Hip Hop World Cup Mixtape

My apologies. My apologies because I was meant to put up this post much sooner than this.

I know the World Cup fever is finally dying down and all that but there is still so much to enjoy from the wonderful tournament especially in the form of related music, art and literature inspired by South Africa 2010. On the musical side of things, quick examples can be drawn from the two Official FIFA World Cup 2010 albums, Listen Up! and Hello Afrika that boasted songs from a galaxy of renowned artistes from all over the globe. I find official event albums pretty bland (always radio edit from the word go, a bit too thematic) so somewhere in the middle of my 100th listen of Waka Waka, I was seriously contemplating the idea of coming up with an alternative music compilation based on the World Cup. However, somebody already beat me to it and did one hellova good job at it as well.

For those who have not grabbed it already, its my pleasure to introduce The Hip Hop World Cup Mixtape brought to us by the guys at World Hip Hop Market and Italian hip hop guru DJ Nio. The theme of this compilation is to celebrate two of the world's greatest unifying forces - Football and Hip Hop. Hardly will you go through any corner of the earth without encountering these two cultural forces.

The Mixtape Cover

The beauty of this compilation is that it comprises of tracks from 31 out of the 32 countries that participated in the World Cup (they failed to find a hip hop act from North Korea although they express quite optimistically "To the best of our knowledge, hip hop does not OFFICIALLY exist in North Korea BUT WE BET ONE DAY IT WILL!!"). Swell, ain't it? The album is more or less alternative in the sense that most of the artistes selected are not really mainstream or what you would expect a given country to offer. You would expect, for example, that England's representative be from the garage/grime/dubstep family like Dizzie Rascal or Ty. Instead, it is Mohammed Yahya (pictured left) and Arabinghi that carry the flag with This Is Why Am Cold.

The mixtape, to some extent, also gives one an outlook of the global state of hip hop and how it has evolved in different cultures.I was somewhat pleased to detect that old school "women's lib" kind of flow that we used to hear from the likes of Queen Latifah and Da Brat in Japan's Coma-Chi's track, B-Girl. Tumi and the Volume from South Africa do not dissapoint with Sticks and Stones while Ghana's Wanlov and Kwabena Jones' hilariously rapid fire Goal is a pleasure to listen to. Female emcees get good representation - Anita Tijoux (Chile), Coma-Chi (Japan), Actitud Maria Marta (Argentina) and Nina Dioz (Mexico) go just as hard as their male counterparts, especially Nina Dioz in Cuando Cuando.

Anita Tijoux

Coma-Chi

Nina Dioz

If we take the comiplation as a competition just as the World Cup itself, pitting each of these acts against each other in a "Hip Hop World Cup"of sorts, it proves very hard to pick out who deserves the crown given the diversity of styles and language barriers. However, according to me, these peeps stood out enough to feature in the quarter finals of this fantasy Hip Hop World Cup:

Arxontas f. Zigolo Korb Tsiak - Dwse ry8mo - Greece
Iam - Hip Hop Ville - France
Tumi And The Volume - Sticks And Stones - South Africa
Hired Gun - The Dark Keys - USA
N’Toko - Dvojna morala - Slovenia
Intik - Révolution - Algeria
Spit Syndicate - Exile - Australia
Nina Dioz - Cuando, Cuando - Mexico

Another great thing about this mixtape:
ITS ABSOLUTELY FREE!!! Cop it Here (108mb zip file, single track mix) and decide who should take the ultimate Hip Hop crown in this very unique compilation. Enjoy.

The Gospel According To Paul...The Octopus Part 2: 5 Secrets of World Domination

I'm not the best of entrepreneurs, that is not my forté , I concede. However, once in a while, I’m lucky to stumble upon a few very interesting ideas when I take my brain for a walk. On one of such cranial strolls, it occurred to me that at any given time, around half of the entire post-pubescent world population suffers from a curious ailment called Heartbreak. Yeah, yeah, yeah I know you know…. If we have known this all along, why hasn’t somebody created a product based on this terrible condition yet? Let alone HIV/AIDS, Heartbreak is THE MOST SERIOUS worldwide pandemic! Of course the first solution would be to create an Avatar-like, alternative virtual world where every male human being is given an opportunity to be this man right below whose girlfriend’s body odour disgusts him so much, he is scheming day and night for the best means to kill her, but meanwhile…:

How To Answer Million Dollar Questions by Edward Cullen, Ph.D

I have a more reasonable solution to this Heartbreak pandemic. In fact, I will soon be on my way to the Kenya Copyright Board to register two very innovative groundbreaking products – The Anti-Heartbreak Pill, containing a well researched compound of herbal leaves and medicinal roots sure to prevent that terrible feeling you get when you see your better half cavorting with some good for nothing man/woman - to be taken three times a day, every day with an extra pill needed on unsafe days (when you feel your better half is going to pull fast one on you and deliver the “it’s not you, it’s me” speech). I’m also in preliminary discussions with the guys at Chartis to come up with a Heart Break Insurance product.

