Rapper Coolio died on Wednesday, at 59. He was at his friend’s house in Los Angeles when he reportedly suffered a cardiac arrest. However, no official cause has been given yet, though TMZ cited officials saying no drugs had been found at the scene. The American artist, best known for Gangsta’s Paradise, had a common catchphrase “Shakazulu”. Many of Coolio’s Instagram posts carry the word.
He had captioned one image, “Check me out in Næstved, thanks for another great show in Europe last weekend. Shakazulu‼️”
While playing at the Fiddler’s Green Amphitheatre on 25th of June 2022, Coolio again captioned the photo “Shakazulu”.
When speaking to Boston.com, Coolio was asked why he said “Shaka-Zulu” a lot, and what it meant to him.
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The rapper replied, “‘Shaka’ is my catchphrase. Emeril got bam, I got Shaka.” He then explained how he came up with the phrase. One day Coolio was talking to his daughter, who pointed out “Dang, Daddy, you cuss too much.” He asked if this were true, to which his daughter replied, “Yeah, every other word you say is [jerk].”
Coolio explained to the interviewer how he thought to himself that this must stop. “And it came out of the blue. I stubbed my toe and I just said, “Shaka.” I’m like, “‘Shaka laka, man'”, he continued, adding, “Oh, I kind of like that.” You put that “laka,” that’s like that bam, this is what that is. It makes it more exciting.”
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Elsewhere, he told Kathie Lee Gifford and Hoda Kotb on the Today show, “I started out saying mothaf—ker as my phrase, but then my daughter told me I cuss too much. So it became Shakazulu”.
Zulu has been in rap history for as long as the genre existed with Afrika Bambaataa’s The Zulu Nation, which eventually became Universal Zulu Nation – a collection of socially and politically aware rappers. While Coolio, being an artist of the genre, would know about The Zulu Nation, he never publicly credited them for having any influence on his catchphrase.
