“The Messengers Episode 1 (Fela Kuti)” is the second in a series of FREE mixtapes by K’naan and J. Period that pay tribute to musical “Messengers” Fela Kuti, Bob Marley and Bob Dylan. This mixtape is based on the works of Fela Kuti, and is basically a bunch of remixes of his music. If you like this, check out “The Messengers EP,” which served as kind of an introduction to this series. Click below to download “The Messengers Episode 1 (Fela Kuti)” for FREE:

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New FREE mixtape by K’naan with beats by J. Period. Apparently, this is the first in a series of mixtapes by the duo with the intention of paying tribute to some musical “Messengers” – which include Fela Kuti, Bob Marley and Bob Dylan. This EP features one Kuti, one Marley, and one Dylan remix, and will be followed by additional remixes in the future. Click below to download K’naan & J. Period’s “The Messengers” EP for FREE:

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This is a artist feature for the 2009 Rock The Bells tour. This feature is on K’naan, who’s “Troubadour” remains one of the top albums of the year.

Brand new video for T.I.A. from K’naan’s spectacular album “Troubadour.”

Live performance of People Like Me, one of many great lyrical tracks from K’naan’s spectacular album “Troubadour.”

K’naan “Troubadour” Album Review
I only paid $2 for this album. I guess there was some kind of fuck up over at Amazon.com, because when I went there to preview the tracks, the sale price was listed as $1.99. Realizing this couldn’t be correct, I quickly jumped on that shit and, immediately after purchasing, checked the page again to see the price listed at $7.99. Nice, huh? Especially since K’naan’s “Troubadour” has become probably my favorite album of 2009 thus far.

Why I Like This Album?

1. Because I was hating on it at first, then realized it was tight – Even though K’naan’s last album, “The Dusty Foot Philosopher,” is possibly a classic to me, I was hating on this new release at first. What can I say? I’m a hater like that. Dude got all popular and most underground hip-hop fans hate on dudes who get popular. But the good part about this is that there’s nothing like having a hip-hop album surpass your expectations. I was expecting a corporate-controlled, watered-down pop album, but I got a lyrical, musical, groundbreaking symphony combining hip-hop, rock, folk and pop music styles. K’naan definitely displays a wide range of musical abilities in “Troubadour.”

2. K’naan tells his story – I’ve heard people hate on K’naan before, saying that since he spent more than half of his life in Canada, it is unfair to capitalize on his Somali upbringing in order to enhance his rap career. But the lyrics on “Troubadour” spend a lot of time reminiscing on K’naan’s childhood, and I never got the impression that he was trying to capitalize on his Somalia experiences – just simply trying to tell his story. And K’naan’s story just seems real to me. This can be seen in tracks like Dreamer, Somalia, Fatima and People Like Me.

One of my favorite lyrical tracks on this album is People Like Me, a slow introspective track in which K’naan drops three great verses about down-and-out individuals. The third verse is a story about his favorite cousin who didn’t make it out of Somalia like K’naan did:

I guess I told you about myself to a degree/
Just by telling you about people like me/
But people like me, they speak politely/
They don’t start no beef or piece of white meat/
Everybody gotta eat, but everybody doesn’t/
Which is why I wanna tell you about my favorite cousin/
He and I grew up where the sun shines/
And we both partook in the gun crimes/
And we both liked American rap rhymes/
Even though we didn’t understand one line/
If you remember my liner notes in my last album/
I talked about a close call with a grenade/
I think we both must’ve been about seventh grade/
But don’t panic, we both survived without damage/
But we developed a bond like we survived the Titanic/
So when the country became frantic/
My mother tried to get us out – planned it/
To the last detail/
Except the plan got derailed/
‘Cause there wasn’t enough money for the plane tickets/
How bitter when my mother had to chose who to take with her/
So my cousin got left in the war/
And that’s just hard to record/
But now I take refuge and prayer/
Kinda like finding God in the phone book/
It came to me sounding something like a song hook/

3. Although it’s poppy, it’s still dope – A lot of underground heads are going to hate on this album, simply because of its sound. Several tracks are poppy as a motherfucker, and upon first listen songs like T.I.A., Bang Bang, 15 Minutes Away and Biscuit may come across as overly-mainstream and pop. However, as I’ve listened to this album more and more, the poppy tracks have slowly become my favorites. “Troubadour” is an album that is very well done, and manages to mix popular sounds, infectious choruses and catchy songs with intelligent lyricism and skilled wordplay.

