African Hip Hop

SARABAH: Sister Fa and the Movement to End FGM

“For years, I wondered why my mother had allowed this to happen. It was not until someone explained to me that she didn’t have a choice: she was not cutting me to harm me, but because she felt that she was doing what was the best for me.” Sister Fa

SARABAH Documentary Film Review by Azra Sarabah follows the life of Senegalese rapper Fatou Mandiang Diatta, better known as Sister Fa, and her quest to address female genital mutilation (FGM) in her village in Senegal.After releasing her first album and marrying a German PhD student, she found herself in Germany working on her music and wanting to commit to raising awareness of FGM in Senegal, as she herself had undergone the procedure as a child. Read the film review now in TRIBES Magazine Summer 2012 Spark Africa Issue!

Visit http://www.sarabahdocumentary.com

NNEKA: Soul is Heavy Interview. Watch footage of Nneka now!

Nneka Egbuna

Interview by Leslie Cunningham for TRIBES Magazine

A talented and passionate singer/songwriter and rapper, Nneka has caught the attention of TRIBES Magazine before. Appearing on the TRIBES Magazine’s Top 24 Independent Artist Tracks on Myspace in 2008, Nneka, even some four years ago was making a name for herself and contemporary Nigeria musical culture & politics in Nigeria (and around Europe) with her soulful acoustic-heavy ballads and freestyle raps on capitalism, poverty and war. Nneka remained on TRIBES Top 24 for several months that year followed by a review in our Music Tribe. Now, Nneka is back in an eagerly anticipatedinterview with TRIBES Magazine, to speak to the family about her musical journey from Warri to Hamburg, Africa and Europe to the U.S, and the mission she pursues through her art in this moment of global connectivity on a platform ready for voices of change and yearning for The Motherland.

Described by some as a new-millennium Bob Marley, Nneka Egbuna (meaning ‘mother is supreme’) first introduced the world to her potent brand of conscious Hip Hop in 2005. The daughter of a Nigerian father and German mother, Nneka was born and raised in Warri, a major oil city in the Niger Delta region of Nigeria that has and continues to suffer great political and social upheaval as its citizens and the world vie for access to the regions wealth of natural resources.

At age 19, Nneka swapped work in her stepmother’s restaurant in Warri for study abroad, at the University of Hamburg. In a new city, music became a means not only to finance her studies but also a means of survival as Nneka searched for her voice in a radically different cultural community. With Nigeria ever heavy on her mind, Nneka began to use music as her stage to express her love, pain and hopes for her homeland.

Nneka’s U.S. album debut, Concrete Jungle, revealed a beautiful, outspoken songbird whose message was delivered in mystical lyrics and passionate sounds with as much depth of feeling and intent as that of any other artist to hit the world stage in recent memory. With vocal talent that generates frequent comparisons to legends like Lauryn Hill, Nina Simone and Erykah Badu, Nneka’s unique blend of afrobeat, reggae, pop, and Hip Hop puts her in a class that is currently all her own. Touring stages from Atlanta to Paris, Nneka has opened for Lenny Kravitz, The Roots, Femi Kuti, Gnarls Barkely and Sean Paul among others and on Nneka’s latest album, Soul Is Heavy, released September 2011 and still making a splash around the globe, fans will once again be moved by a “raw and honest window into her beliefs on love, pain, politics and God” (nnekaworld.com).

TRIBES: How were you introduced to Hip Hop?

NNEKA:I was introduced to Hip Hop in Warri by a friend of mine who used to work in an okrika shop. These are old second hand clothes that are sent from Europe to Africa. He used to sell these clothes. Well, anyway, I used to work in a small food shop close by. So, in his lunch break time, he
used to show me some music on his old walkman. It wasHip Hop.

TRIBES: Can you tell us, how did you get started?

NNEKA: I never really thought I would become a musician. I always loved music, but it was sacred, something I hardly shared with anyone. I have never been a person who would show off with my voice. I was shy and did my thing in a shy way. It was in Germany where I finally began to gain more courage to express myself. Being far way from Nigeria caused me to do music more than ever. And, so it evolved. I wrote my thoughts and my pain down and all I saw. I met other people, including DJ FarHotfrom Afghanistan who is still today the main person I work with. We vibed from the beginning. He was searching for his identity within the music and I was eager to express myself. So, we became a team. I found a record company that was interested in me, YoMama Records. I played a couple of shows and invited them to see me and two months later, they offered me a record deal. YoMama was then sold to Sony. That is how I became an artist on a major record company.

