Radio Zaythini: live radio from Durban

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Radio Zaythini

The scene before it's a scene.

Hip-hop, amapiano, and afro-soul from Durban youth.

Radio Zaythini broadcasts online from Durban under a line it repeats everywhere: for the music, by the people. The station exists for South African youth who want records the commercial stations will not play and conversations they will not have, and it runs on named shows rather than rotation — Piano Hour, The Afro Connect Show, Price City Hittaz, The House of Hip Hop with Slick, a morning show, and The Ryan Show, a weekly syndicated hour from friends in the United States. Listener donations and a small online shop keep it going.

The music is South African and current: amapiano from the log-drum producers who built the sound, Johannesburg afro house, afro-soul, and rap from uMlazi and the wider KwaZulu-Natal scene. Alongside it the station does the work nobody pays it for — an artist of the week, a standing feature on acts yet to break, and in-studio interviews with local musicians on their way up.

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Durban, South Africa

Radio Zaythini

The scene before it's a scene.

Hip-hop, amapiano, and afro-soul from Durban youth.

Radio Zaythini broadcasts online from Durban under a line it repeats everywhere: for the music, by the people. The station exists for South African youth who want records the commercial stations will not play and conversations they will not have, and it runs on named shows rather than rotation — Piano Hour, The Afro Connect Show, Price City Hittaz, The House of Hip Hop with Slick, a morning show, and The Ryan Show, a weekly syndicated hour from friends in the United States. Listener donations and a small online shop keep it going.

The music is South African and current: amapiano from the log-drum producers who built the sound, Johannesburg afro house, afro-soul, and rap from uMlazi and the wider KwaZulu-Natal scene. Alongside it the station does the work nobody pays it for — an artist of the week, a standing feature on acts yet to break, and in-studio interviews with local musicians on their way up.