absolutely jit: the PA system

We moved on from True Jit and received money to record our second album for Warner Brothers, called "Absolutely Jit". Our idea this time was cut the costs of the recording by buying our own PA system and recording studio, and record the album in Zimbabwe.

Well the monies came in, and we bought the PA system to ship to Zimbabwe. Once we had the PA, Gordon decided that we should accompany his friend Chris Bolton, whom he said was a sound engineer and also knows how to repair musical equipment. Chris came along with some of his bits and pieces of equipment to join us going to Zimbabwe. But what we didn't know about Chris was that he was on the run - from the law or from his family. We were made to believe that he wanted to work with us, and so we took him to Zimbabwe and he became our business partner.

Once we were in Zimbabwe, we formed a company called Frontline Sound, which consisted of the PA and a recording studio. A third partner was involved, mainly to help us deal with the paperwork and import duties in Zimbabwe.

Things seemed to be moving ok in the first place. I was worried about storage of the PA equipment whenever we were going abroad, and I suggested that we lock all the equipment at my father's house, and some at Kenny's parent's house. But this idea was denied.

Every time we came to UK, we would buy spare parts for the same PA, and send these to Chris Bolton, to repair the equipment. As they were using this equipment for concerts, we expected to get this money back. However, whenever we returned, we were told the books were in the red.

We started to suspect the money earned by the PA was being mis-used. We discovered that Chris Bolton was paying himself $2000 Zim dollars a week. This was the late 1980's, when the minimum wage was around $80 a month. Even a professional doctor was not getting that kind of pay a week. Yet his workforce were not paid enough, which resulted in them stealing bits and pieces of the equipment.

This angered us, yet Gordon, our manager, could not give us straight answers to how his friend earnt himself that kind of money, when the books were always in red. An argument broke out between the three directors, and the company collapsed.

The studio was sold, after Gordon struck a deal with Grammar Recording Company, which was part of the LONRO group of companies in those days. The deal was that we get some money and some hours (250?) of recording time. One day I went to the studio to try to use some of my time, but I was denied. So in a sense, we lost money through that part of the deal.

As for the PA system, Chris took whatever was left when our company collapsed, and hired it to The Blacks Unlimited band, of which he became their manager. But we, The Bhundu Boys, got nothing from this.