READ THE FULL INTERVIEW in TRIBES Magazine’s Summer 2012 Spark Africa Issue!

Visit NNEKAWORLD.com




NNEKA: Soul is Heavy Interview. Watch footage of Nneka now!

Nneka Egbuna

Interview by Leslie Cunningham for TRIBES Magazine

A talented and passionate singer/songwriter and rapper, Nneka has caught the attention of TRIBES Magazine before. Appearing on the TRIBES Magazine’s Top 24 Independent Artist Tracks on Myspace in 2008, Nneka, even some four years ago was making a name for herself and contemporary Nigeria musical culture & politics in Nigeria (and around Europe) with her soulful acoustic-heavy ballads and freestyle raps on capitalism, poverty and war. Nneka remained on TRIBES Top 24 for several months that year followed by a review in our Music Tribe. Now, Nneka is back in an eagerly anticipated interview with TRIBES Magazine, to speak to the family about her musical journey from Warri to Hamburg, Africa and Europe to the U.S, and the mission she pursues through her art in this moment of global connectivity on a platform ready for voices of change and yearning for The Motherland.

Described by some as a new-millennium Bob Marley, Nneka Egbuna (meaning ‘mother is supreme’) first introduced the world to her potent brand of conscious Hip Hop in 2005. The daughter of a Nigerian father and German mother, Nneka was born and raised in Warri, a major oil city in the Niger Delta region of Nigeria that has and continues to suffer great political and social upheaval as its citizens and the world vie for access to the regions wealth of natural resources.

At age 19, Nneka swapped work in her stepmother’s restaurant in Warri for study abroad, at the University of Hamburg. In a new city, music became a means not only to finance her studies but also a means of survival as Nneka searched for her voice in a radically different cultural community. With Nigeria ever heavy on her mind, Nneka began to use music as her stage to express her love, pain and hopes for her homeland.

Nneka’s U.S. album debut, Concrete Jungle, revealed a beautiful, outspoken songbird whose message was delivered in mystical lyrics and passionate sounds with as much depth of feeling and intent as that of any other artist to hit the world stage in recent memory. With vocal talent that generates frequent comparisons to legends like Lauryn Hill, Nina Simone and Erykah Badu, Nneka’s unique blend of afrobeat, reggae, pop, and Hip Hop puts her in a class that is currently all her own. Touring stages from Atlanta to Paris, Nneka has opened for Lenny Kravitz, The Roots, Femi Kuti, Gnarls Barkely and Sean Paul among others and on Nneka’s latest album, Soul Is Heavy, released September 2011 and still making a splash around the globe, fans will once again be moved by a “raw and honest window into her beliefs on love, pain, politics and God” (nnekaworld.com).

TRIBES: How were you introduced to Hip Hop?

NNEKA: I was introduced to Hip Hop in Warri by a friend of mine who used to work in an okrika shop. These are old second hand clothes that are sent from Europe to Africa. He used to sell these clothes. Well, anyway, I used to work in a small food shop close by. So, in his lunch break time, he
used to show me some music on his old walkman. It was Hip Hop.

TRIBES: Can you tell us, how did you get started?

NNEKA: I never really thought I would become a musician. I always loved music, but it was sacred, something I hardly shared with anyone. I have never been a person who would show off with my voice. I was shy and did my thing in a shy way. It was in Germany where I finally began to gain more courage to express myself. Being far way from Nigeria caused me to do music more than ever. And, so it evolved. I wrote my thoughts and my pain down and all I saw. I met other people, including DJ FarHot from Afghanistan who is still today the main person I work with. We vibed from the beginning. He was searching for his identity within the music and I was eager to express myself. So, we became a team. I found a record company that was interested in me, YoMama Records. I played a couple of shows and invited them to see me and two months later, they offered me a record deal. YoMama was then sold to Sony. That is how I became an artist on a major record company.

READ THE FULL INTERVIEW in TRIBES Magazine’s Summer 2012 Spark Africa Issue!

Visit NNEKAWORLD.com




TRIBES INTERVIEW WITH BUDDHA BLAZE OF SPARK AFRICA

SPARK AFRICA: BUDDHA BLAZE AND THE EAST AFRICAN HIP HOP MOVEMENT

Exclusive Interview with TRIBES editor and senior writer, Alana Jones.