I’m even more confident that these products will be a success since I have been mentored by the best, none other than Paul the Octopus who has managed to fool the entire world that he is a psychic entity as he goes about playing with his food, earning him thousands of endearing fans and “faithful”. I was able to connect to the Outernet for a second and a half, the duration of which Paul was able to outline to me the five-pronged strategy he utilised to attain his success. I will share them in brief with you, my sistren and brethren:

1. Find the Right Minder
Luckily for Paul, his minders are just human beings, mere mortals without 8 appendages and 9 centres of thought. They are the ones who depend on his performance not the other way around. I doubt if he would have advanced much in the company of an especially large giant squid of a step-mom. Your quest for world domination should ape that approach. Find suitable minders- be it among influential people or those with sufficient financial power to enable you achieve your long term objective. Create in them a dependence on you for something which only you can provide. They should be able to complement your strengths and hide your weaknesses so that you are perceived as totally invincible.

2. Find the Right Pattern of Pleasing Your Minders
Just the way Paul figured out the W-L-W-W-W-L feeding pattern that pleased his minders and upped his food supply, find out what makes your minder tick. Be charming, be endearing, be accommodating but just do sell your soul to the Illuminati. Examples – if your boss has a foot fetish, pedicure your digits and reveal those toes a bit more. The Kenyan political elite of the 80s unanimously endorsed the one party state system and the outrageous mlolongo voting to please the head of Baba na Mama Party to ensure that he would have some hand in ensuring their continual occupancy of Parliamentary Seats as a form of appreciation. How many celebrity endorsements of dubious products do we hear every day?

3. Condition the Consumer of Your Products
If you have 9 different brains, tentacles that can smell water, have a seemingly wise face and tons upon tons of research claiming you have supra-intelligent abilities and have a bunch of experts swearing by your name, chances are 9 to 1 that you are psychic. Just like that. Never mind that you’re just playing around with your food. Paul’s coincidental predictions hit the world by storm and he soon dominated all forms of social media. I am willing to bet my last dime that the global chatter surrounding Paul’s mysterious ways may have involuntarily influenced players’ mentalities and performance during the world cup matches involving Germany to favour his predictions. The human brain has some sublime ways of “wirelessly connecting” to other brains to create strong cognitive notions that can move goalposts and change the directions of jabulanis after perfectly executed shots at goal. Some call it magic, others call it juju…

In the same way, statistics and performance histories affect the outcome of so many sports from football to F1. Doctors have used this strategy since time immemorial via the placebo effect to heal people with sugar pills instead of real medicines, and I’m sure there are a bunch of women who walk about everyday with a Rape-Axe in them. George Bush and Co. can now plunder oil fields of Iraq courtesy of the “War on Terror”. A conditioned populace can always be swayed to act in your favour.

4. Make Enemies Preferably Among Your Friends
Once you have attained a sufficient amount of power over your consumers and have a sufficient number of heavy hitters in your sphere of influence, it is time to collect a few enemies either naturally or artificially engineered preferably from a clique of your own fans. It is common knowledge that enemies tend to speak more about you than your friends hence the free publicity. Assume the position of an innocent party that is being onewa’d because of a gift he didn’t chose to have. Same scenario with Paul and German football fans who want him on the dinner table.

5. Good Publicity, Bad Publicity, All Publicity – Make them Yours
Point speaks for itself… here I am typing away and wasting precious kilobytes all because of a mollusk while there are other similar psychics with the decency of being mammals and single brained too such as Leon the Porcupine, Petty the pygmy Hippopotamus and Mani the Parakeet to speak of! Who is their PR manager? The shame!

So there you have it folks, by 2030, I shall prove that Heartbreak is a disease preventable at birth and be the worldwide supplier of anti-heartbreak vaccines for babies and anti-heartbreak sweet gel pills for adults who escape the jab as well as partnering with Chartis to launch a Heartbreak insurance cover product.

