Since the release of her South African Music Award-winning debut album Amagama in 2022, Ndwendwe-born singer-songwriter Nomfundo Ngcobo, professionally known as Nomfundo Moh, has been deliberate enough with her chess moves, avoiding a sophomore slump with Ugcobo (2023) while evading the curse of oversaturating the market with her name.
The “Phakade Lami” note-bender recently released her third studio album titled Twenty Four, christened after her age. Reflective of her age, Moh’s latest installment documents the warbler’s accumulated soliloquies collected but left unsaid from the time she made her entry into the industry as a saucer-eyed newbie to being a respected artist entrusted with the weight of love and wisdom.
With an evened-out playback time of forty minutes, Twenty Four is a predominantly afro-pop album fringed with gradations of R&B, soul, and amapiano. The project’s guestlist features a collage of co-stars to match the multi-hued ambitions of its ornate production, with appearances from Cassper Nyovest, Msaki, Boohle, MaWhoo, Nontokozo Mkhize, Zuko ZA, Inkosi Yamagcokama, Thando Zide, Starr Healer, and Naxion Cross.
Nomfundo Moh | SUPPLIED
From gingerly note selection to the meticulous marriage of harmonies to the base songwriting of each track, the output of Nomfundo Moh’s third craftmanship exhibits the wonderous yet complex precision of human anatomy. The thematic heart of the album pumps blood rich with nascent romance (“Gamalakhe”, “Muntu Wami”, Uyazkhohlwa”), divine favour (“Umusa”), self-empowerment (“Phambili” and “Ngsayozama”), and the value taking care of one’s roots (“Bayavuma”) into each musical limb.
Ngcobo’s album is a sprightly opus in which the songwriter acknowledges the carnal, emotional, and spiritual aspects of herself without alienating one in the quest for validating the feelings of the other. The balancing act results in the twenty-four-year-old achieving an uncanny level of wisdom in the way she expresses love and dispenses knowledge without sounding pretentious or insincere.
The first six songs, apart from the outlying “Umusa” expand on themes of love and romance, whilst the latter portion of the album focuses on growth, adulthood, and the challenges faced as one evolves in life. Whether Nomfundo portrays a meditative lover reminiscing about the miscarriage of burgeoning romance over piano-reliant production (“Abantu”) or she finds herself backed against the wall, heartening herself because the chips are down with nobody to support her (“Phambili”), Ngcobo phases in and out of different characters and moods with such ease, the switch is hardly one that causes auditory whiplash.
Nomfundo Moh | SUPPLIED
The crest of the album comes from “Ngsayozama”, a power ballad founded on triumphant percussion and aerated production which lends it an uplifting atmosphere. “Ngilawulwa intshisekelo”, Nomfundo sings, rehashing the vitality of being one’s greatest cheerleader and the importance of holding oneself accountable in the earnest pursuit of success. The song isn’t a high point for its vocals or songwriting or production but the fusion of all these components while addressing the topics of diligence, perseverance, and staying the course without sounding preachy or gauche like a TED Talk tidbit on TikTok. In this song is the fullness of Nomfundo’s musical prowess, acumen, and unassuming nature all wrapped in a neat bow.
Twenty Four is in every sense of the word a glorious three-peat. If Amagama was the curtain-raiser and Ugcobo was the main event, then Twenty Four is an encore which features nothing but the best parts of what made the debut and the sophomore remarkable works of art. Coming in at number three, this album doesn’t feel like the artistry of someone running on empty. What’s more, the strength, maturity, and thought behind Nomfundo’s album all prophesy the coming of greater music beyond the horizon.