Buddha Blaze of Spark Africa

Buddha Blaze has been building a home for Hip Hop in Kenya and bridging markets across the Motherland for some time. Touting a career resume in the arena of music entertainment, jam packed with groundbreaking moments in African Hip Hop, Buddha Blaze has helped to generate the growing wave of rhymes from the original underground. Thus, we introduce you, TRIBES readers and family, to Buddha Blaze, our TRIBES in Nairobi correspondent and connection to one of the world’s next and most exciting popular music and culture movements.

Buddha Blaze’s media coverage of his Hip Hop community coupled with his entertainment production projects, and contributions to the movement of Hip Hop music and culture, more generally, have taken all variety of forms. Creative partner of Spark Africa, a multi-media authority on African urban culture and entertainment, Buddha Blaze is also founder of Slam Africa, Kenya’s premier poetry event and creator of Kenya’s first hip-hop website, kenyanhiphop.com. Former editor and writer for East Africa’s first entertainment periodical, PHAT! Magazine  and coordinator of the Spark Africa-managed WAPI (Words and Pictures), a global artists’ movement, Buddha Blaze is a Hip Hop activist with a passion for global art, culture and music.

Dead Prez in Kenya

Committed to providing a platform on this world stage for budding African artists, Buddha Blaze has successfully elevated Hip Hop music to new levels in Kenya and helped shine a spotlight on African artists before world audiences. In 2002, Buddha Blaze spearheaded a mass media campaign to have local radio stations play music by Kenyan artists. The result was an explosion of national and regional recognition for local artists and an opportunity for young Kenyan’s and Hip Hop heads in the region to hear themselves and their brand of Hip Hop music on the radio. Buddha Blaze also led the first group of Kenyan artists to the KORA All African Music Awards in Johannesburg, South Africa in 2003. “Hip-hop has always had a positive influence on the youth from the urban centers of the world,” says Buddha Blaze as he mentions some of the artists to play WAPI stage, including Dead Prez, Blak Twang, and Kamau. Blaze has also taken WAPI events on the road, sponsoring concert festivals in Nigeria, Ghana, Uganda and Malawi.

READ THE FULL INTERVIEW!

TRIBES: How did you fall in love with Hip Hop music and culture? Who were some of your Hip Hop favorites, then? And now?

BUDDHA: I grew up on Hip Hop, just like the average kid having heard the early Hip Hop tapes- Biz Markie, Kool Moe Dee and the rest. It was natural that as an urban African kid, I just fell in love.  Biggie, Nas, Rakim are my Hip Hop icons that I look up to. Talib Kweli is the truth! I can’t wait to bring him to Kenya.

TRIBES: When did you first encounter Kenyan Hip Hop? Can you tell us a little something about the Hip Hop scene in Kenya?

BUDDHA: In 2000, there was  a group in Kenya called K-South this is one of the early groups that influenced Hip Hop in the country. I was just minding my business when I bumped into one of the members, Bamboo. I told him I was a rapper and he showed me his world. Which was a whole lot of Hip Hop. At the time, it was them and Kalamashaka that were starting hip hop movements in Kenya.

TRIBES: Is there a characteristic sound or quintessential Kenyan Hip Hop style?

BUDDHA: The Kenyan sound is very edgy, gritty beats and lyrical. You have to have punch-lines or else the song gets no love.

TRIBES: What is your dream for the Hip Hop community in Kenya? And the world?

BUDDHA: For Kenya I would love to see more Kenyan Hip Hop integrated into the world. For the world, I would love to see more Hip Hop artists collaborating with each other on an international stage.

TRIBES: Will you tell us a little about Spark Africa– its origins, mission, and current projects?

BUDDHA: Spark Africa was an idea that came about by highly creative individuals. My partner, Shingirayi Sabeta from Zimbabwe, Khanyi Zwane from South Africa and I are from Kenya. We were tired of the way Africa was being depicted as a dark continent and wanted to be the creators of that spark- that illuminating light that shines across the world. We are multi national Africans and want to enforce the unity amongst Africans. Spark Africa is an urban multi media, events and creative company that is meant to champion the “new Africa”. Our strengths are in publishing, music, events and below the line branding.

TRIBES: How did you become involved with PHAT magazine and initially enter the world of Hip Hop and the entertainment industry?

BUDDHA: At PHAT I was a reporter who ended up being an editor just because I had so much love for the industry. The sky was the limit for me.