SIDENOTE: Just imagine how entertaining the world cup final match would have been if the referee, Howard Webb, was an octopus? He wouldn’t have a problem dishing out those yellow cards, would he? Just picture the number of cards he would flash as a shaggy-haired Carles Puyol “came from behind” and made one of those cynical tackles that the KBC commentators kept referring to as “savagery”! Priceless… simply priceless.

Howard Webb the Octopus. Wait, isn't that Puyol "coming from behind"? Oh my!!

The Gospel According to Paul ... the Octopus Part 1: Man must Live, Octo must Eat!

Even though the World Cup culminated yesterday with Spain slipping a goal past Team Oranje after a less-than-entertaining 115 minutes of play, a lot of questions stay unanswered. Perhaps the most intriguing is how a two year old English born, German naturalised octopus named Paul successfully managed to"predict" the winner of all the matches Germany played in the tournament upping to a 100% the 86% accuracy it had achieved in predicitng the outcomes of Germany's Euro 2008 campaign when it began its career as a psychic entity. Since then, everybody has been wetting their collective pants about the alleged indefeasible pronouncements of this multi-brained creature. I'm being made to understand that the euphoria has spread to Kenya and is threatening to infect our Constitutional referendum process, with calls for Paul to determine if Kenya will vote RED or GREEN come August 4th by the same people shouting that the process should not be interfered with by foreignors ( yet last I checked, the octopus wasn't called Paul Ole Otiende Mak Njuguna).

Paul at work...

My two pence on the psychic abilities of dear Paul - BOLLOCKS! UTTER BOLLOCKS! First and foremost, I cannot understand why someone/something who claims to be psychic can fail to have 100% accuracy in whatever field of psychic-ness he/she/it calims to posses, especially at the most important instances. Flashback to Euro 2008, Paul predicted Germany would win the final match against Spain. He proved a major #FAIL when Spain won eventually and that was after he had also wrongly predicted the outcome of one of the group matches.

Secondly, Paul has only predicted the outcome of 14 matches in total 2 of which were a #FAIL. From a scientific point of view, making the conclusion that Paul Octopizzle's IQ is high up there with the psychics is flawed because the raw data being employed is just too miniscule to be taken seriously. If he had been subjected to predicting the result of all of Bayern Munich's Bundelisliga matches for a season or two, and he scored well above 85% accuracy, maybe then would I raise an eyebrow.

However, I'm not saying that Paul isn't smart or anything. In fact, I have a different theory explaining his predictions that shows he's quite the thinker.

My Theory

So, Octopussies/Octopussi/Octopuses (tomayto, tomahto) have 9 brains, imagine that! Ain't that a beautiful thing?Something like a multi-core processor that would bring shame to your extremely fast laptop or computer, no? I bet they even have their own kind of internet called Outernet (all seas creatures are netphobic), an Outernet where they can IM and Tentaclebook each other and stuff. Smart things. But here's the thing, all those brains are primarily geared towards a single motivator - FOOD ACQUISITION. They have adopted to very efficient hunters that know how to track down their prey with gizmos such as tentacles that can SMELL WATER and what not! Paul the Octopus is no different. He a bad maafaka where food is concerned. He thus adapted to the mechanism employed to enable him "predict" football matches to his advantage.

Take note of the surrounding circumstances before his career. His entire life has been in the company of his minders at the Sea Life Aquarium in Oberhausen, Germany. He is not wild, but I doubt if this translates to knowing what 1 + 1 is. His food acquisition relies on his minders who drop him a mussel or oyster when their fancy tells them too. An intelligent being such as Paul would quickly establish that keeping his minders pleased is top on his priorities list to get that food. It is very doubtful that he can find food on his own if set free in the wild. As he watched his minders from his tank, he must have realised as well that they must be Germany fanatics (the occasional Nazi salute to say good morning, German colour thongs and boxers peeping our of peoples trousers etc. etc.) Who's idea was it in the first place to start subjecting Paul to German match predictions if not them anyway?

Now take note of the prediction mechanism too. Two boxes containing FOOD are placed inside Paul's tank, one with the flag of Germany and the other with the flag of the country about to face Germany. The box Paul selects first will indicate the winner of the match.

So, with these two determinants combining to form the secondary objective of pleasing his Germany-mad minders to get to the primary objective, food, Paul launched his career by correctly predicting a German wins in their first Euro 2008 match. Yay, he was correct. He must have gotten an extra helping of grub for that. Next match, mtindo huo huo, he selected Germany but this proved a #FAIL.

