from 44th minute,baby ndombe is interviewed by marc tabu,he first  talks about his life before maison mere saying he was at university studying to become a doctor  and did two years but due to some tensions between students and mobutu at that time, there was a lot of trouble with their class schedule,so he moved to another university ISC to study finance
he says his (late) dad sometimes kicked him out of their house because he wanted to become a musician so he had to do little jobs like selling oil in streets,working in farms,fishing,selling kebabs in streets to earn some money to eat
he started playing music in 1987 in street groups and papa wemba had already seen him dance in 81 at some viva concerts at bar owned by late pepe
when he did test in maison mere,werra did not even know that he was pepe ndombe's children so people cant say he was not talented but got recruited just because of his dad,and that he arrived in maison mere for a test already looking quite clean,with one of his dad's car...
he considers himself a co founder of maison mere somehow as he claims he is the one who gave the name maison mere,and at beginning adolphe was the president,as he had been vice president in 4X4,then werra told them at some point from now on call me president instead of ya noel or vieux nsone,before intervention rapide
he says they arrived in maison mere with some experience already but werra really help them to improve with his bigger experience,as all leaders do with musicians
he says he does not believe in witchcraft and did not see a maison mere guy doing it but sometimes they were told to wash their hands in a bowl which contained some plants or also some maison mere were afraid of having contact with water whenever they happened to go at seas
he talks about unsettling of didier masela and adolphe saying he was never involved in disrespecting them openly but werra told him that on stage if adolphe did something which excited crowd he had to do something even more exciting to counter attack adolphe and avoid him getting too much attention,some other guys were involved in disrespecting them directly and werra promised them cars and houses if they manage to force out them two as quick as possible and that during bercy days werra was unhappy that adolphe was dressing like he wanted instead of uniform like group members and that if they got him out of the group after tour he'd pay them cars and houses especially bill,him,ferre,jdt who were the most influent members of the group
he says he interpreted werra's parts in double zenith instead of mabiala because mabiala turned up late at rehearsales and concert and it was not because he is from werra's region that werra picked him over mabiala whose voice was closer (both are by the way) and anyway werra's favorite musician was bill clinton who is from another region and werra saw a bit like his own children since bill arrived at a very young age
he talks about what happened in south africa before kibuisa,they were about to go back to paris to record kibuisa and a proposal of two concerts came to werra and for the first time werra asked them what they think about it instead of giving orders like usualy, as only a part of the group was there,the rest stayed in europe fearing their visa will expire by the time they are able to return from africa,only ferre,him,bill,celeo,japonais and kapaya
they all said to werra it was smarter to go back to europe to record album and avoid visa problem and he told werra that adolphe who stayed in europe and was getting very popular could form a  band with those who remained there
when they were travelling,several times he was the one who was given the group's passeports,as one of the main men,and that day all the guys came to ask for their passport to go back to france,and that nsone was so pissed with how musicians made things though for him who had already got money from promoters and insulted him (the type of insults which get your family mentioned)
werra considered him as responsible for other musicians refusing the trip to zimbabwe,prefering option of going back to france and that werrra said already then that the day him baby will get a suspension it will be over for him in maison mere
and project of les marquis started that day from him and jdt
werra's friend late wasenga managed to make werra and musicians reconcile and they recorded kibuisa,after double zenith they almost left already because they never received money they were promised and the cars they had were not paid by werra or at least in his own case he says the only time he asked for werra help for a car,werra gave him 100 dollars instead of the 1000 he was lacking and that those 100 dollars even got changed to 90 by bank as they had to take some  part on it
the day ferre was informed about the group project he went to tell it to werra and werra did not like him and ferre to be friends they d have a month of good relationship then  months of being enemies and that it seems at that time ferre was fearing for his role of maison mere's number 2 so he falled into werra's trap
and that after both left werra relationship became good and when they created les marquis ferre bill and jdt were claiming it was only their idea which did not please him too much as it started from him and his hotel roommate jdt
and when they announced he'd be joining them in europe he was reluctant because he was already seeing them having leadership issues in the way they talked in interviews,and somehow its a good thing that he did not follow them in leaving the group but rather everything was done to kick him out of the group
he reveals eliott mondobe,monib went to take asorcerer and claim that baby had come to see him  with desire to become very powerful and that the condition was that he sleeps with mampata to dominate werra,and werra easily falled into that trap because he was already informed of them planning to form a rebel group so there was a lot of mistrust and also werra had the "burden" of his promise of buying them cars and houses and reveals that when they had reconciled in kibuisa days it was planned that him and ferre would sign contracts alongside werra and get their percentage and that he has papers from their reunions which can prove it
a second thing they said to make werra even more angry and radical is that  supposedly koffi had given baby a tissue to wipe the sweat on werra's face in any occasion they are close then take it back to koffi who'd give it to sorcerers to destroy werra whereas he had never met koffi
this was one week before UK tour of 2004 and werra decided that baby would stay in kin and also werra saw him as one of the guys who had bad influence on other guys to form a group so leaving him behind would make them fear and that werra had even planned that after UK tour he'd hand them all a suspension  in order  to completely destroy the plan while recruiting youngsters to replace them

Hmmmmm,somo!!! This deep,thanx for the translation. It was also interesting to see how the musicians were trying to force out Adjani and JR,look at the body language,how the musicians were chatting when the two did their vocals.

