Recently, I asked my followers on Twitter (as anyone with honor still calls it) to hit me with head-to-head artist matchups and ask who I preferred. Most were easy home runs, mostly because I follow a simple rule when making these decisions: I pick the one I like more.
Among my favorite submissions was Captain Britain vs Mai Tanaka, a fever-dream pairing posed by Taku. For context, Taku is one of my five female fans (four, if you don’t count twins as two), and she’s genuinely hilarious. In a world where being funny paid the bills, she wouldn’t be as broke.
Another standout was Yeat vs Carti. That one gave me flashbacks to when I asked my Dynamos-supporting uncle what had happened in a CAPS vs Highlanders game. He said, “Well, an asteroid didn’t crash into the stadium, so I lost.” That’s exactly what Yeat vs Carti feels like to me.
Then came the hard one: Holy Ten vs Voltz JT.
Now this one was tricky. I’ve got no problem choosing between Pac and Biggie. Or Nas and Hov. In those debates, I’m just some guy on the internet. My opinion is meaningless, which is where I thrive. But Zim hip-hop is different. Unfortunately, my voice carries a little weight here, and I hate that for me.
So, I did the responsible thing: I pled the Fifth.
I don’t particularly love either of these guys, and I’m fairly confident the feeling is mutual. The kind of hip-hop I connect with isn’t exactly what they do. If they did what I love, they’d probably be broke and forced to write think pieces for Riddims & Raps. It’s safe to say they made the right call. They are successful artists, and I’m genuinely proud of that.
Before I get into this breakdown, let me say up front: my taste has never been aligned with public opinion. I have poor taste in music, poor taste in friends, and poor taste in life. What I do have is confidence. I trust my gut. It just happens to be wrong a lot.
Exhibit A: Early 2024.
My friend Dennis — terrible at rapping, and worse at maths — invites me over. Kae Chaps pulls up. He’s just shot a music video and wants to premiere the song for us. He plays it. I listen. I hate it. I even call Dennis afterwards and beg him to tell Chaps not to release it. Dennis, being Dennis, does nothing. The song drops. It’s Madiro. It becomes the biggest hit of Kae Chaps’ career.
I’m not good at this.
So, in keeping with the tradition of uninformed confidence, I’ve created a ten-category deathmatch to decide who wins: Holy Ten or Voltz JT. Why ten categories? Because Holy’s name has "Ten" in it. I’m not a sophisticated man.
Each category will yield one point for the winner. If it’s too close to call, they’ll each get half a point. The math is simple. Even Dennis could follow along.
Let’s begin.
Category 1: Lyricism
This is my favorite category. Because as a writer, I care about writing.
I care about writing more than I care about flow, beats, or the economy. Honestly, whoever wins this category is the overall winner in my head. The other nine categories will be pure admin. I’ll only do them to hit the Riddims & Raps word count, and because I enjoy lying to myself that I’m objective.
My ideal rapper is someone whose bars I can read like scripture. Think Synik, Jungle Loco and M.I.L.E; the best pens in the country. That’s the bar. Let’s see if our two contestants can clear it. Let’s start with Holy Ten, because Holy comes before Voltz in the dictionary. This is how my brain works. You need to make peace with that if you want to be friends with me.
Most rappers — when presented with a line like “Malcom writes for Riddims & Raps” — would follow it with something like “So that means he’s broke and he’s trash.” That’s about the songwriting level I’ve come to expect: functional, basic, and slightly offensive.
But Holy Ten takes the same line and pairs it with:
“Uncles like more physics and maths.”
Let’s break that down:
“Malcom” rhymes with “uncles.”
“Writes for” rhymes with “likes more.”
“Riddims & Raps” rhymes with “physics and maths.”
You don’t even have to catch that; your brain just quietly nods in approval, not knowing why. Even if you don’t clock it, your ears still tell you something about this hits better. That’s Holy’s gift: multisyllabic rhyme schemes and layered internal patterns.
Sometimes, it works beautifully:
Imboendai, muchadzoka zvenyu
I know that you fake, muri nyoka mhenyu
Leg in, leg out; mune tsoka refu
That’s solid. It sounds better than:
Yeah, you’ll eventually be back
Because we know you’re fake
And you’re such a snake
We like Holy because he chooses his words. There’s intention. That’s more than I can say for the second example. But even within that same song, Muchadzoka, things start to spiral. Because Holy’s also the kind of guy who will abandon coherence, logic, storytelling, themes, and your personal safety just to keep the rhyme going. He’s a slave to the syllable. He’ll say anything as long as it fits the cadence.
