I’m sad to say I speak no German, so the only words I can pick out from this radio broadcast are “reggae” “new jersey” and “italian dub community,” but that’s good enough. All I know is they’re playing Raw Music’s Kisumu jams on the badass German radio show Breitband: Listen Here
It’s wonderful and somewhat surreal to hear The Anchoras’ perma-high anthems, recorded live under a tree in Kisumu, broadcast live over the air in Berlin. The show playing the songs, Breitband (“Broadband”), is all about these intersections of culture space and time that are made possible by the Internet and digital recording, and it’s definitely worth checking out. You can hear more of their show at http://breitband.dradio.de/ or check out their page of free downloads at the excellent Free Music Archive. Thanks to Martin and our brothers & sisters in strange sound over in Berlin!
I’ve started a blog on the Huffington Post with the aim of spreading music, raw and otherwise, from around the world. I wrote up the first piece about our man LaFam and our strange journey into the Kenyan countryside. You can check it out here: RMI on HuffPost
The article was also meant to serve as background and an introduction to LaFam’s newest track, a beast of a song called “Aduwa” (top of post).
More on Aduwa and the creative process behind this song over at HuffPost. Enjoy the jam, and be sure to check out DKultur radio (Germany’s NPR?), where a DJ will be taking LaFam’s German radio virginity this Saturday, April 21 at 2 pm (Berlin time). Click Here for DKultur Radio Live Stream
So they (a British firm) found oil in Kenya. And not just any part of Kenya–in one of the country’s most desolate, dry and war-torn regions.
Turkana is where Peter Logono, one of the most popular artists from the Raw Music International compilation, comes from. He left for the relative calm of the Nyanza area of Kenya, and (barely) earned a living playing his homemade Adungu in a homebrew club along the main highway to Uganda. For those who haven’t, check Peter’s story here:
I have no idea what this oil find will do for people like Peter and his family, but the general sense of pessimism from my friends in Kenya and you know, the entire course of modern history, doesn’t leave much room for high hopes.
And that is my “curmudgeonly and half-baked blog post on global affairs far more complex than the scope of my limited understanding” for the week. Thank the Internet.
Raw Music International highlights underground music and good people regardless of where they reside. So far I’ve been sharing tracks and stories from our pilot episode in Kisumu, Kenya, but my recent travels took me to a far more aggressive scene far closer to home–Brooklyn, New York.
Three years ago, a few of my closest friends from Iowa started a very heavy and technically adept punk band called Former Thieves. I had the dubious honor to perform as their opening act on their first tour, and in the summer of 2009 we traveled the sullen pudenda of this country playing empty clubs, garages, basements and once, in the hills of North Carolina, a garage that claimed it was a basement (it too was empty).
Your host in the dirty old days
While my personal music career died after that hard run, the Thieves continued on. Last week, they opened for some of their highschool heroes, Every Time I Die and Terror, at a sold out show at Brooklyn’s Knitting Factory. As usual, I used my personal connections to show up in a place I wasn’t wanted with a camera, and got some backstage shots of Every Time I Die turning a crowd of seemingly sane individuals into snarling beasts (see the vid at the top of the post).
I also filmed Former Thieves at the secret after-party at Acheron:
You may be surprised, but the roots of Raw Music International lay firmly in punk shows of this very sort. Growing up in Iowa, there wasn’t much to do besides punching strangers in the face while listening to very loud music. This we did often, thanks to a beautiful spot called the FSU Garage (immortalized in the classic punk song “First and Ellen” by Modern Life is War). Run by a group of disgruntled kids from Marshalltown, Iowa, the FSU Garage managed to book bands from around the world. The shows were packed, the crowds insane, and the people who ran the house were always generous with food and gas money. As a result, bands far too big to play a sweat-stained, mattress-lined garage (impromptu soundproofing) with a capacity of 50-100 (who knows) would happily make the pit stop between more legitimate shows in Chicago or Minneapolis.
Your host, and Former Thieves' vocalist Matt, learning about music the hard way during a Modern Life is War show at the FSU Garage
It was at FSU that I learned about pure music first-hand–no egos, no financial incentives, just glorious sound made with purpose and conviction. It’s also where I learned that the most amazing music can come from the most humble places.
That’s what the musicians we met in Kenya share with the musicians I grew up listening to in Iowa, and that’s exactly what drives Raw Music International.
Josh the drummer, nice guy, stank eye
Former Thieves' spiritual guru/tour manager Sean, imparting wisdom backstage
Quick update, just gotta share this grievously dope track by our boy Eli Sketch. It’s been on repeat the last few weeks and he just sent me an English trans of the lyrics. He’s been winning rap battles around Kenya for a few years with his complex flow and over the top lyrics, and performs with Ojiji as UFO (hear their massive political slow jam “Mama Africa” here).
