Fulbright-mtvU Fellows

Sanuya

“Sanuya”, written and performed by Modibo “Bastin” Diabate featuring Mah Bara Soumano and Konté B, arranged by Lamine Soumano, produced by Studio Mali, and filmed by Spencer Orey.

“Sanuya” is a song about about cleaning up the trash in Bamako that draws attention to trash and pollution in the city. It’s mostly in Bambara with some French, and it’s around six minutes long. Usually in Bamako I do my best to see through the pollution into the underlying beauty of the city, and trust me, there is a lot there that is beautiful. However, this time, I got to focus directly on trash and make things into a giant chaotic trash party, shooting all but one scene without my tripod while riding around on motorcycles with a big group of rappers in the Bamako neighborhood of Djicoroni Para. Unfortunately, it’s the hot season right now, so it’s nearly 115 degrees F every day, and the light is always incredibly strong, making filming especially difficult. However, with help, we found some dirty places to film: trash piles, burning trash piles, open sewers, meat markets, and more.
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Tags: Bamako, Konté B, Lamine Soumano, Mah Bara Soumano, Modibo “Bastin” Diabate, Studio Mali

Super City Hikoi

Yesterday Auckland’s main street, Queen Street, normally a chaotic jam of pedestrians and cars (refer to my photo tour of Auckland) was completely closed for the Super City Hikoi. Hikoi is a Maori term for a protest march. Around 7,000 people marched against a new Super City proposal for the structuring of the Auckland government, which would remove guaranteed Maori seats from the Auckland city council. Marchers of all ages carried signs reading slogans like, “It’s not about race, it’s about representation” and “Not Super without Maori”.



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Tags: Auckland, Herbs, Smashproof, Sons of Zion, Super City Hikoi

Smashproof

If you are in New Zealand right now, you know about Smashproof. Smashproof, and their hit single “Brother”, are EVERYWHERE. It was thrilling to be in New Zealand watching “Brother” break records with its domination of the singles chart. Each week it surpassed another record, and earlier this month after 11 weeks at number one it became the longest running number one single from a local artist ever, tying with Whitney Houston’s “I Will Always Love You” for second longest-running number one single from either a local or international artist. For critics of Aotearoa (New Zealand) hip hop who claim that it can not compete with hip hop from the US, the fierce national pride in Smashproof was clear as fans fought to keep “Brother” at number 1, even when an imported single from Eminem threatened to defeat it.
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Tags: Aotearora, New Zealand Music Month, Smashproof, Whitney Houston

Video Interview with AP from 113

While at a taping for Glory Time TV, the hip-hop talk show hosted by our friends in the group Blackara, I met French rap artist AP who kindly agreed to do an interview for my project. Currently promoting his first solo Album, Discret, AP originally started his career in the nineties as a member of the successful French rap group 113, and he is also a part of the rap collective Mafia K’1 Fry (K’1fry or “Cainfri” is verlan slang for “African”). Above, you can watch an excerpt from our interview.

Although 113’s talent has been celebrated with two Victoire de la Musique awards (similar to the American Grammys) and a gold album, the group also gained notoriety in 2005 when they, along with several other groups, were accused by over 200 members of the French government for fueling young rioters with incendiary lyrics. (To date, however, French government officials haven’t won any of the numerous lawsuits filed against rap artists.) While I won’t go into depth about why these accusations were misdirected, there are two really interesting points about this case, which have been reinforced by my conversations with AP and with others throughout my research.
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Tags: 113, AP, Blackara, George Brassens, Glory Time TV, Mafia K’1 Fry, Renaud, Victoire de la Musique

Obamako

I left for Mali a few days after the November election, and when I arrived in Bamako, Mali was in the middle of Obama-fever. People all over would ask me if I was French, and after I told them I was from the US, I received huge smiles, slaps on the back, many thumbs ups and lots of “Et ca va Obama??”s.
When the the president was inaugurated in January, things remained just as excited around me. Then, I began to notice President Obama’s picture, already in plain sight, become even more prominent. Official Obama fabric was released and started to be used as everything from pajama pants, button-up shirts, and table cloths. Obama t-shirts and Obama buttons became popular as well.

It wasn’t until about a month after that that I began to collect pictures of all things Obama-related.

So then, Obamako, a city in which Obama’s election inspired nearly everybody and continues today to resonate every single day. It’s incredible to see what the election did in terms of earning respect for Americans in Mali. Talking to musicians, people would tell me that they felt like they were suddenly able to do things, that having a US President with an African father meant that their own futures were brighter. People I asked mentioned that they never expected France to do anything like that, and that the US continues to be the site of hope. Incredible.
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Tags: Bamako, Barak Obama, Mali