Mixtape Friday: Dorm Room Griots' Flow From Above
By Canyon Cody
Published in The Heights

For my little brother's 10th birthday, I sent him The Giver by Lois Lowry. The story follows Jonas through his apprenticeship under the Giver, an old man who serves as his community's Receiver of Memories.

Like the Giver, West African griots have served for centuries as keepers of memories. Griots are oral storytellers who use poetry and music to teach their village about its history. In America, griots became rappers, but somewhere between Senegal and the South Bronx, these rappers forgot the history they were entrusted to protect.

Today, the village of hip-hop suffers from a serious ignorance of its own past, which extends past New York in the 1970s. Modern-day spoken word poets like Saul Williams are hip-hop's true storytellers, but griots are not supposed to be celebrities; they're supposed to be functioning members of every village.

A-Side

Myran Hunter "We Have Forgotten"

At Boston College, a group of poets called the Dorm Room Griots have recorded Flow From Above, an album of spoken word poetry. They will be performing with musicians and DJs at the record release party on Friday at 9 p.m. at The Perch in McElroy.

On "We Have Forgotten," Myran Hunter, BC '07, speaks about the African musical and social history that hip-hop has sold out. "You can purchase an alternate ego, a lavish lifestyle, worldwide recognition, or even a whole new identity. All of this can be yours for three easy payments of your past, your present, and your future," Hunter says.

Noah "The Conflict"

"We are the BC '06, on this track from his upcoming rap album. Noah brings variety to the poetry album, rapping about the inherent conflicts involved in struggling to succeed in a country that was built on slavery.

B-Side

Martine Russell "Moonbeams"
Griots are both men and women, but hip-hop refuses to pass the mic to females. On "Moonbeams," Martine Russell, BC '06, sings her ode to the urban village, the "birth-mother to b-boys and b-girls." Her poem celebrates the persistence of a battered, but not beaten, metropolis, "survivor of Nixon and drug wars / all the while she continues to smile."

Sean Dwyer "Woodrow Wilson"
Time for some American history. "It's no wonder to which demographic democracy reaches / it's been since Woodrow Wilson when a president wrote his own speeches," raps Sean Dwyer BC '04.

More than guns or drugs, hip-hop promotes consumerism. Rappers are like commercials, encouraging listeners to buy, buy, buy. On his track, Dwyer explores how blind consumerism leads to global injustice: "I need to purchase more dead weight, my clothes have more pockets / Am I purchasing death? Wait, how'd they pay for those rockets?"

Sly and Robbie lay down reggae riddim
By Canyon Cody
Published in The Heights

How cool are Sly and Robbie? Too cool for words.

During their three-hour performance at The Paradise on Tuesday, Sly and Robbie were so immersed in their funky reggae rhythm that they didn't say a single word. Instead, the live drum and bass duo laid down a danceable groove while an all-star lineup of guest appearances controlled the microphones.

Drummer Lowell "Sly" Dunbar and bassist Robbie Shakespeare have been pioneers in reggae music for decades. Robbie played the bass on Bob Marley's "Stir It Up" and worked with Sly alongside Mick Jagger and Pete Tosh. Tuesday's show was the last stop on the pair's 25th anniversary celebration tour.

Sly, who earned his nickname by listening to Sly & the Family Stone while growing up, revolutionized reggae music in the early '90s by embracing the electronically programmed beats that became ragamuffin, or ragga for short. The group's beats provide the background for plenty of modern reggae dancehall, including the hit "Murder She Wrote" by Chaka Demus and Pliers.

Back in the day, the duo literally lived off only bread and water while touring in order to save up enough money to start their label, Taxi Productions, which they launched featuring the breakthrough of Black Uhuru.

During the show, Sly picked his drumsticks back up and proved he's still an amazing drummer despite his new role as a beat producer. His fast-paced syncopated rhythms were so intricate and complicated that they sounded as if Sly had produced them on his drum machine.

Robbie roamed the stage plucking away at his bass, flirting with college girls in the front row, and clowning with his silent partner sitting at the drums.

While Sly and Robbie took care of the rhythm and beat, guest singers rotated onstage to accompany the reggae legends. Keyboards, saxophone, and trombone comprised the rest of the backing band for Tony Rebel, who has been touring for nearly as long as Sly and Robbie. Rebel brought his Rastafarian dancehall groove into the mix along with sultry singer Blue Fox. Half Pint was the final act, bringing a bit of youth into a show dominated by aging, but still rocking, old-school reggae stars.

At no point did Sly and Robbie drop the beat for even a moment's rest, leaving the dancing crowd satisfied but exhausted by the night's end. Robbie ended the show with a bass solo so impressively dirty that he stared at his own hands with a disgusted look on his face.

Ozomatli Explodes with Energy Onstage
By Canyon Cody
Published in The Heights

One could waste plenty of hyphens trying to describe Ozomatli's sound: Hispanic funk-rock-rap with salsa-merengue roots and punk-rock energy. Describing Ozomatli's live performance needs far fewer words: remarkable.

The Los Angeles-based 10-man collective brought a contagious energy to The Paradise Rock Club on Tuesday night and maintained complete control of the ecstatic crowd throughout the two-and-a-half hour show, which featured an uninterrupted flow of songs from the group's self-titled debut and its newest release, Street Signs.