In the dead of the night, the Head Minder probably sneaked to the tank and spoke to Paul in Octo-Lingo: "Now look here, Paul. We trying to make money.Money to grow you those juicy oysters and mussels that your ungrateful fat ass like to eat. And today you fucked up. you fucked up big time, we need you to use your brains and get those predictions right. Get it wrong again, utajua malenge ni mboga..."

And with that surpirise confrontation, Paul was left confused with what these people wanted so he continued to stick to his Germany choice with success three times. The Head Minder was obviously elated and happily showered Paul with extra rations of food and secret conjugal rights with another Octopuss called Deliliah specially trained in 'loosening up' the males even though it was against regulations. Germany was also on a similar success and were set to meet Spain in the final match of Euro 2008. It was the big one! It was time for a blitzkrieg upon the La Roja. Nobody even needed to be told that Paul would select Germany to clinch the win and the cup. Paul obliged. Germany were going to win, the octopus had chosen!

That night Paul waited in anticipation for his usual sinful perks and delights but in came an extremely mad Head Minder. " Paul, you IDIOT, only the compassion of Saint Mary is preventing me from immediately throwing you in hot oil and munching your brains. Do you have an idea how much cash we bet on that game. Now its all gone because you could not compose your brains. Your brains! I hate you! From today, no more Delilah, no more extra rations until you make up for this mess..."

Thus, a traumatised Paul was relegated to the ranks of rock algae and moss. No more sexual trysts with Delilah, no more extra food, no more subscription to the outernet, no more extended publicity etc. etc. etc... He must have been miserable in the closing stages of 2008. At the same time, he took his time to analyse his pattern of selection vis a vis the minders' approval/disapproval. By 2010, Paul had come up with this prediction formula sure to please his minders and get him the extra perks:

Given the Approval Season consisted of 6 trials ( max. of 6 matches played, inclusive of the final, in Euro 2008),

where W = Pro-German selection and L = Anti-German selection, and
Approval is directly proportional to rate and amount of Food Supply;

Maximum Approval is achieved in the selection pattern:

W, L, W, W, W, L

Now, I ain't no Albert Einstein but...

Thus, when Paul was called upon to make Germany's predictions in the 2010 World Cup, he knew he would have to employ the selection pattern that would have given him 100% accuracy in Euro 2008. By some wild stroke of luck the predictions and match outcome tallied and followed this W-L-W-W-W-L feeding pattern. So all Paul had to do was to repeat favourable decisions from a past experience due to certain motivational factors. Now, I ain't no Albert Einstein but several years ago a teacher conclusively read, word for word, out of a KIE Biology textbook that such things are normally called conditioned reflexes.

Conclusions

Octopuses are very intelligent animals but they care very little, if at all, for football. One thing is for sure though - they care quite a lot about filling their stomachs. Wait, do octopuses have stomachs or is it one of the brains that does the digestion as well?

SIDENOTE : My heartfelt condolences go out to our friends and counterparts in Uganda either killed, injured or traumatised after yesternight's senseless and barbaric bomb attacks after the World Cup final match. Some people are brainless indeed!!!

Fine Art _ Last Emperor

I'm not really the type to go all goo goo ga ga about pasting people's lyrics on my blog and what not, but once in a while I stumble upon classic tunes full of amazing lyricism that just blows me away... Just recently, underground emcee The Last Emperor released his first single off what is to be his long awaited album The Wizard's Wardrobe. Its called Fine Art, released on July 2, 2010.

(single cover courtesy of thelastemp.com)

The name of the track in itself may seem to be an oxymoron given the complete simplicity of the video (doubt it cost more than a few thousand dollars) and he chooses to spit his rhyme with a raspy delivery that sends of nuances of something very far from what is normally perceived as "fine art". The instrumental is very simple with a touch of violin here and there, which enables you to hear each and every single word he says. And alas! You discover ITS IN THE LYRICS!!
The Last Emperor does not disappoint at all - he proves why he is one of the best lyricists alive with meticulously arranged bars and unforgettable punchlines. Here's a section of my best verse:

"Feed me through intravenous, my veins full of Valvoline
straight shots of gasoline chase em with kerosene
i boil beat breaks and eat cakes made with nicotine
cry tears of Listerene and piss Mr. Clean!
T-L-E the human power converter
and if the rhyme is a crime y'all should charge me for murder
Last Emp, approach the stand and cross-examine em further.."

Now whoever said Hip Hop is dead was suffering a case of mistaken identity. Watch this rare contribution to fine art here: