It's time for a bit of radio silence as I head back to Oakland via NYC. I originally started this blog to keep you all updated while I wandered around in Dakar, studying Wolof and interviewing local rappers. All this has spiralled into a deeper engagement with the people I met here, and their music. Hopefully I'll be able to go back soon and see where this takes me.
In the meantime, I'll try to keep this sweaty space going, with a broader focus.
"When we have been home from abroad for a week or two, and time after time, in answer to our friends' polite inquiries, we have retold our experiences, letting phrase engender phrase, until we have made quite a good story of it all; when the unusual people we encountered have, in retrospect, become fabulous and fantastic, and all the checks and uncertainties of travel had become very serious dangers; when the minor annoyances assume heroic proportions and have become, at the luncheon-table, barely endurable privations; even before that, when in the later stages of our journey we reread in our diaries the somewhat bald chronicle of the preceding months — how very little attention do we pay, among all these false frights and bogies, to the stark horrors of boredom." [Evelyn Waugh (1931]
Gearing up to leave means frantic packing, and frantic packing means motivational playlists. At the moment, this consists of more dancehall from Dakar. Here's a choice track.
I'm haunted by this troubling and minimalist duet between Beirut blogger Mazen Kerbaj (on trumpet) and the Israeli air force (on bombs). (via dj/ rupture)
Check Mazen's blog for up-to-the-minute dispatches — in the forms of comics, thoughts, and occasional music — on the tragedy unfolding in Lebanon.
For a look at the extraordinary resilience and hope of the Lebanese when shit first started to go down last year, (re)read my brother's blog. He was in Beirut last spring when Hariri was killed. I visited a few months later, and it's been horrifying to see that so many of the cities we visited are being chewed up by bombs: Beirut, Tyre, Tripoli, Bint Jbeil, Baalbek. It fills me with the kind of dull sadness and impotent outrage that only television can produce: images of children's bodies being pulled out of rubble, repeated every 30 minutes on the French news.
If there weren't invaders to resist, there wouldn't be resistance movements. Hezbollah isn't the only Shiite party in the South. The mostly non-armed Amal might have more sway if the constant threat/promise of Israeli invasions didn't perpetually strengthen Hezbollah's position.
When I visited the border with my brother last year, the atmosphere and architecture was thick with the well-remembered scars of the Israeli occupation. Gaudily photoshopped posters of martyrs and portraits of Nasrallah rippled from lamposts, bearing witness to the fact that it was Hezbollah territory. Near the recent battle ground of Bint Jbail, we visited a crusader castle, whose commanding view of the Golan heights had made it an ideal site to repel invasions for roughly the last 1000 years. At the time, Hezbollah and Amal flags flew from the ramparts. Who knows what's left of it now, and what has become of the people of the nearby town.
The most painful remnant of the occupation that we saw there (and which also helps explain groups like Hezbollah) was a concetration camp that was used to intern and torture (occasionally to death) Lebanese prisonners during the occupation. The camp wasn't run by the IDF, but was conveniently out-sourced to one of the several militias Israel used to do its dirtiest work during the war.
The same militia that controlled the concentration camp I visisted was also infamous for "accidentally" targeting UN positions, a practice that Israel seems to have taken up again. Why would the Israeli armyy bother to intentionally bomb UN troops? To ensure that whatever multinational force will be from NATO not the UN, and therefore implicitly under American control.
This is what is terrifying about Israel's commitment to pushing its troops into Southern Lebanon: a renewal of this kind of occupation, with no accountability or force of law to protect the people whose lives it will administer.
After leaving Pikine and BMG 44 the other day, I headed to Guediawaye to see Fou Malade. Like many of the poor neighborhoods outside of Dakar, Guediawaye is prone to terrible flooding because it's built in a natural valley, on dunes of sand. Each year, the walls of poured concrete that compose these banlieu neighborhoods sink further into the earth as the rains arrive, while their rooftops reach skyward in an altogether more aspirational way. In Guediawaye or Thiaroye, a great many of the buildings sprout clusters of uncapped rebar. As Achille Mbembe observed of Cameroon, this is because the buildings are rarely finished. Their owners leave the rebar exposed, in the hopes that one day they will have the money to add another story. The forest of exposed iron thickets that stretches across the horizon of rooftops attests to these deferred dreams: people rarely have the money.
