Wessels, SAB Black Label, Blunt Magazine, Lizard, WickedMike, Viv Haviside and anyone else we have sorely missed out. This festival goes down in our brill books ma chinas.

...and the rest is history. Driving back seemed as arduous as the drive up and winding through all the old Ciskei roads is no man's business. Heading towards P.E as a half way stop required us to take a route through Fort Beaufort of all places, where we were to look out for a turn off the regional road and onto another. Unfortunately our sign was lying in the grass on the side of the road in the now extremely darkened evening. Eyes are squinting and mouths are agape as Soulja miss the turnoff and as sure as God made little apples, the road becomes a backyard of a prefab house! Crazy as this may seem, it's all true! The next frantic 20 minutes were spent maneuvering our vehicle and trailer out of this one-horse awful town unassisted by the barking of rabid dogs and a most horrid assortment of other howling beasts that lay lurking in the brush behind us.

Back in iKapa and it's all a dream past through memory that can be easily re-experienced in thought.

NOW FOR SOME OTHER NEWS

And just to add the cherry to the deafening cake and purely for your information, here's a copy of an interview the Zululand Observer did with us before Splashy Fen 2004:

What distinguishes you from other SA rock bands? Does Cape Town influence your music?

We started out from a point where writing well-penned listenable songs for the folk across the music spectrum in the extremely wide genre of 'rock', became largely important. Over time, this objective, married with a killer stage performance and hailing from a cosmopolitan city such as Cape Town where there are so many sources and angles of influence, we've reached a juncture and have been able to step back and say, we seem to have some different, now let's advance.

You have received some great reviews.To what do you owe your musical influences and what do you aspire to?

We've always ascertained that influence is not confined to one or a handful of other artists that inspire us in the now. It's rather a conscious and subconscious collection of all that has passed audibly through our passage of life until this point. Sure we have a nu-metal influence and there are traces of ska reggae in our songs but at the end of the day, there's a whole bunch of styles that have been borrowed from the 70's, 80's and 90's. This combined with the African sounds that have permeated our pips since birth create for a crazy influential environment. The songs pretty much come naturally from this obscure though palpable bank of ideas buried within our musical existence. Naturally, there have also been some transformations and changes in life paths brought about by realizations, personal traumas and loss that have brought us together at this time in Soulja.

What does performing at Splashy Fen mean to you?

It's an honour for us to be returning to Splashy after playing here in 2002. We can't wait to tap into the vibrant energy the KZN festival revelers have on offer and hopefully be able to give it back through our performance. Splashy Fen is such a great festival that seems to cover not only music by lifestyle living as well. It's also a sort of homecoming for Warren as he grew up very close to where the festival is taking place, and it's also one of the only big festivals out of iKapa that seem to have taken notice of our existence by inviting us up here. When we tour Gauteng later this year we're hoping that the big guns and organizers there will be taking notes.

What does the band's name reflect?