Like this gem:
“Zvikanetsa, ndina Mukoma Eddy
Pahondo vari kupisa, kupfuura Border Gezi
Louis V haishamisire kana musingagezi
Ndimi boys raigara bench kana pashota jersey”
Where are we? What are we talking about? What’s happening here? It sounds good, sure. But what’s going on? Holy Ten stans will happily write PhD dissertations explaining why it’s all perfectly coherent. I don’t have the bandwidth for that fight. I’ve got groceries to buy. Let’s talk about Voltz.
Voltz JT’s early career was a no-rhyme zone. His debut album, Life of Muvhimi, was many things. Musical? Yes. Honest? Sure. Rhymed? Absolutely not. You could count on one hand the number of lines that rhymed four bars in a row. Sometimes he didn’t even try. But, and here’s the twist, Voltz always made sense.
His writing has a point. There is an idea, a theme, and a structure. There is coherence, that thing Holy sometimes leaves in the glove compartment. That’s why I love Mangwana. It’s one of my favorite songs of JT’s. He knows what he’s saying, and he says it through with narrative-driven songwriting.
Voltz post-Muvhimi leveled up. I have never seen a bigger improvement in writing ability. It’s like if Adolf Hitler wrote Mein Kampf and then followed it up with To Kill a Mockingbird. He started rhyming, and he didn’t lose the meaning. The bars are still not as acrobatic as Holy’s, but they hold. Songs like Mkoma Brian don’t somehow morph into odes to Ajigija weJiti halfway through. He explores a theme, dissects it, and closes the loop. No random detours about women's behinds. In this economy, that’s commendable writing.
So, who wins?
Honestly, nobody. This is one of those finals where both teams have to lose. It’s CAPS vs Highlanders to a Dynamos supporter. Voltz, despite all the progress, still doesn’t scratch that lyricist’s itch. His content is more grounded, more digestible, and more audience-aware, but it lacks the pensmith magic of the greats. He writes better now, but the wizardry isn’t there. Holy Ten, on the other hand, is a rhyming machine. His bars bounce and his syllables dance. But for me, that’s not enough. Because too often, he rhymes himself straight out of the point.
This isn’t a tie. It’s just a category with no winner. It’s more like a standoff; two rappers standing outside the lyricists’ club with the wrong IDs.
Point to… nobody.
Category 2: Catalogue Strength
In 2020, I had absolutely nothing going on. I don’t mean that in the poetic, coming-of-age, “I was lost and searching” kind of way. I mean nothing. COVID-19 had put my studies on pause. My relationship had fizzled. I was unemployed, uninspired, and overfed. I had nothing but time. So, I went back to music.
I’d taken a long, dramatic break from songwriting, but the pandemic handed me a fresh excuse to pick up the pen. I wrote over 300 songs during lockdown. Yes, you read that right. Nonetheless, when the world reopened, I had no idea what to do with them. Part of me wanted to just bin the whole thing and go back to screenwriting, the only career that had ever shown any promise. There, I had a shot at a pension. But another part of me refused to let all that effort go to waste. So, I did what any delusional fossil would do: I announced my comeback to my ten loyal fans. I recorded every song I’d written, updated a few lyrics to reflect the current pop culture moment, and gave everything a post-pandemic polish. And that’s how you got all the Malcom Mufunde albums you know today (if you know any).
One of the most common criticisms I got was that I was flooding the market and oversaturating the space, whether or not the music was actually good. At the time, I didn’t get it. “How can more be bad?” Then I became a full-time music consumer, and I had to start following Holy Ten.
I remember Risky Life because it was right after the big blow-up, his post-viral debut. I’d already heard Suicide Notes before that, his rawer, earlier album. But everything after Risky Life is a blur. We got a never-ending stream of singles, EPs, features, and albums. New track every other week. At some point, I swear he dropped a song while I was still listening to the previous one. It got to the point where I couldn’t keep up, and more importantly, didn’t want to.
The problem wasn’t just volume; it was repetition. Holy wasn’t doing anything new. It was like being stuck in a Holy Ten multiverse where every version of him had the same bars, same angles, same schemes, everything. I’d sometimes find myself predicting his next bars, which is impressive in its own cursed way.
