dialo askia

Dip Diver: Making Waves and Paying Homage to Hip Hop

 

Dip Diver: Making Waves and Paying Homage to Hip Hop

Interview By Leslie Cunningham

I hope you can swim or at least back stroke, because this article is meant to be read under water. I am seriously excited about Dip Diver, a peculiarly masked Chicago duo making waves in the underground scene with beats and rhymes that pay homage to some of the big Hip Hop fish. I’ve known Dialo Askia as a talented music journalist who has in the past added some dope words to the pages of TRIBES. In one feature article, he wrote about Nowenen, the genius behind This Day Amine. So, when Dialo and Nowenen decided to come together to create Agua Lung, I couldn’t wait to listen and learn more.

Dip Diver

 

TRIBES: What is the meaning of the name “Dip Diver”?

Nowenen: We come from freshness and always being dipped in Lo, Woolrich, Wally’s, Diadora, Bjorn Borg, Fila, etc.  But we also come from having knowledge of self, being right and exact studying math, science, man, woman and child, etc. The term dip dive dates back to the song Superrappin’ by Grandmaster Flash and The Furious Five, and that term has moved on from Puba and Lakim Shabazz to Organized Konfusion to Wu Tang.

TRIBES: How did Dip Diver get started?

Dialo Askia: Nowenen and I have been writing verses for years, though not concentrating on rapping. He suggested we do an album. To do it properly we had to craft our own sound to be sufficiently in our own lane. We created our first CD with the intention of no one outside of ourselves and immediate circle hearing it. It made its way outside those boundaries and the consensus was “do another one!”

TRIBES: How is the Dip Diver sound created?

Dialo Askia: There is no set structure. Sometimes Nowenen and I brainstorm ideas to come up with concepts. Sometimes we come up with ideas individually and present to the other. We work on the music together. If one of us loves a track and the other is on the fence, we don’t use it.  If we aren’t both like “That’s it!” we move on. Most interesting is how we write. We never write together, but still seem to stay on the same page. We often times reference the same things in a song. For example, “Deen” is a song where we’re each conversing with a woman. Somehow we both reference gluten-free. We’re in sync.

TRIBES: What was happening in your life that inspired the tracks on “aqua lung?”

Dialo Askia: Everything and anything. Inspiration came from everywhere at all times. I was having breakfast on vacation saying a rhyme about the food. It made the album.

Nowenen:  When we went to record, my mother had passed away, and in my sorrow for her absence, I was thinking, “Wow, she won’t be able to witness this freshness.”  Read the full interview now in the Spring 2017 Issue # 37. 

Visit dipdiver.bandcamp.com.

ROOTS IN RAP

Dialo Askia, TRIBES Contributing Writer

ROOTS IN RAP by Dialo Askia 

Hip Hop started out in the park but if you trace the roots of the Hip Hop tree further, you’ll find yourself traveling back through the Caribbean and across the Atlantic to the Motherland, with your ear to the ground, feeling the vibration of the African drum. The early years of Hip Hop held a strong connection to African roots and the music instilled pride in the community while educating listeners.

Greek, Italian, Polish …my senior year in high school, English class included monthly cultural lessons with visiting college professors that would lead us in study and discussion of various cultures. For the sake of authenticity, professors born of the given culture conducted the lessons and so, on the day of the African studies, I enthusiastically walked to the auditorium ready to be instructed by an academic with roots on African continent, a person of color, only to be greeted by a white professor.

Read the full article in TRIBES Summer 2012 SPARK AFRICA issue.

ROOTS IN RAP

Dialo Askia, TRIBES Contributing Writer

ROOTS IN RAP by Dialo Askia 

Hip Hop started out in the park but if you trace the roots of the Hip Hop tree further, you’ll find yourself traveling back through the Caribbean and across the Atlantic to the Motherland, with your ear to the ground, feeling the vibration of the African drum. The early years of Hip Hop held a strong connection to African roots and the music instilled pride in the community while educating listeners.

Greek, Italian, Polish …my senior year in high school, English class included monthly cultural lessons with visiting college professors that would lead us in study and discussion of various cultures. For the sake of authenticity, professors born of the given culture conducted the lessons and so, on the day of the African studies, I enthusiastically walked to the auditorium ready to be instructed by an academic with roots on African continent, a person of color, only to be greeted by a white professor.

Read the full article in TRIBES Summer 2012 SPARK AFRICA issue.