TRIBES: What are your ultimate aspirations as a journalist and Hip Hop supporter?

BUDDHA: My inspiration is to see the entertainment industry in Africa be one to be proud of. We want to have artists that we can take around the world and not care about cultural differences but ones that make music for the world.

TRIBES: What sparked your move from print to radio and television? To blogging and social media?

BUDDHA: It’s just growth really. You have to roll with the moment. Everything that we do just feeds into what we become. At Spark Africa we do not live a career, we live a lifestyle.

TRIBES: Has the work of building strong virtual Hip Hop communities on the web been difficult?

BUDDHA: It’s actually been a blessing, in Kenya there’s a lot of interest in Hip Hop, both online and on the ground. It’s been really easy. We have had international artists such as Dead Prez, Ian Kamau, Knaan, Blak Twang, Nneka join us, so for me it’s all love.

TRIBES: In your opinion, who are the Kenyan artists to watch in the coming months? Who should TRIBES readers make sure to add to their summer playlists?

BUDDHA: I recommend you watch out for that kid Bamboo. Then there is Octopizzo, Doobiz and on the BET Awards watch out for my little nephews, Camp Mulla. they’ve been nominated as Best International.

TRIBES: For the Summer 2012 edition of TRIBES Magazine, we’ve put together a calendar of great world summer music tours for our readers. Will you be attending any summer concerts or music tours/festivals that you would like to encourage the TRIBES family to check out?

BUDDHA: Yeah, I’m working on the Wale tour in South Africa and Kenya. Dates not announced yet. On August 4th Watch out for that kid Tumi from the Volume at the Blankets and Wine Festival in Nairobi.

VISIT: Buddha Blaze’s blog at buddhablazeworld.blogspot.com.

VISIT: SPARK AFRICA facebook.com/sparkafrica facebook.com/wapiweb

SARABAH: Sister Fa and the Movement to End FGM

“For years, I wondered why my mother had allowed this to happen. It was not until someone explained to me that she didn’t have a choice: she was not cutting me to harm me, but because she felt that she was doing what was the best for me.” Sister Fa

SARABAH Documentary Film Review by Azra Sarabah follows the life of Senegalese rapper Fatou Mandiang Diatta, better known as Sister Fa, and her quest to address female genital mutilation (FGM) in her village in Senegal.After releasing her first album and marrying a German PhD student, she found herself in Germany working on her music and wanting to commit to raising awareness of FGM in Senegal, as she herself had undergone the procedure as a child. Read the film review now in TRIBES Magazine Summer 2012 Spark Africa Issue!

Visit http://www.sarabahdocumentary.com

NNEKA: Soul is Heavy Interview. Watch footage of Nneka now!

Nneka Egbuna

Interview by Leslie Cunningham for TRIBES Magazine

A talented and passionate singer/songwriter and rapper, Nneka has caught the attention of TRIBES Magazine before. Appearing on the TRIBES Magazine’s Top 24 Independent Artist Tracks on Myspace in 2008, Nneka, even some four years ago was making a name for herself and contemporary Nigeria musical culture & politics in Nigeria (and around Europe) with her soulful acoustic-heavy ballads and freestyle raps on capitalism, poverty and war. Nneka remained on TRIBES Top 24 for several months that year followed by a review in our Music Tribe. Now, Nneka is back in an eagerly anticipated interview with TRIBES Magazine, to speak to the family about her musical journey from Warri to Hamburg, Africa and Europe to the U.S, and the mission she pursues through her art in this moment of global connectivity on a platform ready for voices of change and yearning for The Motherland.

Described by some as a new-millennium Bob Marley, Nneka Egbuna (meaning ‘mother is supreme’) first introduced the world to her potent brand of conscious Hip Hop in 2005. The daughter of a Nigerian father and German mother, Nneka was born and raised in Warri, a major oil city in the Niger Delta region of Nigeria that has and continues to suffer great political and social upheaval as its citizens and the world vie for access to the regions wealth of natural resources.

At age 19, Nneka swapped work in her stepmother’s restaurant in Warri for study abroad, at the University of Hamburg. In a new city, music became a means not only to finance her studies but also a means of survival as Nneka searched for her voice in a radically different cultural community. With Nigeria ever heavy on her mind, Nneka began to use music as her stage to express her love, pain and hopes for her homeland.