Voltz, meanwhile, approached things like his own flow; slow and deliberate. After the success of Life of Muvhimi, he mostly stepped back, did a few features, ghosted here and there, and probably read some books. When he came back, it was with purpose. He dropped N.O.P Makoni, and the growth was loud; you could hear and feel it. Songs like Rima or the final verse on Maziso Two sounded like a new Voltz; focused, clear-eyed, and — shocker — with bars!
This category becomes the classic fight: quantity vs quality. Back when I was still lying to myself, I had this line on a Jungle Loco collab that never dropped:
“They asked ‘Quantity or quality?’ and I said yes.”
Because why can’t we have both? Hell, if you're going to be a "quality-only" kind of artist, then come back with something like A Travel Guide for the Broken. Shoutout to Synik.
(Yes, I know I bring up Synik in every example. Yes, it’s a problem. No, I will not stop.)
So who wins? One guy released too much and evolved too little. The other bided his time and came back with music that didn’t sound like leftovers from last week’s project. Quality wins this round.
Score: 0–1.
Category 3: Numbers
At first, I wanted to split this into separate categories: fanbase size, number of hits, YouTube subscribers, monthly listeners, maybe even the number of times someone has screamed their name on a kombi. But I realized all that data boils down to one simple question:
Who’s bigger?
This is the most objective category in the whole debate. Not one think piece is required.
One of my favorite Zim music commentators is Fari Mudzi. He is a walking Excel sheet. Any time there’s a debate online — Who’s the best rapper? Who fell off? Who’s doing what? — Fari jumps in uninvited with a pie chart, a line graph, and a “hope this helps” energy. I kid you not, I’ve seen him bring data visualisations to settle an argument about which rapper dresses better.
“As you can see from Q3–Q4 of 2022, negative sentiment around Artist B’s wardrobe choices increased by 23.7%, particularly around their pants and the durags.”
Brother, it’s not that deep. Relax.
Back in uni — this was around 2018 — my boys and I ran a social experiment to settle a similar debate. We picked our friend Emmerson, who is spectacularly average in every measurable way (face, body, GPA, personality), and had him walk around campus in different outfits: casual wear, a business suit, a homeless look, and a loud floral shirt with pointy shoes. Each look had its own walk, different postures, and different energy levels. Most outfits got no reaction at all; people ignored him. But when he wore the business attire, everything changed. Women turned to look. Men subtly backed away to avoid comparison. Security guards nodded in respect. We were thrilled because we’d discovered something cool that day: status is aesthetic. It’s all about how you dress and carry yourself.
Now, could we have figured this out using data? Sure. But that’s boring. Fari would’ve ruined it immediately by handing us a chart and a scatter plot. That’s why I’m not friends with people like Fari. He’s a math guy; the anti-Dennis. I’m friends with people like Dennis because Dennis is dumb, and I like that about us. Another one of us is Blu Mordecai, a music video director who’s worked with both Voltz and Holy Ten. Every time his friend Kuda Rice shows up, Blu says:
“Kuda Rice… ukuda rice here?”
Same joke every single time; no remix, no innovation, nothing. And every single time, we laugh like idiots. That’s my kind of people. But Fari is right; sometimes we have to go by the numbers. And the numbers say Holy Ten is that guy.
YouTube views? Holy.
Subscribers? Holy.
Spotify streams? Holy.
TikTok sounds? Holy.
Albums sold, units moved? Holy.
Number of fans ready to commit violence on his behalf in the comment section? Holy… maybe? OK, that one’s tricky.
Holy Ten is the biggest hip-hop star Zimbabwe has ever produced. The only person who could take this round from him is God, and even He might need a Holy Ten feature to get the numbers up.
Score: 1–1.
Category 4: Live Performance
On 31 August 2024, Dennis and I went to the Unplugged Music Festival. I don’t know where it was held. There were trees and maybe a fence. The point is: I was there. I’d brought a drinks budget of $100. Dennis tossed in another dead president, and between the two of us, we scraped together enough good spirits to cater for ourselves and our extended family. Tee Madzika of Greedysouth fame contributed nothing. He had no money.
As you all know, I don’t have much alcohol tolerance; I’m just not built for it. By 8PM, I was on my third personality and my fourth dimension. I missed most of the acts. I vaguely remember a woman putting on a phenomenal set, but to this day, we still don’t know if it was Tamy Moyo or Melyssa ZW. My excuse is that I was tipsy. Dennis’ excuse is that he’s dumb. Tee’s excuse is that he’s broke.