One good example is the track Somalia, in which K’naan drops one of the album’s standout verses – touching upon his struggle, his purpose, and his status as beyond the normal “underground verses mainstream” classifications of hip-hop:

We used to take barbed wire/
Mould it around discarded bike tires/
Roll ‘em down the hill on foot blazing/
Now that was our version of mountain bike racing/
Daaaamn! Do you see why it’s amazing?/
When someone comes outta such a dire situation/
And learns the English language just to share his observation/
Probably get a grammy without a gram of education/
So fuck you school and fuck you immigration/
And all of you thought I wouldn’t amount to constipation/
And now I’m here without the slightest fear or reservation/
They love me in the slums in their native reservations/
The world is a ghetto with ministrant deprivation/
But mommy didn’t raise no fool, did she Hoyle?/
I promise that I’ll get it and remain strictly loyal/
‘Cause when they get it, they let it all switch and spoil/
But I just illuminated it like kitchen foil/
A lot of mainstream niggas is yapping about yapping/
A lot of underground niggas is rapping about rapping/
I just want to tell you what’s really crackalacking/
Before the tears came down, this is what happened/

4. This shit makes me happy yo – The first nine tracks of this album are just nonstop cranks. After that, it takes more of a folkish R&B twist. But from start to finish, even with often emotional content, “Troubadour” is an album with a happy vibe and a positive outlook. The music is head-nodding, the lyrics are motivational and K’naan’s flow is mostly upbeat and fun. Tracks like Dreamer, I Come Prepared, Bang Bang and T.I.A. had me dancing around on the subway looking like Carlton Banks.

In the track Dreamer, K’naan imagines a life without the hardships he’s faced:

Back on the verse/
Imagine crack wasn’t birthed/
Imagine the Earth wasn’t hurt/
Imagine the homeland alerts/
Imagine no record locator/
So I wouldn’t have to get a criminal waiver/
Imagine the piece wasn’t in my briefs/
Instead peace could stretch across the seas/
So finally we could just rest in the East/
No refugees/

Overall: This album got mixed reviews – and nobody seems to think it is as tight as I do. But I like every single song on this album, and have been bumping it nonstop for like two weeks now. Whether you’re a fan of the underground or the mainstream, you will probably appreciate K’naan’s “Troubadour” as one of those albums that is bigger than both. Musical, lyrical, conscious, unique, innovative: “Troubadour” is all of these. My first five-star album of the year thus far, so I highly recommend giving it a try. Peace.

Album Track Listing:

1. T.I.A.
2. ABC’s (featuring Chubb Rock)
3. Dreamer
4. I Come Prepared (featuring Damian Marley)
5. Bang Bang (featuring Adam Levine)
6. If Rap Gets Jealous (featuring Kirk Hammett of Metallica)
7. Wavin’ Flag
8. Somalia
9. America (featuring Mos Def and Chali 2na)
10. Fatima
11. Fire in Freetown
12. Take a Minute
13. 15 Minutes Away
14. People Like Me

This week’s track of the week is K’naan’s America, the first track to really jump out at me from his new album “Troubadour,” which I only paid $1.99 for yesterday because of an Amazon fuck up! America is just one of a handful of tracks that have already jumped out at me from the album, and features guest verses by Mos Def and Chali 2na. Click below to listen:

[See post to listen to audio]

From K’naan’s “Troubadour” – the upcoming follow up to his highly successful “The Dusty Foot Philosopher.”

