South, that shouted the mantra “Free the Land,” and the Sandinistas in Nicaragua, and the ANC in South Africa. So I knew why Zimbabwe was called out in the song, who Mugabe was, and how his political organization, ZANU, beat back the British colonial forces, just as I knew about the New Afrikan People’s Organization in the U.S. I was raised a child of leftist intellectuals. In “Master Blaster," Wonder sings, “Peace has come to Zimbabwe / Third World's right on the one / Now's the time for celebration / 'Cause we've only just begun.” It's a party song, and a revolutionary one. Before he was a despot, he was a freedom fighter. Not over Mugabe’s death, but over his loss. And I was listening to it, nostalgically, the day before I heard that the former and first Zimbabwean prime minister, Robert Mugabe, had died. My favorite song from that album was “Master Blaster.” Like most people, I imagine, I called it “Jammin,’” from its refrain, “Nobody ever told you that you / would be jammin’ until the break of dawn.” A reggae-influenced jubilant song, it makes you want to dance and laugh. I turned eight the year Stevie Wonder’s album Hotter Than July was released.
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