The one set I remember vividly, and viscerally, is Holy Ten’s. This was Dennis’ Super Bowl. Holy Ten is his favorite artist alive, possibly ever. People always ask me how I feel about this, considering Dennis is one of my closest friends and doesn’t rate my music at all. I tell them it’s because Dennis is dumb. That usually clears things up. The moment Holy Ten walked on stage, Dennis screamed at a pitch that triggered my tinnitus. My left ear still rings.
Anyway, the performance was incredible. Mr Candy was on backup. I have a complicated relationship with Mr Candy. I like his music, but I have deep beef with the way he dyes his hair, especially when he adds a tight fade. It makes his head look like a tennis ball. A glossy, overconfident tennis ball. Please tell him to stop, or at least go for a matte finish.
Holy Ten was in his bag. The crowd was with him. We were locked in. Even Tee, who spent most of the night reminding us Voltz was better, went suspiciously quiet. For a brief moment, we all forgot our grievances and surrendered to greatness. And then Holy opened his mouth. Not to rap; to talk. See, artists stopping the music to speak is a sacred moment. You expect something gentle and grateful. It’s usually to say thank you, maybe shout out to the city, and acknowledge the love.
“Thank you, Harare!”
“Much love to my fans!”
“Shoutout to the real ones!”
Instead, Holy launched into a full-blown rant. From what we could make out, he was unhappy with Voltz and Winky D, arguably Zimbabwe’s two most beloved artists. The crowd’s reaction was predictable. Cans started flying, and the boos got louder. Even Dennis, who once argued that Risky Life was better than The Miseducation of Lauryn Hill, looked crushed. That’s when I knew Holy had lost the room. Security shuffled him and Mr Candy offstage. Tee, now high on vindication and borrowed alcohol, immediately stood up, arms raised prophetically.
“What did I say, Malcom? Dennis, what did I SAY?” He repeated this for fifteen minutes. I almost reminded him he hadn’t paid for a single drop of the alcohol he was drinking.
But the night wasn’t over for Holy. No, no. He had a double shift. From whatever undisclosed wasteland Unplugged took place, he teleported to City Sports Centre for the 2024 Harare Cup Clash, hosted by DJ Fantan. Here, on that monumental, chaotic stage, Holy uttered the line that echoed across the nation.
“Hoyo kuna Poto!”
Poto, for the uninitiated, is a child — a child who started rapping live on stage, freestyling pure, Grade-A filth. Holy stood behind him, shirtless, hyping him up. He was Poto’s Mr Candy, adlibbing obscenities and smiling like a proud father. Somewhere in the chaos, Holy tripped. I don’t know if he slipped, blacked out, or briefly ascended to the spirit realm. All I know is he hit the ground, and someone hit upload. The internet had a field day.
I don’t know why these things keep happening. There is something about Holy Ten and live events that refuses to align. It’s like stage lights confuse him, or the energy of the crowd activates a hidden self-sabotage chip in his spine. I don’t know.
Voltz wins this round. Score: 1–2, 1–2.
Category 5: Personality
Hip-hop has always been a game of personality. Half the reason certain bars hit like they do is because of who says them. When 50 Cent says, “I’ll teach you how to stunt,” it feels like a promise. If Ti Gonzi says it… ehhh. That’s just how this works.
I don’t believe in separating the art from the artist, never have. The artist is the interface through which the art enters the world, and that matters. I’ve never heard a Christian say, “Let’s separate what Madungwe is saying from who he is.” No. He’s a clown. If the artist is a clown, then the art should be clowned on.
Denzel Washington — or Big Zel, as his sons call him — said something in an interview I stumbled on while I was trying to find Denzel Sambo’s channel so I can unsubscribe. Zel said Scorsese could’ve directed Schindler’s List, and Spielberg could’ve directed Goodfellas. They both would've done fine, but those films are what they are because of who made them. Then, and I’m quoting from memory here, he said, “Take Malcom Mufunde, for example. He’s a nerd who grew up indoors and accessed the world through books and M-Net. When he raps about the hustle and the street grind on albums like Ekasi or Ekwedu, sure, they’re technically brilliant. But they’re still based on a lie, and that disconnects me a little.”
I once asked Dennis what he thought of Voltz JT. He gave me nothing, mostly because the question involved the word “thought.” So I rephrased: “Do you have any feelings about Voltz JT, Dennis?” And that’s when he said something that stuck with me:
“I believe him.”
