Yesterday, on the way home from Bloomington, Indiana (where I’d left my son Luke), one of the things that kept me company was this guy’s latest album.*
Black Star (Mos Def, Talib Kweli), “Definition” (1998)
Vodpod videos no longer available.*Mos Def, The Ecstatic (2009)
It used to be that music came from a particular place. No more. Whether it’s Sohrab Saadat Ladjevardi (the Iranian saxophonist who’s lived in Germany, in Japan, and now in New York City [2/18/10]), or Burkina Electric (whose members come from Burkina Faso, from Germany, and from New York City [by way of Austria] [2/22/10]), or this singer, who’s lived (and has homes) in Nigeria and in Germany, much of today’s most intriguing music has its ears and heart and feet on more than one continent.
Nneka, “Heartbeat”
Take 1: recording/video
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Take 2: live, Philadelphia, 2009
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Take 3: J. Period Remix, featuring Talib Kweli
What’s old is new again.
Talib Kweli & Hi-Tek, “Memories Live” (2000; sampling Ann Peebles, “I Can’t Stand the Rain,” 1973 [yesterday’s post])
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lagniappe
mail
Very cool! [DeLois Barrett Campbell and the Barrett Sisters, 1/3/10]
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Great clip! Enjoyed seeing Jack Paar, too, and loved the way the camera eased back to show the drummer at work with the brushes. [Blossom Dearie, 1/7/10]
With a big shout-out to my older son Alex, here—on his birthday (22!)—is a small sampling of the music he’s opened my ears to.
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The Very Best
Here’s something he emailed me just last week—new sounds out of Africa (by way of England).
The Very Best, “Julia”
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The Pains of Being Pure at Heart
Here’s a show he saw over the summer, while living in New York.
The Pains of Being Pure at Heart, live, NYC (South Street Seaport), 7/09
“Come Saturday”
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“Everything With You”
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“The Pains of Being Pure at Heart”
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Amadou & Mariam
I might have gotten around to Amadou & Mariam sooner or later on my own, but thanks to Alex—who played me their (wonderful) album Dimanche a Bamako a few years ago—I got to this Malian duo sooner. (He and I saw them together, at Chicago’s Park West, in May, just a few months after this performance.)
Amadou & Mariam, “Sebeke,” live, Paris, 2008
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Talib Kweli
Several years ago, thanks to Alex, I first heard this hip-hop artist’s (terrific) album Quality.
Talib Kweli, “Get By,” live, NYC, 2007
Want to hear the original studio track? Here. (Yeah, that’s Kanye at 1:20 and again at 3:24—he produced this track.)
(For all you hip-hop-&-law trivia buffs, Kweli’s the answer to the following question: What hip-hop artist has a brother who’s a professor at a top law school? [Jamal Greene, Columbia].)
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lagniappe
Want to see the world (bits and pieces of it, anyway) through the eyes of one now-22-year-old? Here. Here. Here.
music clip of the day 