Category Archives: Event Listings

MR. Deba(Lex Records,Dailysession)

DJ Monchan(Dailysession,Nininja,Skyscraper)

17 cedar st, Brooklyn 11221

info: muzic@earthlink.net

The most influential and controversial rap group of the’80’s performs on the 20th anniversary of their seminal album Fear of a Black Planet, with two rising and equally political new comers.

Public Enemy rewrote the rules of hip-hop, becoming the most influential and controversial rap groups of all time. Public Enemy pioneered a variation of rap that was revolutionary. With his powerful, authoritative baritone, co-founder Chuck D rhymed about all kinds of social problems, particularly those plaguing the Black community, often condoning revolutionary tactics and social activism. In the process, he directed hip-hop toward an explicitly self-aware, Pro-Black consciousness. Musically, Public Enemy were just as revolutionary, creating dense soundscapes that relied on avant-garde cut-and-paste techniques, unrecognizable samples, piercing sirens, relentless beats, and deep funk. It was chaotic and invigorating music, made all the more intoxicating by Chuck D’s forceful vocals and the absurdist raps of his comic foil Flavor Flav. Today, PE celebrates the twentieth anniversary of their classic, influential album Fear of A Black Planet.

Ghanaian hip-hop artist Blitz the Ambassador uses rousing horns and clever beats that make him impossible to take lightly. Alongside his band, The Embassy Ensemble, Blitz tests the limits of hip-hop with live instruments and heavily complex, cross-cultural musical exploration.

In an age of disposable, cookie cutter acts, The 7th Octave offers up a different musical and lyrical perspective, combining metal riffs and blistering instrumentation with fiery, socially aware lyrics to provoke the minds of the new millennium generation.

orce M.D.’s versatile mix of credible urban savvy with smooth showbiz pleases both b-boys and traditional soul fans.

New York born and bred, The Force M.D.’s began their climb to fame by singing and dancing on Greenwich Village street corners and the Staten Island ferry. Among the first R&B vocal groups to intermix catchy doo wop-affected consonances with hip-hop beats, the Force M.D.’s versatile mix of credible urban savvy with smooth showbiz pleases both b-boys and traditional soul fans.

he king of Jamaican reggae plays alongside roots newcomers from South Carolina and Burkina Faso.

Dr. Jimmy Cliff is the world’s the best-known living Jamaican reggae musician and songwriter. He is generally credited for helping popularize the genre internationally with his soundtrack to the movie The Harder They Come, in which he also starred. His many hits include “Sitting In Limbo,” “You Can Get It If You Really Want” and “Many Rivers to Cross” and the now classic covers of “Wild World” and “I Can See Clearly Now.” He was recently inducted into The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and holds The Order of Merit, the highest honor granted by the Jamaican government for achievements in the arts.

Trevor Hall, a native of South Carolina, has been writing and performing since he was fourteen years old. His unconventional mix of acoustic rock and reggae serves as a vibrant backdrop for thought-provoking, inspiring lyrics, which he delivers in a uniquely soulful voice. Of his self-titled 2009 album, Rolling Stone says, “Trevor Hall fills his third album with spiritually inclined roots jams.”

For more than thirty years, Victor Démé has performed his soulful blend of rootsy African blues in bars and clubs of his home town of Ouagadougou, the capital of the landlocked West African nation of Burkina Faso. His heartful vocals evoke the struggle of a hard lived life, but also the confidence and wisdom of a man who comes from the griot tradition and spends his life honing his craft. Having already won acclaim throughout Europe, this is his US debut. But it wasn’t until the intervention of a French journalist and local hip-hop club promoter that he was able to record his first album of all original material. In 2009, his self-titled debut of rootsy blues gems was finally released internationally.

The godfather of hip-hop and neo soul performs classics and music from his first new album in over fifteen years.

Gil Scott-Heron’s poetry and music is widely acknowledged as the matrix from which hip-hop and neo-soul emerged. His transgressive, politicized, spoken-word-meets-jazz recordings, including, “The Revolution Will Not Be Televised,” “Whitey on the Moon,” “The Bottle” and “Small Talk at 125th and Lennox,” have been covered, sampled, referenced, deified and parodied by generations of artists. 2010 saw the release of I’m New Here, Scott-Heron’s first release in thirteen years. SPIN called the album, “not so much a comeback as a testament to spiritual resilience.”

This event is presented in association with Jill Newman productions and is part of the NYC Revolutions series.

Energizing rock rhythms and unexpected up-tempo dance beats from Africa and the Middle East will make you rethink party music.