And that’s the thing. When Voltz says, “Dai taisa-rapper, taivhara vanhu paZimex,” you believe him. You picture him standing outside Gulf Complex, selling fake Sauvage and unlocking Econet lines for a fee. It fits. Dennis and I once ranked Zim rappers based on how convincingly they could pull off being a thug. Bagga was number one. It’s not even because of size. He has the aura. Nyasha David, by contrast, looks like he could fold me in half with one punch. But when he speaks, you quickly realize you’ve got a shot, and you might even win that fight. His voice has too much treble to inspire fear. Real thugs don’t harmonize in soprano. Dennis, in an uncharacteristically brilliant moment, commented, “But The Sopranos were thugs.” I chuckled. It was the first of only two times I’ve ever been proud of Dennis.
The second was when he got Voltz on his podcast. It was a genuinely good interview. The conversation was excellent. Voltz came across as thoughtful, smart, and grounded. Since Dennis is the polar opposite of all three, the chemistry worked. Opposites attract. Afterwards, at Shebeen Festival, I asked Dennis if the interview changed anything in his personal Holy vs Voltz rankings.
“Yeah,” he said. “That bumped Voltz up. He’s tied with Ten now.”
That’s how much personality matters. We like Voltz because he’s a likeable guy; measured, private, rarely says too much. He’s not always online looking for a fight, and because of that, you want to like him. That affects how the music lands. When he raps, you’re rooting for him. I find it hard — genuinely difficult — to enjoy art from someone I consider an a**hole.
So let’s talk about one.
From the jump, Holy positioned himself as “The Leader of the Youth”, a title that sounds noble until you realize it means you’re responsible for people like Poto. He arrived with Ndaremerwa at the exact moment the #ZimLivesMatter movement was peaking. The stars were aligned. It wasn’t just the right song; it was the right face: a young, slightly weathered, thoughtful-looking dude saying the things we needed to hear. It mattered that it came from him. He looked like someone who’d known hardship. He sounded like he’d been through it. It felt earned. It felt honest.
Compare that to Kikky Badass, whom I adore and wish every blessing under the sun. When she dropped her #ZimLivesMatter freestyle, it didn’t quite land. Is it because she’s hot? Possibly. That kinda softens the struggle for me. I’m four economic classes, two currencies, and one offshore account away from Kikky’s fart radius. She wouldn’t even sneeze anywhere near my tax bracket. I don’t want to hear a revolutionary chant from someone like that.
When Sane Wav raps:
“Handina kublueticker pawaisa marecents, ndanga ndichitsvaga spelling ya gorgeous”
It makes sense. That is not a child who looks like he can survive the Scripps National Spelling Bee qualifiers. It’s a line that came from personal pain. But back to Holy.
Whatever goodwill Ten earned early on, he quickly torched it. For a moment, he had us. Then he started talking more, tweeting more, going on live more, saying too much too often. The message stayed solid, but the messenger not so much. Even the empowerment songs started sounding disingenuous. We stopped trusting the voice. It’s like if Hitler posted #FreePalestine. Technically, I agree, but I’m not about to repost that, not from you. And once that disconnect settles in, it’s hard to shake.
I remember as a kid, I wanted to be a fireman. Then I found out firemen don’t make fires; they actually stop them. I was crushed. My entire sense of reality collapsed. I think Holy Ten did the same thing when he knighted himself “Leader of the Youth.” He just might be the reason they need leadership in the first place.
Score: 1–3.
Category 6: Versatility
A pretty lady friend of mine — and I mean that literally, as in she’s a lady who’s pretty, not a woman who’s “pretty much” a lady — once asked me why men claim to love pretty women, and yet she’s still single. No, this wasn’t her trying to flirt with me. She’s firmly convinced I’m gay. I told her it’s because she’s too pretty. Believe it or not, there’s a mathematical principle that explains this. It ties into economics and attraction.
Straight men don’t find men attractive, so when they see someone that attractive, their brain assumes, “No way she’d want me.” They lose the ability to conceptualize being chosen by such a woman, so they say nothing. Instead, she then gets approached by Dunning-Kruger graduates. These are men with the confidence of war generals and the self-awareness of a toddler in a Spider-Man costume; think Captain Britain (Zimbabwe’s, not Marvel’s). This is how confident idiots win the baddie, which explains my marriage.