I have the dvd (see the part Bill na Adolphe baso bengangana petit Heritier ba serie wana aza nanu na classe) 

Great read Archos and thanks again  for the translations. what amazes me is how these musicians survive  without pay but only handouts 

I think Baby Ndombe was speaking the truth. But it is clear that Ferre Gola and Werrason are not in good terms. I have never seen them together since 2004 before Ferre left him.

I think Baby Ndombe was speaking the truth. But it is clear that Ferre Gola and Werrason are not in good terms. I have never seen them together since 2004 before Ferre left him.

No one leaves Maison Mere and remains in good books with Werrason and his fans until they kneel down at La Zamba,those who return to the band after being forgiven don't last long, they are kicked out in a covert way.

I think Baby Ndombe was speaking the truth. But it is clear that Ferre Gola and Werrason are not in good terms. I have never seen them together since 2004 before Ferre left him.

No one leaves Maison Mere and remains in good books with Werrason and his fans until they kneel down at La Zamba,those who return to the band after being forgiven don't last long, they are kicked out in a covert way.

Unless you're talking about fans in physical attendance at La Zamba, but Maison Mere fans have followed and creactively critiqued ex members from Adolphe all the way to Wata.

I wonder why Didier Masela's depature was not a big buzz like that of Aldophe Dominguez 1 year later.

I wonder why Didier Masela's depature was not a big buzz like that of Aldophe Dominguez 1 year later.

  congolese people hey! they don't value instrumentalist as much as lead singers even though here on this site we value both

Imagine if Baby and co accepted the deal to go to Zimbabwe and failed to return in Europe. I'm sure that Aldophe would taking over Europe with Burkina Faso, Serge Mabiala, Didier Lacoste, Sankara de Nkuta and session musicians like Les Marquis in 2004 and Academia.

I wonder why Didier Masela's depature was not a big buzz like that of Aldophe Dominguez 1 year later.

  congolese people hey! they don't value instrumentalist as much as lead singers even though here on this site we value both

That's true look Babia's death was hyped by the Congolese press and compare it with Demukuse's death(who contributed more in the Congolese-music history than Babia) who went unremarked by the Congolese press.

yeah didier masela's departure did not create too much,somehow makaba's in bcbg aswell,both were too laid back in a period where you had to show strong personality,they were nowhere as influent as they were in 4X4 proof is for example how every musician brought by masela to join the group were rejected and makaba had to handle seeing on stage the team of kibens,rio,chai,suzuki which he was strongly against as artistic director it was actually planned that adolphe would create his group with them and he was waiting for celeo to return aswell as japonais
adolphe had planned adjani,mabialos and lacoste,japonais,shora mbonda to create wenge cour des grands but then when  baby ndombe and co returned  he changed his plans and went for creating a group in kinshasa

makaba had to handle seeing on stage the team of kibens,rio,chai,suzuki which he was strongly against as artistic director

is it true that bula and makaba didn't like kibens or didn't want him in the group? I also heard that the relationship between alain mpela and kibens wasn't also that great

it was actually planned that adolphe would create his group with them and he was waiting for celeo to return aswell as japonais
adolphe had planned adjani,mabialos and lacoste,japonais,shora mbonda to create wenge cour des grands but then when  baby ndombe and co returned  he changed his plans and went for creating a group in kinshasa

I remember that rumour, the name of the band would be Verta Musica if I remember well. Wasenga (R.I.P.) saved Werra's carreer, why were him and Werra in bad terms the last years?

prince,both blaise and makaba knew kibens way before bcbg,but it was makaba who didi not like the idea of making the group larger because it would make producer's task harder to care about 20+ musicians with the likes of kibens,chai,alba and co on tour instead of that original wenge musica team with only gentamicine added as ekokota's replacement
mpela and kibens was good but sometimes tense because both wanted to rule the group especially when kibens took artistic director role but they got on quite well overall
about late was' as far as i know one of the reasons if not THE reason of the fallout was that he was involved in ferre joining latino