Hear K.O., watch a vid of the man performing, and check the lyrics after the jump…
For more Eli Sketch check out his ReverbNation page
Check Sketch performing at the Raw Music Block Party:
Kenny Rogers's 1979 Kenyan release of The Gambler (seriously)
In an earlier post I mentioned the strange love for Kenny Rogers in Kenya. “Our parents used to listen to him” one of my friends told me as we sat around bleary eyed and stoned at a party in Nyalenda, Kenny blaring in the background.
It was a somewhat disconcerting realization. What could Kenny’s slick lamentations mean to an older generation of Kenyans? Was it the lyrics? The voice? That silvery patch of fur living on his face?
It wasn’t just the middle aged. Even Ranking T, the Rasta/DJ/herbal entrepreneur, a man with otherwise impeccable taste in music, had a soft spot for Kenny.
Nobody could really explain it, but American country seems to translate well around the world. I’ve heard it in Iran, and friends who have traveled to South America tell me it has made its way down there. A veritable cockroach of world music. The only more resilient cultural artifacts I’ve come across are Mexican soap operas (which have taken TV sets in Kenya and Iran by storm).
En Nombre Del Amore- The Mexican soap-opera of choice in Kenya
Perhaps this isn’t a coincidence. Mexican soap operas and American country have a lot in common–strong and simple stories, flailing emotion, sex, love, betrayal, high melodrama, and a feel for the melancholy. People all over the world seem to know and love these feelings and, for reasons unknown, Botoxed Mexican actors and that wily silver fox of the American South seem uniquely gifted at conveying them. The photo of the record at the top of this post is of a Kenny Rogers joint pressed in Kenya in 1979, sold by a Croatian record dealer with excellent feedback on eBay–physical proof that Kenny Rogers lives on in the world at large.
OK, I’ll stop pulling this Tom Friedman-ery long enough to post some music. I’ve always heard a relation between American country and early Kenyan guitar music. This is a sweet song by Fundi Konde, one of the first and greatest of Kenyan guitarists, and it has that lilting country vibe… Daniel Katuga & Fundi Kondi – Ewe Nyota Zuhura.mp3
On New Year’s Eve 2010, Ozzy, Vic and I recorded the great guitar legend Olima Anditi at his home in the Manyatta slum, Kisumu, Kenya (video from session above). Exactly one year later, Ozzy found him and delivered the first (and only) $100 we’ve made from sales of the Raw Music International Mixtape (available here). A big thank you to all who bought the mixtape. $100 is a massive sum for a guy making around $2 a day, and getting him that dough, contributed by dozens of fans throughout the world, is a highlight of the project so far.
Olima, in his ancient turtle way, seemed in fine form, although his guitar had several new holes in it. Ozzy interviewed him again and cleared up some lingering questions. We were able to confirm that the Dickson Olima credited on this old record (image courtesy of KenTanzaVinyl) is indeed our man Olima Anditi (Dickson is his Christian name). Olima hasn’t held a physical record he cut in decades, so I’m looking for one.
Upendo vinyl single credited to Dickson Olima and Ogaja Jazz
Ozzy recorded their encounter on video and I’ll have some tasty clips of first-person Kenyan music history as soon as that lazy fuck sends me the translation. (Ozzwaldo! The world is waiting!) When I post the video I’ll also tell you about a controversy that arose surrounding the real identity of Olima Anditi after an astute reader wrote in with some questions. We call it OlimaGate, and it has involved a journalist in Washington DC, record diggers in London, musicologists in Nairobi, and occupied my (admittedly pretty lackluster) being for the past month.
Also, some great coverage from the Free Music Archive, a website dedicated to free and Creative Commons licensed music of quality. Great to be involved with such a forward thinking crew. Check their site for jams of all genres and see their story on Raw Music here: Free Music Archive.
Raw Music tracks have also been featured on WFMU radio and, as I posted earlier, there was this interview at the Onion’s A.V. Club.
Finally, big up to our sister and videographer Angela Shoemaker. Her photo documentary on a nursing home for heroin addicts in Amsterdam (where we met–in the city, not the nursing home) were featured in the LA Times (check them here).
It has all the elements–great (or at least really interesting) music, religious extremism, changing cultural norms, clueless authority figures and young people doing weird shit. Anyone know any Indonesian punk music to check out? I found this Indonesian Oi-singalong after a really half-ass youtube search…
These kids must be rehabilitated!
Also, Raw Music was recently featured in the Onion’s A.V. club. Check that here
It is with great pain (carpal tunnel and otherwise) that I report that Raw Music International has joined yet another social media networking site (why?? who comes up with this shit!? how many passwords can a person have?). On the upside, this means the entire “Raw Music International: Kisumu” mixtape (17 exclusive tracks plus PDF liner notes) is now available for download here:
As a special offer to the loyal readers of this blog, the album is available for free (or whatever you’d like to pay) for the first week of its online existence. After this period, it will cost $3, so get it now and invest those savings in a 40 (the gift that keeps giving).
The 17 tracks span three generations of underground music in and around Kisumu–from a recording session at the guitar legend Olima Anditi’s home to blunted tracks of the reggae set to certified bangers from LaFam, Nebulazz, Eli Sketch and more of Kisumu’s young and promising rappers. These tracks offer a unique glimpse into one of East Africa’s most musical cities, and many of them can only be heard here. All artists on the album appear on the pilot episode of Raw Music International, and you can learn more about each one/watch video clips over at the download page (link above). Track listing after the jump…
Cy and DJ Ranking T discuss the art of a good mixtape
The New York Times ran an article on a huge American producer who uses Fruity Loops to make his rap beats. It’s the same software the guys in Kisumu use, so I put together this little video. Read below for the full story.
Yesterday’s New York Times magazine had an article about 20-year-old rap producer Lex Luger. Written in the bemused tone of a high school guidance counselor describing the work of a talented but troubled student, the article focuses on Luger’s production technique. The drums boom like a drunk marching band and the synths are thick and loud enough to make the most reserved ’70s German electro artist well up with pride. Every sound is loud, every pause pregnant, and the whole thing is mastered in a way that makes professional recording engineers cringe (and irrelevant). Hard raps about corner drug deals fine-tuned for playback through tiny speakers on thousand-dollar Macs, each songhasmillionsofhits and makes me want to bang my head and drink grain alcohols til socio-economic cognitive dissonance is the least of my concerns.
The important thing is that the kid made all of these beats using a shitty laptop and a pirated copy of Fruity Loops recording software–EXACTLY the same setup every rapper and producer we met in Kisumu used. Moreover, they use this setup for the exact same reasons. Fruity Loops takes about 20 minutes to learn, runs on computers with very low memory, and comes in a file size small enough to download with the slowest internet connections. It comes equipped with hundreds of sounds pre-loaded and a simple interface even wide-eyed New York Times rap writers could figure out. From Iowa to Angola to India to China kids are using this software (without paying the company a dime…oops). So what’s keeping the next Lex Luger from being from one of these places? Not much, I imagine–the equipments the same, the skills are the same, the drugs are the same, the incentive is the same. I just hope Raw Music can be there to see it happen.
While we wait for the next breakout star, here are a couple dope tracks by our boys Eli Sketch and LaFam in Kisumu, made using Fruity Loops of course…
While on the topic of The Conscious Youths (see post below), I thought I’d post this short clip of outtakes from the pilot. Here, Roy Captain of Conscious Youths debuts a new Luo rap song–first for us on the street, and then at the infamous Sunspot, a club in the Kondele slum, Kisumu, Kenya.
The great Kenyan environmentalist/women’s rights advocate Wangari Maathai has died at age 71. She was beloved throughout Africa for her Green Belt movement, which pays women small amounts of money to plant trees. In 2004, she became the first African woman to win the Nobel Prize.
She suffered jail-time, beatings and gender discrimination, but she helped thousands and is responsible for millions of trees throughout the continent. The New York Times quotes her saying: “In the course of history, there comes a time when humanity is called to shift to a new level of consciousness, to reach a higher moral ground.”
I don’t know if the Conscious Youths were familiar with this quote when they named their band. They’re definitely more into smoking trees than planting them, but its a testament to her legacy that these toughened rastas from Kisumu’s slums wrote one of their best songs about her. Here’s “Conserve de Trees” by Kisumu’s Conscious Youths, in honor of Mama Maathai.
Finally, a full video of Olima Anditi playing the beautiful “Apoli” from the session we recorded at his home December 31, 2010. “Apoli”, the subject of the song, is the sister of Kevo, the young guy who helps Olima get around and who appears in the video. Enjoy, and download the song here:
Lyn Jay, one of the hardest rappers we met in Kisumu regardless of gender, tells a bit about life as a female rapper in this short clip from the Raw Music pilot episode. As Lyn Jay told me, there are a lot of girls who sing on tracks, but very few of them actually write and record rhymed verses, especially solo. Click below to hear her stark H.I.V. warning song, “Ni Kubaya” (It’s Dangerous), produced by our man LaFam. It’s one of my favorite songs from Kisumu all around. English translation (by Ozzy) after the jump…
One perk of this RMI deal is getting to correspond with other (even more obsessive) fans of music around the world. Over the past few days I’ve been emailing with people running some amazing projects…
KenTanza is an archive of 45rpm recordings released in Kenya and Tanzania from independence until vinyl was phased out by cassettes in the mid 70s. At this point the archive lists almost 5,000 different releases, and while you can’t listen to the music, you can track the incredibly convoluted recording histories of some of the region’s great artists.
One interesting thread that runs through the archive is the work of A.P. Chandarana, a producer based in Kericho, the center of Kenya’s Rift Valley tea growing operation. The guy started recording in 1958 and put out literally thousands of records on different subsidiary labels. Apparently his family owned a shop in Kericho which recently closed. If I knew about the Chandarana empire before I left I definitely would have stopped by and tried to learn more about the life of Kenya’s major music mogul/shop owner.