Amid all the ruckus, it is easy to overlook the quieter voices in rap music; not every artist rhymes about guns and drugs. Having spent his early years in war-torn Somalia before seeking refuge in Canada, poet and hip-hop artist K’naan could easily take his place among today’s most favored gangster rappers–and probably with more credibility. However, that’s not his style.

Instead K’naan chooses to affiliate with more peaceful and intellectual-minded musicians, such as Mos Def and Bob Marley’s sons Damian and Stephen. And he refuses to draw lines in the sand by labeling his music.

“I think it’s nice that people think my music is [socially] conscious, but it is not commentary I would make,” K’naan said in a recent phone interview.

“If my music has a message, then it’s just that of justice and beauty and putting some attention on some difficult scenarios in some different parts of the world. But the real message is that music has to be good,” he added.

K’naan doesn’t focus on the violence in his past, only pausing to summarize his experiences in Mogadishu, Somalia, as “as horrible as you would imagine.” Still, he doesn’t deny the relevance of his youth spent in an area of political unrest.

“Those experiences did construct me and shape me–and it has a real impact on my sound,” he said in a moment of self-reflection. And what exactly is that sound? Jim Welte of MP3.com best described it as fusion of “Bob Marley, conscious American hip-hop, and brilliant protest poetry.”

One song that most exemplifies such praise is “In the Beginning” from K’naan’s debut album, “The Dusty Foot Philosopher.” Melodic guitar-strumming, teamed with African drums and a chorus of chirpy la-la-la-las, seamlessly weave between verses that call for enlightenment and demand freedom. One listen and it isn’t hard to imagine how “The Dusty Foot Philosopher” won “Best Rap Recording” at the 2006 Juno Awards (the Grammys for Canadians), and that K’naan was recently bestowed “Newcomer of the Year” by BBC’s Radio 3 Awards.

What is hard to imagine is that, despite his peaceful words and global success, K’naan still has to deal with the same social injustices and ignorance that he often raps about. Last year, after finishing an onstage performance with the Marley brothers in Gothenburg, Sweden, K’naan alleges that he and his manager where physically assaulted by two bouncers he described as “skinheads.” According to the artist, the bouncers had just watched him perform, yet refused to let him backstage even though he had the correct pass. The incident escalated, and the police were called–but it was K’naan and his friends who were arrested.

“When the police came, they spoke Swedish to the bouncers and didn’t talk to us. It was a very trying experience,” he recalled. “With things like that, you can see you’re clearly in the process of being disempowered. You feel kind of helpless.”

According to K’naan, the concert promoters and Marley family were willing to seek legal action. But he chose a subtle–yet more powerful–approach. Using instrumentals from Lupe Fiasco’s “Kick Push,” K’naan responded with a song called “Kicked Pushed.” The video, which uses actual footage from the incident and can be found on his MySpace page, is now being used to teach tolerance in schools throughout Sweden.

At present, K’naan is concentrating on his fall solo tour with select dates featuring Matisyahu. The tour will preview songs from K’naan’s upcoming album, “Troubadour,” set to release in January 2009.

K’naan described the new album as “the realization of the theories I’ve done in ‘The Dusty Foot Philosopher.’ I feel more accomplished,” he added.

Tomorrow, K’naan will play a free concert at National Geographic headquarters in Washington. It will be a can’t-miss show for the informed and enlightened.

Source:
The Free Lance Star

K’naan “The Dusty Foot Philosopher Deluxe Edition” Album Review
It’s been more than two years since I was first introduced to the music of K’naan. It was early 2006, and I saw him open up a show for Jean Grae, Mos Def and Talib Kweli. Now I’ve always said that Kweli and Mos are among the best live performers in hip-hop – yet K’naan somehow managed to give the most memorable performance of that evening.

Following the concert, I ran around to some local record stores only to find out that none were carrying K’naan’s “The Dusty Foot Philosopher” which had dropped sometime in 2005. When I tried the Internet, I learned that the album was actually an import – one that would cost $30 to purchase and take up to one month to receive. I decided to wait until it hit the local stores, but it never did, and I sadly missed out on the album.

