he says he started music at kimbanguist church as his family over generations has been kimbanguist then did info musica with papy louange,gabanna and co and joined cultura in late 1990's when the group just started and reveals they even had french and english teacher because wazekwa wanted his group to have a unique profile compared to other groups and that musicians were even tired of it( i remember back then people were mocking cultura that its a group of pastors,because they even had a strict dress code,no jeans,shirt tied to the max and things like that
and he was not the first chef d orchestre,there was a guy called papy tshisekedi,this was when cultura had many people who were not around anymore when the group started breakthrough and he reveals he should have gone to maison mere when wenge split happened but he rejected late alisi baba approach because of people an their stories about witchcraft in wenge,so they picked adjani instead
then few times after musicians did not like the chef they found him too strict but wazekwa liked him so he did not want to demote him like that so he organised french and english exams as a trick in order to pick joss and when the group had their first ever concert abroad in equatorial guinea joss was surprised to be left at airport(if i remember well wazekwa once explained that he was advised to do that at airport by late madilu who saw in joss already strong star potential) and it was tough for him and he had to take hidden paths to go back home to avoid shame
at that time didier masela had left maison mere and out of disappointment he went to didier's recruitment and was accepted but his heart was not there and masela was working with raw accoustic instruments which was like going backwards for him who was already used to lives and rehearsals with electric instruments and deep down he still wanted to be in cultura so he naturally returned by the time they were back
he says he felt cultura made a proper statement since album signature where he saw a lot of things changeing and he saw the cultura musicians were starting to get recognition and even colleagues like alain mpela would see him in nightclub and come to salute him
during that europe trip to record signature,all singers ran away with only him returning to kinshasa along with gessac hono kapanga bijou depaulga...( wazekwa often said in interviews in the past that he literally cried when he arrived in airport and returning with 6 or so members on a 20 visa list with joss crying with him then conforting him telling him as long as they both are there cultura will still exist and will make bigger things)
he was asked about their famous controversial move to quartier latin and he says wazekwa himself opened the door for that without knowing,first by allowing koffi to come to their rehearsal in matete were he could get a closer look at the group then with how all of sudden during maisha days he started calling koffi his friends,hanging out with koffi in the same car(going to studio with koffi,participating to the wednesday parties of koffi,if somebody wonder about that i will explain later lol)
he says he was getting insisting approach from people of quartier latin and he feels one event which indirectly created a favorable context for that operation is a concert in boma(where wazekwa was informed in his ears during concert of having been robbed 70K dollars at home,which they did not know) and all of a sudden his mood changed and he threw his anger at them which hurt them
he reveals that contrarily to what people think mutu ya liboma aliaka na fulu existed when they still were in the group and was not aimed at koffi at all,it was an impro by a dancer on which eclipse started like a joke to follow him and created animation just like that and they even went to program it in studio
then one day while he was heading to private rehearsal at wazekwa house and was almost entering wazekwa's avenue he received a call from koffi and said "hello who is it?and koffi replied its koffi le quadra and koffi straight away told him to come at studio ndiaye and he was like what? since he had not really really agreed yet to join,and he changed his plan and drove to studio ndiaye( he even almost fought with his bodyguard in the car who disagreed with his idea)
and when he arrived he saw hono,gesac and gabbana who had joined before him and then they discussed contract of 3 years but he wont disclose amount because it will piss ex quartier latin members of that era but koffi told him it was the biggest he ever spent on a musician to make him join and contrarily to what people think he was not attracted by the car,he had three cars when he joined quartier latin,a volkswagen ladybird(which only fally i think among group members had then), a mercedes 300 and another and actually koffi offered him what was his 4th car with a driver so he was not impressed by the perspective of a car,he just accepted koffi's gift
he says koffi is a more of a boss he rehearsed fully with koffi barely 5 times in his time in quartier latin,koffi would come way after just to see things are going,and maybe it was different in the early days of suzuki and co
on the other hand, wazekwa is a work "animal",and he doubt there are two leaders like that in drc,he'd set up instruments for rehearsal himself an all musicians would come and meet him already there playing guitar while most leaders arrive hours after rehearsal has started,and you'd go home with your clothes full of sweat and he'd take a break of one or two hours then do another rehearsal all by himself
he talked about zenith 2007 where the visas were already done and dusted when he joined and he ended up being there thanks to the fact he was starting steps to get european papers in his last days in cultura and he could get a temporary paper which allowed him to go to france thanks to a sidekick so he arrived in france but him and zoe bella were kidnapped the day of concert and this is when he start having his first strange feelings about koffi,as to his surprise the person who organised their kidnapping was welcomed warmly by koffi in a concert soon after when they returned to kinshasa and he found it super suspect that koffi said nothing to that person,and he suspected koffi to have been behind it for ununderstable reasons he could think that it was strategy for buzz of concert but what kills that theory is that koffi never showed any interest to them about what happened,never worried if they were beaten or psychologically hurt and did his things like nothing ever happened and the guy regretted having done that later on when he knew him and joss had close friends in common
then what really pissed him off was a concert at hotel venus in which he was very involved as quartier latin's chef d'orchestre since like he said koffi was not too involved and to his surprise he did not receive text message from koffi for the concert and cafe etienne who was the mastermind behind their move to quartier latin called him as he was surprised not to see him at concert and cafe said "so koffi has started his bullshit again"
then all of a sudden koffi called him to office another day and started shouting hard at admins like sypo jazz guys like montana and co for having dropped him from concert while they were not involved its only him who decides who he sends text messages to for concert rehearsals tv promotion...so he was just laughing when koffi pretended he was upset with his omission because he knew its koffi himself
and he says unlike other leaders koffi is very directly involved in the mess in and around his group,not admins
but nevertheless thanks to his time in quartier latin,he could travel to more african countries than in cultura and learn more about rumbas
he is asked about good and bad memories overall in quartier latin and cultura he says there are too much good memories in cultura and the bad ones are staying behind for the guinea trip and that incident at concert and in quartier latin his best memory is one day in ivory coast koffi presented him saying "ladies and gentleman this is the only congolese musician married to a deputy" since his wife lolo milolo was a deputy then along with her career of journalist and people respected him a lot and treated him differently because of that and that it brough him a lot of women and jokes about that and says to his wife dont take it too seriously its in the past
he was also asked about him beefing with ferre in the past and he saysthey did not beef he was asked a question on tv,whether he does not fear ferre as a singer since then ferre was the biggest star of the new generation born after wenge split and he said not all,and he says he does not regret it today because he did not insult ferre,he respects ferre as a great singer but he just wanted to show the journalist he was not a nobody he was cultura's chef and did and does not think he has anything to envy to ferre in terms of singing ability and would not mind a challenge
he talks about his solo project with hono kapanga and gesac and says for him it was more a collaboration than a group with him as the only and dominant leader he wanted them to have freedom and they showed they wanted freedom aswell with gesac going solo hono going to live in usa but it was good experience
he is asked what would be his reaction if wazekwa calls him to lead cultura while he focuses on something else for example,he says he will definitely accept because cultura is home for him but they'd have to discuss how to deal with it and he reveals he could have been at cultura's olympia as him and wazekwa had restarted to talk already but the timing was too short between his programmed exit of latino(after accumulating several humiliations here and there) and the concert,and it would have made it hard from one of the singers who could make it on list because of him and the rest being gone
then when he went solo wazekwa called him to congratulate him for album vitrine and reveals that wazekwa will participate on his new album force de caractere and there is other things planned between them
he urges musicians and especially the older ones to unite to find a solution for europe concerts
