Africa-Press – Lesotho. Born Lehlohonolo Nkole, ‘Magnum Maestro’ is a Hip Hop artiste who was born and bred in Maputsoe, Leribe, and whose music mirrors daily life in the commercial town.
“My music journey as an artiste goes as far back as 2008 when I met an old friend while attending a regional science fair event and found out he could rap.
“I asked him to teach me the basics and from that day he became my mentor,” recalls Lehlohonolo. He says his mentor’s name is Shawn 3gga beats, who also happens to have produced the song 3-5-0 on his newly released project.
Upon learning the skill of rapping Lehlohonolo joined forces with two other schoolmates a year later and formed a group after which they recorded their first project together late in 2009.
The group took the name Black Panthers – after the famous African American civil rights movement of the same name. The group disbanded in 2013 and that’s when his solo career began.
In 2015 he released his first single titled All The Time which debuted live on Lesotho Television’s Urban Jams Show of the time. Over the years from then until 2018 he released most of his songs on ‘The King’ experimental project as individual singles.
Late in 2019 he signed to be the brand ambassador for a local fashion label named ‘Tycoon Series’ which has since then been shooting most of his visual material such as music videos and photo shoots, in a partnership that continues to date.
Contractual relations between Magnum Maestro and the Tycoon Series company have landed the artiste a cameo role in one of their upcoming feature films that is scheduled for release soon, titled ‘Pulamaliboho’ while, on the other hand, through the same friendship he has also released his new project.
Digital Rain was released on June 4 on the LesMusic website through the ‘Tycoon Series’ channel. The compilation was created and mastered in Maputsoe featuring local acts such as Recoil, Pynkillah Ls and the female rapper Sida Real.
The project has seen encouraging reception from the supporters as it went straight to the Number One spot on the date of its release on the LesMusic Top30 charts.
All the six songs from the project debuted in the Top 10 occupying Number 6 to Number 1 positions respectively, and stayed in the spot for three to four weeks since the release dates.
The two songs kept swapping the number one spot between themselves. Maestro explained: “Digital Rain is inspired by the American movie, The Matrix trilogy movies.
Basically Digital Rain is the code which the matrix is based on; it’s like the bricks that make up the house. “So, I wanted a very futuristic sound which wasn’t very typical in as far as the beats chosen are concerned.
Through it I aimed to address issues in our society but in an interesting way that would draw the attention of even listeners that don’t understand Hip Hop.
“One can easily hear references of African history from pre-colonial times from issues of entrepreneurship and investment to issues relating to crime, especially in my home town, Maputsoe,” he said.
