The race is on for SAMA 23 Record of the Year

And they are off... the race is on for SAMA 23 Record of the Year as top 20 shortlist is revealed

While it’s a smorgasbord of genres, music styles, newcomers and veterans vying for the top honour of Record of the Year, it would seem that dance music is all the rage. The top 20 shortlist for the SAMA23 Record of the Year were revealed on SABC1’s LiveAmp last Friday and have been put up for public vote.

DJ Black Coffee leads with two of his tracks Come With Me featuring Mque and Your Eyes featuring Shekinah earning him two berths.

Dance music dominates and will see trusted names DJ Clock (Wolves featuring Prom Knights), DJ Ganyani (Talk to Me), DJ Speedsta (Mayo featuring Yung Swizz, Tellaman and Sha), Euphonik and Mi Casa (Don’t Wanna Be), Locnville (Cold Shoulder), Bucie (Rejoice featuring Black Motion), Miss Pru DJ (Ameni), Mobi Dixon (Trigger featuring Inga Hina), Sketchy Bongo & Shekinah (Let You Know) and Timo Odv (I Need You).

Newcomers Afro-soul songbird Amanda Black with her single Amazulu; Gqom queen Babes Wodumo’s Wololo featuring Mampintsha; and rapper Nasty C with Hell Naw made the cut.

Rap is represented by AKA’s One Time and Kwesta’s Ngud.

With this revelation, Nasty C’s tally of nominations goes up to seven making him the most nominated artist of SAMA 23 followed by Kwesta with six and Amanda Black’s five.  

An elated Nhlanhla Sibisi, CEO of RiSA commented: ‘The shortlist of the top 20 Record of the Year finalists is a true reflection of a lively and vibrant music industry. These are the songs that we danced to in the past year and all have earned their place here. We encourage music lovers to now do the right thing and vote with their fingers for their favourites to make it into the last 10 finalist stage.’

To vote for your favourite song dial *120*33123#, and follow the prompt menu and enter the number of the artist you would like to vote for. USSD charges R1.50 per minute, free minutes do not apply.  A maximum of 50 votes per cell phone number, per song on the list will be allowed.  Voting lines are now open and will close on May 18, 2017 for the cut down to top 10. 

Lines will  be re-opened on the 19^th May 2017 at 20:00 for the top 10 to be voted on.  The lines will remain opened until the 27^th May 2017 at 21:00.