The Sunday News
Peter Matika, Senior Life Reporter
A MEMBER of one of South Africa’s award winning boy band’s The Muffinz, Mthabisi G-Clef Sibanda, who happens to be Zimbabwean, recently revealed that he was working on a project that would kick start his journey into the comic book industry.
He showed off his artistic side with a drawing of a character of a comic book he is working on.
Mthabisi, warmly known as Mthae is the group’s guitarist, was born and raised in Zimbabwe and only went to study in Johannesburg later in his teens, before the group was formed.
Mthae posted the rather gothic but epic picture on his Instagram before captioning it: “This guy is a He-Witch! Doing some concept art for a comic book I’m working on, this will be the first of many!!”
The Muffinz was formed a few years ago by a group of friends, who were also varsity students.
The band is made up of five personalities who are instrumentalists, as well as singers, contributing to the rich experience of watching a live band with the musicians themselves as lead and backing vocalists.
Simply put, The Muffinz is an urban indie Jazz Band, mixing up the beautiful sounds of light afro jazz, soul, pop, funk and little touch of genius to create a new type of band.
The Muffinz have unleashed their mysteriously beautiful world of eclectic soul to the South African public and they are set for world domination.
The music of The Muffinz is so new, yet so soulful, so accessible, so honest and so innocent, that it appeals to all age groups, races, classes and sexes.
The five young musicians make a refreshing change from the usual run of the mill rappers and house DJs, who are currently dominating the popular music scene, in that they play real instruments, and they play them well. Added to that is all five musicians are great singers in their different genres of expertise.
Take for instance electric guitarist and vocalist, Atomza. His voice is best described as a young Michael Jackson meets Usher with a twist of rock. Drummer Keke then enters with his Senegalese meets rumba vocals. The band switch from a groovy R&B rhythm led by acoustic guitarist Mthae and bassist Skabz, to a classy jazz guitar sound introduced by electric guitarist and acapella singer, Simz. And that by the way is just on one song! That is why, to explain the band, they decided to call themselves The Muffinz. Explains Mthae: “We wanted a name that would be remembered, something catchy but a name that people would want to find out more about. Plus, we all come from different backgrounds musically and so we all bring different ingredients – as in the ingredients in a muffin.”
The group was established in 2010 when Mthae, Simz and Atomza met while singing in the UJ (University Of Johannesburg) Choir.
@peterkmatika
