Markus Kamau: Music

Concrete Savannah
Written in December 1988
© Chura Kipara Music

Written after coming back from a Johnny Clegg concert at the 9:30 club in Washington DC. It was a full moon in the winter, the streets were deserted and I caught the last underground train home.

Maasai chant prologue

This is the planet earth speaking tonight beneath the lunar perfume
I can see you’re struggling to get back home from an appointment and it ended too soon
Hey is this forest too cold to be alone in?
Forest floor upon floor?
Down in the modern catacombs
This is the city’s stone core
Down in the modern catacombs
Thus is the city’s stone core

[CHORUS)
I said I’m lost in your city
There’s no place to live
I said I’m lost in the city of life
No place to live

Hey now are you the architect of the plan?
Well I’m dying to see it
Do you deliver these visions of life?
Well baby bring some more to me
But will your streets always be empty
When you got nothing left to give
Because I’m lost in the city
No place to live

Maasai chanting

[CHORUS]

Well, do I look like a coyote?
In this barren landscape?
Yes, I’d be running cross the prairie grass for sure
If I could change my shape
Hey now the wind would be my guitar, I’m howling
I’d be out of this trap
But instead of expanding
My range, it just keeps fading back
I said instead of expanding my range
It just keeps fading back

[Chorus]

Maasai chanting