Posts Tagged ‘hip-hop’
How many musicians are willing and able to talk about the corrosive effect of male supremacy on the family?! Big ups to Akala and Selah on this one.
Wonderful video as ever from Global Faction. Love the cameo from the excellent Lez Henry also.
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Check out Lez Henry’s site, Nu Beyond
Akala’s new Fire In The Both shows once again that Akala brings the full package of lyrical skill, content, flows, relevance and personality. Forget all these wannabe gangsters and autotune bubblegum rappers! Akala has set the standard. Who’s rising to the challenge?
Akala’s mixtape ‘Knowledge Is Power vol 1’ will be released on 28 May. Preorder it here.
Militant Trayvon Martin tribute over the classic Nas ‘Made You Look’ beat (produced by Salaam Remi). Great video by Bmike.
Heartening to see top-level established artists coming together to make a statement, raise awareness, educate and organise.
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Single taken from the forthcoming album, Radical Dilemma.
The song samples a late 60s Spanish pop ballad, “Soy Rebelde, porque el mundo me hecho asi..” (I’m a Rebel, because the world has made me this way…”).
Produced by G1 of Rebel Diaz. Shot and edited by Pocho1.
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Check the new video for this firing track from Hasan Salaam’s excellent ‘Music Is My Weapon’ album.
‘Miss America’ explores the hypocrisy of the United States, which brands itself as the centre of the free world, whilst busily creating war, famine and discord throughout the world.
The content is important, the lyricism is deep, and Hasan Salaam’s voice rides perfectly over the intense beat. My only issue with the song is that a male rapper using the metaphor of the ‘slut’ is problematic, given the context of the patriarchal society we live in, where men disapprove of female ‘sluttishness’ whist applauding male promiscuity. The sociology of this issue runs deep, and has racial and class aspects to it as well as gender ones (society holds up an image of the virtuous, passive, pure, affluent white woman, which is contrasted to the immoral, nympho, poor black woman). Anyway, check bell hooks’ book “Ain’t I A Woman” for further ideas on that subject! In the meantime, check the video and support the album.
UPDATE: Hasan Salaam reached out on Twitter to clarify the meaning of the metaphor he used: “I don’t think your critique was on point due the fact it wasn’t held up against male promiscuity or women of color. The name Miss America comes from the ‘beauty pageant’ here in the states & is attacking the falsehood of Americas purity.”
The concept behind Hasan Salaam’s EP “Music Is My Weapon” is the belief that music can be used as a powerful tool in the pursuit of freedom, justice, and equality. With the release of the project, Hasan is aiming to prove that music can change people’s lives, literally. All profits from the sale of the EP will be used to fund a school, clean water well, and medical clinic in Guinea-Bissau, West Africa. The school has already been completed, and construction of the well is underway. In November 2010, Hasan became the first U.S hip hop artist to ever perform in Bissau. On the same trip he worked with the young artists, taught creative writing to the youth, and headlined a concert to promote freedom of speech. The “Music Is My Weapon” project is the next step, in an effort to provide change to a country that remains one of the poorest and least politically stable in the world.
Get Music Is My Weapon on iTunes. Follow Hasan Salaam on Twitter.
Check out this dope remix of J Cole’s “Can’t Get Enough”. RodStarz (one half of Rebel Diaz) and Luss represent for Mutulu Shakur, Sundiata Acoli, Oscar López, Mumia Abu-Jamal and all political prisoners.
Also check Rebel Diaz’s track Never A Prisoner – Free Mumia
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Here’s the new mixtape from revolutionary rapper Marcel Cartier, featuring classics from all three “Revolutionary Minded” projects, plus exclusives from the forthcoming album with Agent of Change (me!) and previously unreleased joints.
Pick it up for just $5 / £3.49 from OneRpm.
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Some really dope interview and studio footage from Dead Prez, Yasiin Bey and MikeFlo, as they put together a tribute to Trayvon Martin over the classic Nas ‘Made You Look’ beat (produced by the legendary Salaam Remi).
It’s heartening to see top-level established artists coming together to make a statement, raise awareness, educate and organise.
Also be sure to check out Jasiri X’s heart-felt tribute to Trayvon, over the ‘No Church in the Wild’ beat from Watch The Throne.
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10 minutes of great insight from Akala, without a doubt one of the leading cultural figures in the scene. Akala exposes some of the major problems in the UK underground/black music scene, addressing in particular the issue of cultural colonialism, whereby the corporate power structure uses its economic domination to shape the music towards its own agenda.
Akala
A dope concept and track from Rebel Diaz! Check it out.
Here’s what they say about it:
New Joint! “AMERICAN SPRING” Rebel Diaz (produced by DJ Charlie Hustle)
As the NATO summit converges on Chicago, and protestors gear up for the inevitable confrontations to come, many are dubbing this moment the American Spring – a response to last year’s uprisings in the Middle East, known as the Arab Spring.
Everywhere in the world, people are demanding human dignity and an end to the neoliberal model that puts profit before people. Yet, in the Arab Spring, we have seen the corporate media co-opt the mass discontent in the Middle East, and use the chaos as an excuse to engineer regime changes favorable to the global elite.
So if the US empire used the Arab Spring as a smokescreen for a power grab of land and oil resources from Afghanistan to Africa, what will be of the American Spring?
The last few months, people have been organizing, planning for the Spring- May Day actions, protests against NATO/G8, etc. Yet the last few months also saw the passage of NDAA, and other instruments to ‘legally’ declare a police state. Could the American Spring, and the discontent of protestors across the US, be utilized as an excuse for mass incarceration and martial law? Or will we channel this energy to create an organic movement for real change and true democracy? stay tuned but for now… the “American Spring.” by Rebel Diaz
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