The band's rowdy cacophony of horns and percussion inspired excited dancing from everyone in the crowd. The only people who seemed to be enjoying themselves more than the screaming crowd were the ebullient performers onstage who jumped and screamed with a seemingly ceaseless supply of energy.

With a dozen multi-ethnic musicians onstage, Ozomatli is truly an international orchestra in which timbales, turntables, and trumpets come together for a free-wheeling party of rhythm and horns. The performance featured solos from nearly every member, including the dirtiest clarinet solo Boston has heard since Benny Goodman.

Ozomatli also features two emcees, Justin Poree and Jabu Smith-Freeman, who throw poltically-conscious verses on top of the polyrhythmic percussion of drummers Jiro Yamaguchi and Mario Calire.

The rest of the band, when not performing, chips in with additional percussion by banging away at anything they can hit with a communal set of drum sticks circulating on stage.

In an interview following the concert, Yamaguchi told me, "Playing in Boston is fun because the crowd is full of college students who are trying to have a good time. As for us, we always have a good time."

The highlight of the evening came with a guest appearance from trumpet genius Tony Lujan, who dazzled the crowd as he was accompanied by mariachi guitar played by Raul Pachecho [ed. note: a fellow Thacher alum] and scratching from turntablist Rene "Spinobi" Dominguez.

Without any single leader, Ozomatli is truly an ensemble of superb musical talent who know how to rock a crowd. It would be nearly impossible to avoid catching the infectious energy that literally comes down from the stage as the members of Ozomatli descend into the crowd for a conga line that ends each of their shows.

After the band's conga line at the South by Southwest Music Festival last year ended with two members in jail for a noise ordinance violation, Ozomatli kept this rowdy party indoors.

The only thing better than Tuesday night's show would be seeing former members Chali 2na and DJ Cut Chemist (now of Jurassic 5) performing with their old crew. Nevertheless, any fan of live music should never miss an opportunity to see Ozomatli perform.

Mixtape Friday - International Hip-Hop
By Canyon Cody
Published in The Heights

Puff Daddy (I refuse to call him P. Diddy) once bragged, "I been around the world," but these emcees are from around the world. As technology increases the speed and ease with which music can traverse international borders, billions of ears around the world have fallen in love with hip-hop. By fusing regional style and international flavor, rappers from around the world have created some of the most innovate hip-hop in years. In the '80s, Slick Rick's British accent was a novelty; now KRS-One is rapping on a track with a teenage Japanese emcee, Lil Ai.

k-os "Call Me" Exit
Canadian rapper k-os (pronounced "chaos") raps in the tradition of fellow anti-Babylon revolutionaries Bob Marley and Lauryn Hill and combines large chunks of reggae, jazz, and funk. His debut album is quite simply one of the most impressive, beautiful pieces of music released in recent memory. Most notably, Exit is a complete album, with 11 diverse but thematically related tracks, with acoustic flamenco guitars, wailing vocals, and deep organic beats.

k-os explains the spiritual undertones of his tracks: "My parents are Jehovah's Witnesses so they go door-to-door with their messages. But for me, I've made a CD that has a chance to get into people's homes, and I don't have to knock on doors. People are taking me into their homes simply because they want to."


Lyrics Born "Callin' Out" Later That Day
When Rakim was rapping in New York in the '80s, he probably never imagined that people would be listening halfway around the world. Tokyo-born Tom Shimura moved to California and started making beats with friends at UC Davis. One of his friends, Josh Davis, is now better known as DJ Shadow, while another, Gift of Gab, later formed Blackalicious. On Later That Day, Shimura's debut under the moniker Lyrics Born, he proves UC Davis might be the next Berklee School of Music.

"Callin' Out," featuring pro-skateboarder Tommy Guerrero, offers a nasty beat for Lyrics Born to drop his breathless flow: "My life is the culmination of my past achievements/ with a lotta heavy liftin, a lotta deep breathin/ a lotta courage, a lotta doubt, a lotta mixed feelins/ a lotta love, a lotta luggage for a lotta reasons."

Orishas "537 CUBA" A Lo Cubano
"It's a goddamn hip-hop world, and now it has even invaded Cuba," complained Ry Cooder, producer of Cuba's most famous musical export, Buena Vista Social Club. For those excited by change and progress, rather then afraid of it, the Orishas are the future of hip-hop and world music in general. They rap in fluid Spanish over classic Cuban afro-jazz combined with contemporary hip-hop beats.

In their 2000 debut A Lo Cubano and follow-up Emigrante, the Orishas generally avoided sampling, but "537 CUBA" is a hip-hop remix of Compay Segundo's classic "Chan Chan." They also avoid the polemic issues of politics and communism in Cuba, preferring to focus on the personal experience of growing up on the island. Rapper Yotuel explains, "Adding a danceable rhythm to socially conscious lyrics is like the spoonful of sugar that helps the medicine go down."

The Streets "Weak Becomes Heroes" Original Pirate Material

Mike Skinner, aka The Streets, recorded his debut album in his basement, while his mum screamed at him to turn the music down. His lyrics are filled with local lingo: Girls are "birds," guys are "geezers," and weak rhymes are "rhubarb and custard verses."

He doesn't even actually rap, but just kind of talks in some sort of syncopated rhythm, often apathetic to the beat. He is definitely not rapping about life in "the streets," but mostly about PlayStation 2 and ordering Chinese food with some serious munchies.