I say all this to make a point. I’m not a numbers guy. I’m more of a poetry and feelings and “other gay stuff like that” type of writer. But notice how I just used a mathematical concept to explain something? That’s versatility. That’s range. That’s what it means to colour outside your genre. I went beyond my comfort zone to keep your reading experience dynamic. In music, this is particularly important. Repetition is a slow death. Our ears don’t tolerate monotony; they get bored fast. If you keep doing the same thing, the law of diminishing returns eventually takes effect. The magic fades when the trick stays the same.
Holy Ten figured this out early. His breakthrough album, Risky Life, ends with Appetite, a duet with Anita Jaxson that sounds more Kanindo than Kendrick. At the time, it confused everyone. Twitter was furious. Hardcore fans felt betrayed. Some said he sold out, and others weren’t sure what genre he was trying to sell into. It was the same kind of chaos that greeted Voltz JT’s Handidi Sorry, a flat, sung-rap experiment that felt like it came from a voice note he meant to delete. The title promised no apology, but fans demanded one anyway.
But here’s the difference. Voltz retreated. He doubled back to his rap roots and has stayed in that lane ever since, safe and predictable. No missteps, but no surprises. He failed a driving test and decided walking builds character. Holy, on the other hand, doubled down. He kept experimenting, pushing further into Rhumba-Hop, Afropop, and whatever else his instincts told him to try.
Loss, his October 2022 single with Nicky Genius, was the turning point. Then came Marisa in December, Pressure in January, and Delilah not long after, which, mind you, knocked Voltz’s Same Drawer neGown off every major chart despite that song being a certified banger in its own right. These were the genre-bending, radio-dominating, algorithm-friendly songs that took Holy Ten from “rapper” to “brand.” They were part of a new sonic formula: pop-friendly, melodic-rap hybrids. Even when Voltz was technically “winning” the beef, Holy was dominating the playlists.
We haven’t even mentioned Ucharamba Uchipisa, his reggae-leaning collab with Poptain. For context: Anita Jaxson and Poptain were a musical couple for a minute. They made songs together. None of them really took off. Holy, in the same era, made hits with both of them, separately.
Versatility isn’t about genre-switching for sport. It’s knowing how to adjust the recipe without burning the meal. It’s about having multiple gears; knowing when to drop a sermon, when to drop a hook, and when to drop the mic altogether. Ten knows how to switch flows, change beats, shift moods, and still sound like himself. Even when he releases a duet with his wife, which is essentially artistic nepotism, the numbers don’t care. It works.
Voltz is incredibly good at what he does. He’s a stronger writer now, cleaner structurally, and more in touch with his themes. But there’s a limit to his reach, at least so far. He hasn’t shown the same elasticity.
There’s a thing people do online, especially in Zim, where no matter what’s happening to an artist, they must preface their opinion with a disclaimer about the music. I saw this with SaintFloew’s rehab post. The comments were full of, “I’ve never liked his music, but I hope he gets better.” “I’m not a fan of his last album, but I wish him healing.”
Why is that necessary? Why are we giving album reviews during a cry for help? As if your taste in music affects his liver function. The only time that kind of sentence makes sense is when someone says:
“I’ve never liked Holy Ten’s personality... but damn, he’s creative.”
Score: 2–3.
Category 7: Artistic Influence
One of the clearest marks of greatness is how many people try to copy you. Sometimes it’s sound. Sometimes it’s style. Sometimes it’s sound, style, vocabulary, and hairstyle. If other artists start echoing your choices, you’ve done something right. That’s the mark of true impact: when your artistry is so distinct, so disruptive, that other artists can’t help but reach for your blueprint.
Take Maskiri, easily one of the most influential rappers in Zimbabwean history. You can hear his DNA in Ti Gonzi’s music. Just like you can hear Stunner’s ego and cadence echoed in Mudiwa Hood’s sermons. Maskiri influenced Ti Gonzi. Stunner influenced Mudiwa Hood. Because of those examples, we can safely say Maskiri won.
Now, I hate to admit this publicly, but I have a day job. Like, a regular one; nine to five, that kind of job. What keeps me sane, aside from the promise of weekends, are my colleagues. I like them. I think they like me. Because I’m not bad with words, I’ve developed a habit of dropping puns in the office whenever I can. My colleagues aren’t a witty bunch, so even my laziest wordplay gets standing ovations. It’s a low bar, but I clear it with grace.