It is on such a rooftop that I finally meet up with Malal Talla, better known as Fou Malade. Malal is sated on a mat on the roof of the house he shares with family and his crew, the Bat'haillons Blin-d (Army of the Lower Classes). Fou Malade is an unlikely and slightly reluctant rising star here. The Bat'haillons have been building steam since their album 2 Gun Taan, but it's Malal's goofy, crotchety Fou Malade personality that has really been taking off. He's done several colloborations with the one and only Viviane Ndour (their best track together is "Taximan"), he's taken over Fatim's old rap TV show on RTS2, and he's recently dropped his solo album, Radio Kankan. Despite the success, he's fiercely loyal to his crew, his neighborhood.
Of all the artists and producers who've been understandably skeptical of me, Malal was the most wary. He wanted to know who I was, what I wanted, and where all this was going before he'd even make eye contact. In nervous Wolof, I tried to give an account of myself while he and Nkrumahh scrutinized me, as they blasted their latest from the speakers behind me. It's moments like these that make me to reflect on what I'm doing here. I try to be crystal clear about what I hope to do with these interviews, what they might get out of it, and also what I might get out of it. Pretending that everything is transparent from the outset is a naive luxury that only people in my position can afford. You can't pretend you're on the same playing field when the artist you're interviewing is explaining why dozens of his countrymen entrust themselves to motorboats to reach Europe each month, where you'll be flying in less than a week. I can fly into Senegal or Europe without even needing a visa, whereas Senegalese with hefty bank accounts, letters of invitation, and professional responsibilities are routinely turned away from the US.
None of this is lost on Malal. Behind the goofiness of his onstage personality, he's a smart young man with a university degree in English, who references colonial history and quotes Dead Prez in the same breath. After he's slightly reassured by me, we try and conduct the interview largely in Wolof, with him recounting the history of the Bat'haillons, his views on rap in Dakar, and his own peculiar style. Besides the collaborations, one of the reasons for Fou Malade's success is that he cloaks his sharp social critiques in devastatingly funny rhymes.
Malal wins over his listeners by acting the fool in his raps, dropping a kernel of hard truth when he knows he's got them reeled in. He explained this, his "smiling style," with some help from his buddy Niagass. Even in a country where rap is unapologetically political, it's already becoming too easy for people to tune out the harder, shriller groups in favor of blingy club tracks (though the difference is never all that clear). Unlike other rappers who share his rabble rousing stance, Malal and the Bat'haillons make their message go down easy — at least at first.
As the sun was setting over the sprawl of Guediawaye, played their unreleased latest track, "Faale Politique" (Politics Over There): it's sly indictment of politicians that preach social change but only eat money. The track is carried along by playful sing-song hook that ends with a reference to Lumumba, the first Congolese Prime Minister, assasinated by the Belgians in 1961. This kind of lyrical flourish is Malal's calling card: a song that's light and playful on the surface, but which changes your smile of amusement to one of rueful recognition. "In laughter there's truth," he says.
Here's a taste of his big summer hit with Pacotille: "Thioukhou Na Kaaye" literally means "it's delicious". In the song, Fou Malade and and Pacotille go through a laundry list of banal and not so banal activities (brushing your teeth, flossing in a Mercedes), declaring each to be delicious.
PBS were about as established as hip-hop gets in Senegal. Around since forever, the duo of Awadi and Duggy T coasted into respectability before parting ways. Awadi now seems to be comfortable as an elder statesman, releasing raps mostly in French for international ears. Several years ago, though, he reformed the group as a collective without Duggy — PBS Radikal.
"Xoyma" surges along with a beat courtesy of Trinidad's Shel Shok. The title "Show Me" is addressed to the young ladies, though what they're showing is left up to the imagination.
On a Saturday, I met up with Fatim to pay a visit to the rest of Wa BMG 44 in Pikine. Fatim is a firey young woman and a new addition to Wa BMG, which stands for Wa Bokk Menmen Gestu ("Join Forces for Better Thinking"). The 44 is for 1944, when the Senegalese tirailleurs who fought for the French were repatriated. Deciphering their name just confirms BMG's unapolegetically political stance. BMG 44 are known for abrasive raps that keep them from being heard much on the radio or the government-run entertainment channel RTS2. Despite this, they've been around for many years in various incarnations, and have a couple awards and several European tours under their belts.
We arrived by taxi in the banlieu neighborhood of Pikine, where Fatim's fellow BMG member Matador has recently been installed as the director of a hip-hop cultural center he's calling Africulturban. This is kind of an odd state of affairs for Matador the MC, but it's also a lucky break for the group and the hip-hop community at large.
The center is a huge, official building — which used to house the mayor's offices. It's now covered with tags that climb up the walls like vines. The office itself furnished with a few desks and chairs, as well as file cabinets with such labels as "graffiti", "hip hop crews," and "breakdancers." A group of young men and women sit around, looking far from busy. Matador introduces each one as a "secretary" of Africacultururban, prompting Fatim to mutter under her breath, "there sure are a lot secretaries here."
