Music Review: Nsi Nsamba – Sheebah & T Paul 256

One thing you cannot fault Sheebah for is, she outs in the work. Her latest collaboration is a single with T Paul 256. If your immediate response to this is 'Who?' well, he has been on the scene for a while now, etching his name on the canvas of our music industry.

Signed under Alpha Music Entertainment and managed by producer Bruno Beats, his government name is Paul Taremwa. He hails from Kakoba, a cosy suburb of Mbarara City (he is sometimes known as "the Kakoba Boy" and, somewhat unimaginatively, "Western King" (Ray G may have something to say about that)).

Speaking of Ray G, the two actually have a song together: Nyamunyonyi. Some of T Paul 256’s most notable releases include the breakout airplay hit Commando and Otariwe, Wanchekecha, and Love Season with Jamal Wasswa. That is not a bad resume.

Nsi Nsamba is a curious song; it is multilingual, combining English, Luganda and Runyankole – you will be hard pressed to find something along those lines in this market. It is something of an Afrobeat and zouk mashup.

I think this collaboration actually brings out some of the best musical effort that Sheebah has put in in a while. She sounds surprisingly melodic and is inspired by form. There’s a softer edge to her sound, and it is a sound we haven’t seen in a while.

I feel like it’s a response to T Paul 25’s vocals, and he is a silky singer, with impressive vocals and a great, rounded sound.

The zouk feel to Nsi Nsamba is refreshing and a nice change of pace from the usual nonsense. It also lends the song a surprisingly broader audience, something that artiste managers never seem to realise, so kudos to Bruno Beats. A song like this works across multiple generations and would be big in Arua, as well as across the border in DRC Congo. The multilingual approach makes it a natural fit in Kampala, Masaka and Western Uganda, and the way it is executed with technical finesse, especially with the vocals, means it has even more appeal universally.

The management team behind Sheebah, and indeed, Sheebah herself, deserves recognition for delivering on Nsi Nsamba. The song shows a versatility (and technical quality) to Sheebah that I genuinely did not think existed.

It also opens the industry up to T Paul 25, who is a bona fide talent that I somehow had no idea about. And also shows us that Sheebah has the ability for reinvention – there’s a lot more to Uganda’s sassiest entertainer than we imagined!