Nneka’s U.S. album debut, Concrete Jungle, revealed a beautiful, outspoken songbird whose message was delivered in mystical lyrics and passionate sounds with as much depth of feeling and intent as that of any other artist to hit the world stage in recent memory. With vocal talent that generates frequent comparisons to legends like Lauryn Hill, Nina Simone and Erykah Badu, Nneka’s unique blend of afrobeat, reggae, pop, and Hip Hop puts her in a class that is currently all her own. Touring stages from Atlanta to Paris, Nneka has opened for Lenny Kravitz, The Roots, Femi Kuti, Gnarls Barkely and Sean Paul among others and on Nneka’s latest album, Soul Is Heavy, released September 2011 and still making a splash around the globe, fans will once again be moved by a “raw and honest window into her beliefs on love, pain, politics and God” (nnekaworld.com).

TRIBES: How were you introduced to Hip Hop?

NNEKA: I was introduced to Hip Hop in Warri by a friend of mine who used to work in an okrika shop. These are old second hand clothes that are sent from Europe to Africa. He used to sell these clothes. Well, anyway, I used to work in a small food shop close by. So, in his lunch break time, he
used to show me some music on his old walkman. It was Hip Hop.

TRIBES: Can you tell us, how did you get started?

NNEKA: I never really thought I would become a musician. I always loved music, but it was sacred, something I hardly shared with anyone. I have never been a person who would show off with my voice. I was shy and did my thing in a shy way. It was in Germany where I finally began to gain more courage to express myself. Being far way from Nigeria caused me to do music more than ever. And, so it evolved. I wrote my thoughts and my pain down and all I saw. I met other people, including DJ FarHot from Afghanistan who is still today the main person I work with. We vibed from the beginning. He was searching for his identity within the music and I was eager to express myself. So, we became a team. I found a record company that was interested in me, YoMama Records. I played a couple of shows and invited them to see me and two months later, they offered me a record deal. YoMama was then sold to Sony. That is how I became an artist on a major record company.

READ THE FULL INTERVIEW in TRIBES Magazine’s Summer 2012 Spark Africa Issue!

Visit NNEKAWORLD.com




TRIBES Summer 2012 issue: SPARK AFRICA


TRIBES Magazine Summer 2012 – The SPARK AFRICA Issue

Get a copy in print or download a digital version to your computer or mobile device.

In the spirit of ushering in a new summer and preparing to bring this latest TRIBES Magazine Summer 2012: Spark Africa issue to press, the crew at TRIBES Central took a field trip to the Carolina Theatre for a highly anticipated, limited screening of Marley, the new documentary film from Kevin MacDonald chronicling the complete life and works of the international superstar. Immersing his art in the political and socioeconomic realities of life in post-colonial Jamaica and committed to reclaiming a cultural homeland and spiritual roots for all members of the Africa diaspora, Bob Marley was beloved by his fans and peers for his commitment to the work of truth and reconciliation in his music and the love for humanity that permeated his life and work.

In this issue of TRIBES Magazine, join us as we head to Nigeria, Kenya, Sierra Leon, Guinea Bissau, Senegal, and S. Africa by way of Germany and the United States, to meet musician and activist Nneka– raising awareness around big oil business, natural resource exploitation, and state corruption in her hometown of Warri- Hip Hop Activist, promoter, and journalist, Buddha Blaze– co-founder of Spark Africa and various efforts to generate and unify Hip Hop communities across the African continent- Sister Fa– Female MC and subject of the new documentary film, Sarabah, on her mission to combat female genital mutilation (FGM) practices in her Senegalese homeland- and MAMA AFRICA, Miriam Makeba, and her peace and humanitarian work during and after the fall of apartheid in her native South Africa.

These individuals, and the other artists and activists to grace the pages of this Spark Africa edition, teach us that through intensely personal, substantively relevant expressions of art and culture, we become infinitely connected and limitless beings with voices amplified for the work of improving our world. Celebrate inspired community and the arts with our favorite summer concerts and festivals, write your Spark Africa summer playlist after a visit to our Music TRIBES and find inspiration for new forms of expression in Pierce Freelon’s latest project, Tar Heel Tracks, and Renaldo Davidson’s collaborative, mixed-media work, Black Clown.

In this summer of 2012, love, and as a means for revolution, reigns supreme and thus, we welcome you to the TRIBES Magazine 2012: SPARK AFRICA Issue. May your heart’s light illuminate the darkness!  Alana Jones, TRIBES Executive Editor