Matador is a short, wiry guy, full of energy and intensity, outfitted only in camo pants and a wife-beater on this sweltering afternoon. His new job seems to be a bit of a balancing act. He's determined to use this cultural center for the good of his community, organizing concerts, developing ties with other scenes worldwide, and drawing people together to reorganize the terminally inefficient production and distribution systems that are the bane of all Senegalese rappers. But he's clearly balancing these bureaucratic better intentions with the restless energy of a man more accustomed to ripping mics than shuffling papers.
Waa BMG 44 also appeared on the 2000 Politichiens compilation, which earned them harrasment and even death threats at the time. Matador is busy tempting fate again this election season. Though he's probably the first rapper to be given a quais-official post (this is not as strange as it sounds — Senegal still operates with a lot of remnants of the French model, where everyone with any power seems to work for the government in some way or another), he's intent on subverting the newfound legitimacy as quickly as possible. His current plan is to put on a massive, political-minded hip-hop festival — Electorap — with over 40 groups, and then put out another compilation like Politichiens before the election in February. He's trying to get the government to fund it without telling them exactly how rabble-rousing it will be.
We drank attaya outside while Fatim and Matador veered from heated argument to heated argument: on immigration, politics — everything except BMG 44. Matador kept turning to me and saying, "OK, now we can start the interview." "This is the interview," I almost told him. Later, we talked about the highs and lows of their time in the scene. Halfway through, Thiouf showed up with a backpack full of copies of his new album. Thiouf is the surprisingly humble MC who won last year's Hip Hop Feeling contest — it's a sort of rap version of American Idol. The prize was enough cash to make an album, and a year later it's finally coming out. You can see posters for it all over Dakar. After we rapped it up with Matador and Fatim, Thiouf and I tried to grab a cab over to Guediawaye, to see Fou Malade. Before we could find one, a bunch of kids in a passing car recognize him in the street and give us a ride.
Fatim, Thiouf, and the other performers I've met in the hip hop game are stars are in Senegal — appearing in magazines and on TV — yet they're usually as broke as everyone else. Fatim hadn't been to the group's Pikine studio for two weeks because she couldn't afford the trip.
Matador explained: you can make about $100 for a show. That's about as much as a monthly salary here for a father supporting a bunch of kids. But the catch is that — like all work here — it's sporadic. An MC would be lucky to get a gig once a month, and anything they make is likely to be eaten up by production costs. The other problem is cassettes. Clunky, hoopty tapes are still the main format on which music — from mbalax to rap — is sold here. A new CD costs an outrageous $10-15, and even a burned bootleg one from a shop is still $4. So the humble cassette, at a about $2 a pop, is still the medium of choice. Remember how they cooked when you left them on the dashboard? Try weeks on end of that kind of weather. Besides the preservation problems, the main difficulty with tapes is that nobody buys tape players any more. And yet all most people can afford to buy is a cassette, so they slap down their 1000CFA, and borrow their friend's brother's friend's tape deck.
Despite this handicap, here's some digital bits of BMG for yall interwebbers.
A freestyle with a couple other crews from a few years ago:
A controversial hit from the Dakar All Stars. The super group of Keyti, Gaston, Ass Malick, and Nix (see post below) released this as the single for their eponymous album. The bouncy, sai-sai beat belies the message of the hook: "mooma togne wala ma ko togne" questions who's at fault with a teenage pregnancy. It's a bit of Sorry Ms Jackson posturing and it definitely ruffled feathers when it came out a couple years back.
Get familiar and stream more of their tracks. "Miss Town" is equally deadly (tho listed as "Mass Town"...)
Working on a longer post about Fou Malade and BMG 44, but in the meantime here's "Rap Rek" (Just Rap), a track from Nix that's popping up on many comps this summer. Nix - Rap Rek
Not surprisingly, Akon gets mad love in Dakar. People love to see a local boy succeed, even though there were some rumblings of resentment about dude charging over 50 dollars a ticket for his concert here last summer.
Here's the Dakarois remix of his best single, featuring the ubiquitous Viviane Ndour. Viviane is Youssou's sister-in-law, and has leveraged her superstar career mbalax soul into a series of syrupy guest spots on hip-hop tracks. And while her warblings are usually a little too sugary for my tastes, this remix is an exception. "Leppu benn la" (everywhere it's the same) she croons, turning Akon's hustler's lament into a lesson on the difficulties of immigration.
