Music Review (Down Memory Lane): Good Lover (My Mwami) by Brown Shugar

A long time ago in a city dramatically near you, Brown Shugar was in love. I know the story already sounds like it ends in low-budget tears – one of the protagonists is called Brown Shugar after all, and the other? The one she was in love with? Well, it gets worse – that was  businessman Sipapa (Charles Olim).

She then wrote the song Good Lover (My Mwami) as a dedication (good lawd) to him. 

Brown Shugar is on record saying she bitterly regretted doing this, of course. The couple separated acrimoniously in 2018, over whatever couples were separating over in that Year of our Lord.

Inevitably, I had never heard of Brown Shugar before, so it was this interview of regret that brought her to my attention. So I looked up the song.

Darn, she did not hold back on this one. She mentions his name at least four times, and sings some of the most syrupy nonsense you will hear this year as she wails out his praises.

The song goes for a big band feel, with a brass section cooing the closest to being convincing in this regard, but real life brass instruments have a lot more bit to it. You can hear the synthetic origins a mile away, even before you pay attention to the percussion.

It is probably a bad idea to write music while you are in love (which might explain why English singer Adele waits until she’s been dumped). Good Lover has the lyricism of a 12-year- old housemaid in its simplicity. 

However, there was a method to her ‘process’ when releasing this song. While Sipapa is a name I barely recognise and Brown Shugar’s music is something I only knew existed this week, these people have a following, a significant portion of the population that considers them to be celebrities. There are people out there that celebrate them folks, and for them, the fact that these two were dating was a big deal.

Writing a song about her dating life, therefore, was a sleek business movie – heck, five years later, the song is still around. I doubt Alien Skin will be able to say that about any of his ‘songs’ in five years, eh…?

Also, the simple, sing along structure of the song works for its target audience – ‘know your audience’ is Sales 101. 

Heck, even giving that interview about how she deeply regretted releasing a song about Sipapa was a good move by Brown Shugar. Immediately after the interview, the song started trending again, five years later as folks who had not heard it before looked it up, and as folks who had heard it anyway, gave it another listen.

We live in a brutal world, in a country where the economy is a punch line for jokes at cocktail parties – sometimes, you have to use everything at your disposal to make a buck. Brown Shugar has milked a ill-fated affair with Sipapa to bits, and made a bit of music out of it too.

I chalk that off as a win.