Last year, I told them I’d be flying to Dubai with my wife and would be gone for a while. This caused genuine concern. Their spirits sank. Not because they’d miss me, but they’d miss the free grammar service I provide (their spelling ability is only marginally better than Sane Wav’s) and the steady supply of wordplay. On my last day before the trip, as we said our goodbyes, one of my colleagues looked me dead in the eye, took a deep breath, and said, with pure pride:
“Malcom... goodubai.”
She was so pleased with herself. Honestly, I was proud of her. We all were. My work there was done. That, boys and girls, is influence.
Say what you want about Holy Ten (and we will), but he’s undeniably had a hand in shaping the current wave. His Samanyanga stable alone is stacked with artists who’ve broken through under his wing: SaintFloew, Michael Magz, Voltz JT (regrettably), Bagga, Bling4, and Young Gemini. They have all passed through the Mujaya pipeline, with varying levels of gratitude and trauma. Some owe him more than others. Some say they owe him nothing. But the two I want to focus on are SaintFloew and Magz, because that’s where the trail of influence is impossible to ignore.
Remember the internal rhyme structure we talked about in Category 1? That syllable-stacking, line-dancing, rhyme-heavy style? Go listen to five SaintFloew songs, then five from Magz. If you don’t hear it, you need better headphones. If you still don’t hear it, you need better ears. They’re not quoting him, but the fingerprints are there. The words change, but the technique doesn’t. It’s like reading different authors who all went to the same workshop. Did Holy teach them directly? Maybe. Maybe not. But they didn’t rhyme like that before Samanyanga Sounds, that’s for sure.
Look, I love Santa and Mike. In fact, I prefer their music to Holy’s these days. In some ways, they’ve outgrown him. That doesn’t change the fact that their cadences, patterns, and lyrical gymnastics were first developed in Holy’s gym. A large chunk of what makes them special was first drawn in Mujaya’s sketchbook.
Speaking of Mujaya — Holy’s nickname, meaning “boy” — Young Gemini now goes by Muskana, meaning “girl.” The symmetry is not lost on us. Nor is the artistic template. Listening to her song Bag; the production, the tone, and the rhythm of thought all feel eerily familiar. It’s not just the beat selection. There’s that same cocktail of randomness and precision, the same bounce in the verse structure, the phrasing, the same casual swing between introspection and pettiness. Coincidence? Maybe. But again, that sound didn’t exist in her music before the Samanyanga internship.
But that’s just the good ones. There’s also Mr. Hyper, who sounds like he’s been trying to cosplay as Holy Ten since 2021, just without the vocal control or actual talent. We can’t fault Holy for the knock-offs; he didn’t ask for that. That’s just what happens when your style becomes a style guide.
What about Voltz JT?
The truth is: Muvhimi’s influence is harder to pin down. You don’t hear someone on radio and go, “Yep, that’s a Voltz baby.” You could make a case for KG Phenomenal. He borrows a bit from both Holy and Voltz — the gritty edge, the phrasing — but nothing you could confidently trace back to just JT. It’s not a clean attribution. The same goes for Gambit Illmind and Tha Bees, two promising rappers who carry Voltz-like energy in their music. And both, as it turns out, are his siblings. So maybe the influence isn’t artistic. Maybe it’s genetic. Maybe the real icons here are Mhamha naDhedhi.
Score: Holy 3 – Voltz 3.
Category 8: Awards & Accolades
Not many people read my work. I say that not for pity or pathos; it’s just the truth. So naturally, whenever someone shares one of my articles, I get a little tingle in my stomach. The kind you get when your crush likes your Instagram story. It’s nice. It makes me feel seen. Bonus points if the person sharing has a sizeable audience.
When I dropped my debut piece for Riddims & Raps last week, two rappers shared it: Voltz JT and Gambit Illmind. Voltz shared it first. That felt good; I wasn’t even flattering him in the article. If anything, I was being mean, but he still pushed it to his followers. That was classy. Then I noticed Gambit had also shared it, and I appreciated that too, because I genuinely like Gambit. He’s a truly great guy, very polite, and extremely aware that his rap career is in the early access beta phase. But if I’m being honest, after Voltz’s retweet, Gambit’s felt like learning that Tee Madzika is the surprise act after King Kandoro at a comedy show. You smile politely, but the night peaked ten minutes ago.