Plagued by warfare and drought, the political and environmental plight of the Tuareg people of the Southern Sahara has been given voice by the electrifying music of Tinariwen. Formed in 1979, the band rose to prominence in the 1980s as the pied pipers of a new political and social conscience in the southern Sahara, becoming icons to a generation of young Tuareg living in exile in Algeria and Libya. In the early 2000s, Tinariwen attracted a following outside Africa, first in the world music community and then in the wider rock scene, thanks to frequent tours and appearances at festivals in Europe and the US. Tinariwen sing about the suffering and exile of their people, the semi-nomadic Kel Tamashek, and about the beauty of their desert home.

Since 1994, Omar Souleyman and his musicians have reigned supreme as a staple of Syria’s dance-folk-pop scene. To date, they have issued more than 500 studio and live recorded cassette albums, easily spotted in the shops of any Syrian city. A ground-breaking musician, Souleyman melds classical Arabic mawal-style vocalization with Syrian dabke (the regional folkloric dance and party music), Iraqi choubi, and contemporary Arabic, Kurdish and Turkish styles. The music often consists of phase-shifted Arabic keyboard solos and frantic rhythms. Oud, reeds, baglama saz, accompanying vocals and percussion fill out the sound from track to track. This performance offers a rare glimpse into Syrian street-level folk-pop phenomena seldom heard in the West.

Toubab Krewe has set a new standard for fusions of rock ’n’ roll and West African music. The North Carolina musicians developed their unique sound over the course of numerous extended trips to Mali, Guinea and the Ivory Coast, where they immersed themselves in the local culture and studied and performed with native musical luminaries. Their seminal new studio album, TK2, is a genre and mind-bending example of what the instrumental group’s “futuristic, psychedelic, neo-griot frenzy” (Village Voice) is all about. Featuring an uber-unique and seamless mix of ancient and modern instrumentation and sounds, TK2 defines Toubab Krewe as “one of the most innovative bands in music today” (Honest Tune)

Rich Medina & LPR present Jump ‘n Funk
Tony Allen’s Afrobeat Orchestra
w/ Janka Nabay and special guest Rich Medina
Thu., June 17, 2010 / 10:30 PM

SLF presents Afro-Dub Sessions
Saturday, May 29, 2010, 10 p.m.–4 a.m.
(and every last Saturday of the month)
Rose Live Music, 345 Grand St., Brooklyn, NY

Sound Liberation Front (SLF), an arts and music organization based in Brooklyn, presents Afro-Dub
Sessions: a monthly party at Rose Live Music in Williamsburg that combines live music and DJs to
celebrate the best in Dub and African-influenced sounds.

This month?s party will feature an Africa-inspired guest set by Amir from the world-renown record-
collecting duo Kon and Amir. Revered for his extensive knowledge of music, Amir has made a name for
himself compiling rare grooves for the duo?s legendary Kings of Diggin?, On Track and Off Track releases
on BBE Records. This includes the just-released Off Track III mix CD, which features eclectic African
disco and soul from the period following Fela Kuti?s mid-70s creative peak. Amir also heads the record
label arm of Wax Poetics magazine, and has been featured in XLR8R, Spine Magazine, The Source,
Scratch, and Urb.

As it does every month, Afro-Dub Sessions also features a pair of live performances by resident band
Super Hi-Fi, which combines Afrobeat, Dub, live remixing and special guest appearances to create their
signature Afro-Dub sound. The five-piece collective features members of Aphrodesia, Slavic Soul Party,
The Superpowers, and the Blue Man Group.

SLF?s resident DJs Linh, Q-Mastah and Lil Tiger will bring their diverse musical selections to the
turntables to round out the night.

Afro-Dub Sessions is dedicated to the idea that dub, born in Jamaica, and African musical styles like
Afrobeat, Afropop and Afrofunk are natural partners in the origins of global dance music. Each month
SLF explores these connections by hosting a different guest DJ specializing in Dub or African-influenced
styles. The June 26 party will feature New York reggae specialists Deadly Dragon Sound System.

SOUND LIBERATION FRONT is a Brooklyn-based non-profit organization devoted to the power of music
as a socially liberating and unifying cultural force. Last summer, the group organized the Sound
Liberation Festival in Brooklyn. The event featured hip-hop legends Brand Nubian; electro-Afrobeat
pioneers Chico Mann; Ticklah; DJs Kenny Parker, Cosmo Baker, and Ian Friday; and, workshops by
Afro Mosaic Soul and DubSpot. SLF also hosts SoundLib Wednesdays at Moe?s Bar in Fort Greene.

SCREENINGS OF AMI UNDERGROUND + BEAUTIFUL LOSERS
PRESENTED BY Kings County Cinema Society
INFO: Screening at 8pm
WEDNESDAY, MAY 26TH
Doors 6:00pm
SCREENING AT 8PM