There is a new dance craze ruling Dakar. Its origins are obscure, and it is known only as the Feccu Toby (Toby Dance). It is not to be confused with the Danca Do Gringo.
To Feccu Toby, place your right hand on your left elbow. Sway. Step. Brush the dirt off your shoulders. Repeat.
Finishing classes. Searching out Waa BMG 44 and Fou Malade. Swimming to nearby islands. Showing visitors around. Eating sea snails. Arriving late to my good bye party.
There will be some dead air here for a few days, but stay tuned for more music and musings.
"Dearest Mucklebugletski; Today I got four letters from you so it is a national holiday...I'd like to explain to you about journalism but I don't know whether I can and am maybe too sleepy. I see perfectly well that it is bad for you; as it is not really a good enough trade for you and it has also a faintly or permanently non-grown-up thing about it. But it is good for me. It gives me many things for my eyes and mind to feed on, and they need to feed on actual sights rather than reading, simply because they are not first-rate; but that is their best food. It gives me a chance to meet people I would never otherwise meet, and I want to know them. [...] I know it does not harm me to do this work. On the contrary. It tires me physically but as I do not take myself solemnly I have no chance of believing myself to be a prophet or a power. I feel and act like a hardworking stenographer and I feel kind of happy about it in a grubby hardworking way. I do not think you need ever worry about me turning into a walking dead: on occasion, when with shits, I try very hard to throw weight around since that is all they are impressed by, but am never very succesful at it. And I'm not a walking dead because it is a great big world and I love to walk about it and look at it. [...] I not suggest this is either good or necessary or desirable for you. But I do think you would wish very much to have seen, the other afternoon, the tiny little silver balloons like elephants floating against a pink-red sky, over a city that is now so shabby and still quite lovely. I think you would have liked the black Lancs going off into the black night. I think you would like the cold long train rids, listening to the people talk. I think it is not disgusting to look at the world and at the war; because someone must see, and after all we have trained ourselves to see. It is an honorable profession. You are a very great writer and what you see gets pressed down and compact and one day it becomes a book. I am not a great writer and function more like colonic irrigation, with things coming in and out at top speed. But I am on occasion very mildly pleased with my articles and even when not pleased with what I write, I am immensely pleased with what I have understood. My mind feels good now, lively and digesting with ease."
[Martha Gellhorn to Ernest Hemingway, December 13, 1943]
More dancehall bounce from Sister Fa, about whom I haven't been able to find much. Girl's got a sassy, MIA-ish lean to her vox. Ideal soundtrack for a day like today, when the sun is hot enough to peel paint.
Two versions of "Yaye Boye". Both are taken from the essential (and expensive but entirely worth it) Golden Afrique series, which is a compilation of West African music from the late 70s - early 80s, collected and remastered by earnest and thorough Germans.
One football player says something so hateful that another player — renowned for his composure — tries to drive his shaved temple right through the other's belly. The second player is sent off, demoralizing his team, who eventually lose the match. The whole world is watching, but one comment muttered under someone's breath is not audible in the competing cacophonies of patriots and fans screaming themselves hoarse.
The second player does not regret what he did, but is sorry that children had to see it. He also refuses to repeat the words. Some words are harder to hear than actions, he says. A team of international lip-readers is called in. They pour over the tapes from every angle, attempting to establish the Truth. These partisans of the "is it still racist if nobody overhears it" school speculate that the one player called the other player's mother or sister prostitutes, terrorists, or worse.
As the ceremonies close and confetti rains onto the Italians in Berlin, the TVs here in Senegal cut to a claymation ad for Coca Cola that has been ubiquitous this past month. In the spot, entitled "Nous Parlons Tous Football" (We All Speak Football), a goal is scored and pairs of unlikely fans come together to celebrate: a lumberjack hugs a tree, a cactus hugs a balloon, a cuckold hugs his wife's lover, a scientist hugs his lab rat, and a line cook hugs his plucked chicken. The spectacle of sport will erase your differences, Coke assures us; but these are cartoon antagonisms, not the more familiar and fundamental fault lines. We may all speak football, but what happens when football talks back? What is saying to us? To speak football, should we try to decipher the nasty and inaudible words uttered in front all of us? Or can we read something more important in the lowered head and ashen eyes one man pushed over the edge?
Here in Dakar, groups of kids run cheering through the streets celebrating the Italian team's victory over the former colonizer, France, whose team is itself largely composed of French players of African, North African, and Antillean descent. Somewhere in France, a Le Pen voter cries into his beer over the defeat of les Blues. When we all speak football, what are we hearing?