So you can probably imagine how amped I was a month ago to receive a promo copy of “The Dusty Foot Philosopher Deluxe Edition” in the mail. The new album is a rerelease of the original with the addition of two new tracks and a DVD containing videos, live footage and other bonus materials. If you’re one of the people who – like me – missed out on this album the first time around, do yourself a favor and pick up the deluxe edition immediately. Although it is almost three years old, “The Dusty Foot Philosopher” is a brilliant album that remains relevant and groundbreaking in 2008.

K’naan’s style is reminiscent of fellow-Canadian K-Os’ in that he utilizes myriad styles and genres in the creation of his music, while his flow is at times reminiscent of a young Eminem. But lyrically, K’naan is about as unique as they come, basing the majority of “The Dusty Foot Philosopher” on his childhood experiences on the deadly streets of Mogadishu, Somalia.

The beginning of the album serves to introduce the listener to the situation in Somalia. This can be seen in Soobax, which speaks directly to the warlords and rival gangs that terrorize the streets, My Old Home, which is a meticulous lyrical description of Mogadishu, and What’s Hardcore, which invites so-called thug American rappers to reevaluate what hardcore really means by looking at the ghettos of Africa. In the opening track of Wash It Down, K’naan drops the following verse which poetically describes this Somalia state of mind.

Born in a pot boiling black and hot/
Waiting to be tasted and rapping a lot/
But justice would not come and eat my flesh/
Instead I had poverty to feed my stress/
Until my life became an ode to the gun/
Not needed like an overcoat to the sun/
So I thought I was just made to exist/
Not to live or change and resist/
But fear will have you believing fear/
Paralyzed have you bleeding tears/

The second part of the album is more analytical and, at times, philosophical, with K’naan giving more of an inside looking into his thoughts and reactions. This can be seen in I Was Stabbed by Satan, which tells the story of a young victim of a violent environment, Smile, which urges us to remain optimistic in the face of adversity, and Strugglin’, which views struggle as something that is ongoing and necessary – as he indicates in the following verse.

I’m from the hardest heartless projects dear departed/
I’m now known as a recording artist/
Spilling what little remains of your memories in the process/
Bit or a little for making your names into a colossus/
Believe me I’m thankful my brother’s still with me/
And ain’t much changed – Bobby’s still troubling Whitney/
And Bush is still bombing poor people yo he’s deadly/
And me I got a little recording gig but evidently/
I’m strugglin’ …

The remainder of the album incorporates more raw emotion in the form of either hardcore vibes or African folk music. Notables include If Rap Gets Jealous, which combines laid back smoothly-rhymed verses with a hardcore heavy metal chorus, Dusty Foot Philosopher, which is on some straight rhyme shit, and Boxing My Shadow, a lyrical masterpiece fused with anger and despair. Add in a set of African ballads, including In The Beginning, Hoobaale, African Way and Voices In My Head, and it becomes hard to find a track on the album that isn’t worth a mention.

Overall, I’m really glad Interdependent Media decided to reissue this CD for the United States. Old or new, K’naan’s “The Dusty Foot Philosopher” is a great timeless hip-hop album that is definitely worth the wait. I highly recommend picking up a copy. PEACE.

Album Track Listing:

1. Wash It Down
2. Soobax
3. What’s Hardcore?
4. My Old Home
5. Moment (Interlude)
6. I Was Stabbed by Satan
7. My God (Interlude)
8. Smile
9. If Rap Gets Jealous
10. Dusty Foot Philosopher
11. Strugglin’
12. In the Beginning
13. Hoobaale
14. African Way feat. Mwafrika
15. Voices in My Head
16. My Shadow
17. For Mohamoud (Soviet) (Interlude)
18. Until the Lion Learns to Speak
19. Blues for the Horn
20. Til We Get There feat. M-1