#Lockdown - The melancholic magic of its music

One of the most pleasant surprises on local TV has to be Mzansi Magic's Lockdown, a prison drama that focuses on women.

One of the most pleasant surprises on local TV has to be Mzansi Magic's Lockdown, a prison drama that focuses on women.

Published Mar 7, 2017

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Johannesburg - One of the most pleasant surprises on local TV has to be Mzansi Magic's Lockdown, a prison drama that focuses on women. While the storylines are raw and unpredictable, it is the chilling soundtrack, as Azania Mosaka pointed out on Twitter on Monday night, that enhances the dark shade in which the Lockdown world is portrayed. 

The show trends every Monday night. The song has a melancholic line about death which is repeated over and over again.

The director Mandla N is part of the team responsible for the song. Many people may know him from the City Sesl'a sitcoms but Mandla N has also dabbled with music as he was a member of Gang of Instrumentals, a hip hop outfit that gave us hit songs like Number One. He spoke to us about the music on Lockdown.

"People are talking about the different songs we used for every episode. I don't use library music but I actually create music that is relevant to both the prison world and the particular episode that we are running. So I use the prison terms and all that and so far we have eight songs," said Mandla N.

You will be happy to know that the singers on the said tracks are actually from the pool of talent that's acting on the show.

"We have Nelisiwe Sibiya and Zola Nomonde, who play prisoners, plus Slindile Nodangala who plays the prison warden. They are all vocalists and they take turns in singing the songs for given scenes," he explained.

Mandla N was happy to shed light on the show's title track.

"The main theme song is Useshonile sengonile which means 'he's dead, I've screwed up'. That's played at the start and end of the show," he said.

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