#97: Aisha Thokoane (Syddevil)
We're joined by Joburg-based DJ, singer & student, Aisha Thokoane, aka Syddevil, who tells us more about 'Dune' by Frank Herbert, their first single 'Run Away', Sound of Metal (2020), and more.
We’re joined by Aisha Thokoane, aka Syddevil, a Johannesburg born and bred DJ, singer, and 2nd year student. Singing was her first musical passion from a young age and through that, she is now is a guitarist, songwriter and producer.
In the year (and a bit) since her debut in the Johannesburg scene, among various gigs in the thriving local scene, she has secured two residencies for Underground Africa and Living Machines, respectively. While pursuing her musical career, Aisha is in her 2nd year of university at Wits, studying English, International Relations and Sociology.
“With many, varying loves and interests, I’ve fought very hard to get to just 10 recommendations that reflect the multiple aspects of me. I hope you enjoy! And if you do end up looking into them, pop me a message and tell me what you think :)”
📚🏜 Books
I have always loved reading, and it is a love I am so grateful for. The capacity of the human mind to imagine and create whole other words, to warp time and make it pass in an instant. I’ve met many people who don’t enjoy in reading, and I think it speaks to a cultural failure in helping people develop their taste. I completely understand why many people never read—it is an important skill to have and maintain for many reasons, but academics may have made it a chore and there is perceived to be a wrong or right way to go about reading.
‘Dune’ by Frank Herbert is so fascinating to me as it speculates on a human society that has survived 10,000 years, through a massive war of human vs AI and has now come out on top, with a common enemy: Thinking Machines. In order to no longer rely on AI and thus risk another cataclysmic war, humans developed genetic skills to augment these, hence the Sisters of the Bene Gesserit, the Tleilaxua, Mentats, and so on and so forth. Dune is undoubtedly a challenging and sometimes dry read. And I must admit that the recent film adaptations by the ever talented Denis Villeneuve are both extremely beautiful and helped me visualise a lot of the far-off imagery and philosophical lines of questioning. Frank Herbert has a way with words and
“Survival is the ability to swim in strange water.”
―Frank Herbert, Dune
In a world that increasingly lacks critical literacy, and that actively campaigns to undermine it, reading is a skill that needs to be actively exercised and maintained. Being able to read is a privilege many don’t have, through no fault of their own. Reclaiming and developing a new relationship with reading, based on our enjoyment and capacity is a radical act.
Poetry analysis was once a big struggle for me as a high school English student, and my failure to meet my own standards ultimately hindered my enjoyment of the poems I studied… that and the fact that we had to learn 15 poems, perhaps?
I’m extremely grateful that my English degree has expanded my view of English literature, and a lovely side effect is that I’ve developed a love for poetry. A poem that is very fond to me is ‘Wild Geese’ by Mary Oliver, you can find it in her anthology, ‘Devotions: The Selected Poems’. As a nature poet, Mary Oliver was extremely talented in bringing the sublime to the natural world around us, reminding us that we too are just animals in the natural order of things. I’ve recited this poem before on my Instagram story, my favourite lines are:
“You do not have to be good. You do not have to walk on your knees for a hundred miles through the desert repenting. You only have to let the soft animal of your body love what it loves.”
—Wild geese, Mary Oliver
I love intellectualising as much as any other, but when it comes down to it, we are all just animals with a level of consciousness. Crying, laughing uncontrollably until it physically pains you, attraction, frenzy. We are animal instinct. We are meant to hibernate every winter! But that’s a discussion for another time, onwards!
🎸🎧 Music
I have always been quite academically minded and I never really thought I would pursue music the way I have since finishing school 2 years ago. I was always involved in music throughout school but when I was 16, I thought I would be a corporate lawyer. And when I was 17, I said I was going to be a DJ, so go figure.
If there is one thing I am, is a perfectionist. I performed my first original song for my school when I was 10, but only now, after last year constantly teasing, can I say that I’ve released my first single. Composed, written and produced by me. I wrote this song around a year ago, and we had some ups and downs, but I’m seriously proud of it.
It’s crazy to me that I thought I could do anything but this when it has been the only constant in a crazy life. Music is a moral law, at least it’s certainly one of mine. This song is a piece of me. Go listen to ‘Run Away’ on all streaming platforms! https://distrokid.com/hyperfollow/sydneyaisha/run-away
🥁🎬 Film & Tv
To be honest, I never finish tv shows, nor do I really ever start or finish new movies. My best friend is always in charge of what we watch, but I do have some gems hidden up my sleeve.
I find that my dislike of tv stems from a disappointment in the expression of a real cool idea with a lot of potential. I attribute a lot of this to the shift to streaming model of television, not compensating writers and other necessary artists in the film process, and a major over-reliance on frankly awful CGI. As seen with releasing Severance and 'The White Lotus episodes every week, it built a sense of energy around the show. I miss that in TV.
There is a limited series on Netflix called ‘Oats Studios’. When I first stumbled on it, it reminded me of Love, Death and Robots, with less episodes and runtime. One episode stands out: Zygote, featuring Dakota Fanning. While looking up more about this episode I was pleased to learn that it was directed South African-Canadian director Neill Blomkamp, who also directed Chappie and District 9 ;)
Zygote finds us in medias res and proceeds to be 23 minutes of utter terror and stress. I like how short it is, as these sci-fi premises can often drag themselves out and in that, flaws begin to show.
My movie recommendation is a remake of the 1977 cult classic, ‘Suspiria’. The 2018 film, directed by Luca Guadagnino, is extremely strange, gory, and downright witchy. Tilda Swinton plays both Helena Markos and strange Dr. Jozef Klemperer, Dakota Johnson plays Suzy Bannion and Mia Goth is Sara Simms. Suzy moves to Germany and joins the Markos Tanz Company, but she has no inkling of how sinister and dark the forces withing are.
What I found so captivating about this movie is the choreography the film is centred around, Volk, the beauty and rawness of which we can credit to Damien Jalet, a Belgo-French choreographer and dancer. Thom Yorke is responsible for tthe film’s score and the resulting effect is simply arresting. The power of dance to be used for violence, to channel such power through raw, animalistic movement, is simply arresting. I can try explain, but I promise its best to watch with limited context.
My final movie recommendation, one of the most gut-wrenching films I’ve watched, is ‘Sound of Metal’. I honestly put off watching this film for a while as I knew it would strike a chord in me, my hearing has always been less than satisfactory and has only deteriorated as I devote myself more and more to music.
In my first year of university I was lucky enough to study South African Sign Language, and apart of this course is a module on d/Deaf culture and disability culture as a whole. I watched the film early in the first semester and it was all the more poignant.
The film not only tries to depict the grief of losing one’s hearing, but also reflects how disabilities in society are framed as something that should mean exclusion and hostility, but in truth, just requires adjusting and accommodating people with different needs than one’s self.
The film has its critiques from the d/Deaf community that cannot be ignored, but I recommend this movie not just for its compelling and eye-opening portrayal of deaf culture, but because in the music scene, there is a huge disregard for hearing safety and perhaps an unwillingness to appreciate the irreversible nature of hearing loss.
Thus I then recommend earplugs! The damage is (currently; as far as I know) irreversible my friends. I suffer from piercing Tinnitus when my allergies are acting up, and it is so uncomfortable.. I have tried quite a few kinds and I definitely recommend Plugs, you don’t compromise too much on sound and they’re comfortable. Your hearing is precious, and one thing that makes pursuing music so fulfilling is how passionate both the musicians and the listeners are. I think it’s important that this gift is not taken for granted.