Voltz shared my article. Voltz showed me love. Voltz went on Dennis’ podcast, which is a feat of generosity I’ve still not forgiven him for. Voltz didn’t block me on Twitter after I said his latest album was mixed like it was engineered on Microsoft Excel. I’m starting to worry: do I now have a bias in this whole Voltz vs Holy discourse? There’s a selflessness to how Voltz engages with people, and I’d be lying if I said it didn’t colour how I feel about him. Maybe I’ve been rooting for him this whole time without even noticing it.
But I’ll try to be objective.
Where do awards land in this debate? Should they matter? I feel the same way about the Zim Hip Hop Awards that I feel about my cousin’s birthday parties. I appreciate the invite. I acknowledge the effort, but I won’t exactly block out my calendar for them. I wouldn’t cancel plans to be there. I wouldn’t even move a haircut. Regardless, the Zim Hip-Hop Awards are a real institution. They’ve got credibility, consistency, and enough pull to get a suit out of Stunner. So they do carry weight. They’re not some fly-by-night operation. People care, unlike the Changamire Awards, for example.
But, again, how much should awards matter in this conversation? The NAMAs, the ZHHAs, the Changamires, the Star FM awards. Do Twitter polls count? Technically, what’s the difference? Both are politics, and both can be swayed by fanbases with too much data and not enough hobbies. I honestly don’t care much for this category. Voltz has awards. Holy has awards. They’ve both done the rounds, posed with plaques, and smiled on red carpets. You can’t walk three steps into their discography without tripping over a NAMA, a ZHHA, a Star FM Top 50 placement, or a certificate of participation from Samanyanga Sounds.
None of it changes what I play in the car.
Score: 3.5 – 3.5.
Category 9: Features
We’ve never been rich in my family. I think we have a generational allergy to wealth, one of those rare hereditary conditions that skips absolutely no one. A few of my uncles and aunts on my dad’s side seem to have been cured early though. They made it and bought big houses in the leafy suburbs of Borrowdale. That’s where I got to taste what rich felt like.
I loved visiting. It gave me the chance to role-play bougie. The only problem with Borrowdale was the English. It wasn’t just vocabulary; it was the accents, the idioms, and the rhythm. They didn’t say “toilet,” they said “loo.” Stuff like that.
One summer, when I was about eight, I stayed over at my uncle’s. Every night before bed, we’d play word games. This is how you know you’re in a good family. The house line-up was me, my uncle and aunt, their two kids, the helper (the only person whose English I understood), and my aunt’s mother — a staunch Catholic whom we all called Gogo. May her soul rest in peace.
That night’s game was a sketch-off. The rules were simple: the helper would call out a word, we’d each draw it in two minutes, and the worst sketch would be eliminated. I was confident I’d wipe the floor with everyone.
First round. The word was “Cock.”
I froze. That couldn’t be right. Did she really say that? I looked around. My cousins were already sketching furiously. One looked at me and snickered: “You can’t draw a cock?” I rose to the challenge. I was eight, but I had access to biology textbooks, and I’m nothing if not committed to accuracy. So, I picked up my marker, put my head down, and drew the most accurate, most detailed, anatomically-correct cock I could manage. I was proud. I’d never been prouder.
Time was up. Everyone revealed their sketches. My cousin had drawn a decent rooster. My other cousin’s looked more like a pigeon. My aunt and uncle had textbook chickens. The only outlier was Gogo, who proudly raised a drawing of a Coca-Cola bottle. Everyone howled. “Aiwa Gogo, it’s cock, not Coke!” It was a sweet mistake, but we all knew what had to happen; Gogo had to be eliminated. It was obvious.
Then I flipped my board around. I won’t say what I drew, but Gogo made it to the next round.
That night changed me. It triggered a form of lexical OCD. To this day, I can’t use a potentially ambiguous word without explaining it first. I have to clarify terms before I proceed, even when everyone already understands. So, just to be safe, when I say “Features,” I don’t mean their physical features. I mean collaborations. Guest verses. Musical partnerships. I am not ranking who has the better cheekbones. Although if I were, it’s Voltz by a chin.
Now then—
Actually, you know what? I’ve just realised something. I’ve officially gone over the word count for a standard Riddims & Raps feature. This was meant to be the part where I talk about standout collabs and drop a couple of punchy sentences about who bodied who. But then I remembered I get paid per word, and I’ve hit the cap. Manando’s not paying for bonus paragraphs, so that’s it.
Bye. That's the feature.
