Twin Cities Daily Planet (https://www.tcdailyplanet.net/author/justin-schell/page/6/)
Justin Schell (612to651@gmail.com) is a freelance writer and grad student in Minneapolis, working on a book and documentary about immigrant, refugee, and diasporic hip-hop here in the Twin Cities. For more on the project, see WeRockLongDistance.com.
Recent Minneapolis transplant El Guante (Spanish for “the glove”), whose album El Guante’s Haunted Studio Apartment was just released on Speakeasy Records (part of TrúRúts) conveys a mixture of Continue Reading
The recent collection of essays, Total Chaos: The Art and Aesthetics of Hip Hop, edited by Jeff Chang, attempts to re-center hip hop as an entire artistic movement, encompassing not only the four original elements of MCing, DJing, graffiti writing, and b-boying/b-girling, but the art’s expansion into theater, literature, dance, and many others. Such a move counters the telescoped definition that hip hop is only rap music. Chang, the author of the critically acclaimed Can’t Stop, Won’t Stop: A History of the Hip-Hop Generation as well as an organizer of the first National Hip-Hop Political Convention in 2004, has organized a number of panel discussions throughout the country following the publication of Total Chaos. These are not simple book signings: for each panel, Chang brings together some of the most important figures in hip hop today. For the panel held last week at the Walker Art Center (click here for the Walker Channel panel discussion), Chang included two Twin Cities hip hop figures: Roger Cummings, co-founder of North Minneapolis’s Juxtaposition Arts and one of the Twin Cities’ earliest graffiti writers, and Rachel Ramist, a graduate student at the University of Minnesota’s Gender, Women, and Sexuality Studies program. Continue Reading
“Wigger.” “Wanksta.” “White negro.” These and other terms form the lexicon of whiteness in hip hop. What it means to be white and participate in the culture of hip hop often falls victim to crass binarizations of black authenticity versus white usurpation. While there have been numerous instances of cross-racial collaboration, as well as numerous white figures in hip hop that challenge such strict binarizationsm, Twin Cities artist Brother Ali possesses a whiteness of a different shade. His identity as an albino Muslim reveals much about the fluidity of race and hip hop. Ali turns his own liminal identity into a positive marker of difference, overturning the historical associations of albinism with the Barnum-esque freak shows of the nineteenth century as well as contemporary stereotypes of the “evil Albino” (think Silas in The Da Vinci Code). Continue Reading
Everything about this year’s earlier-than-usual Sound Unseen Festival pointed to cost-cutting measures. Most of the films were shown at the much smaller Bryant Lake Bowl Theater, save for a few select films at the Riverview Theater. The number of films was scaled back nearly by half (from over 30 in 2005 to 17 in 2006), while the glossy booklet handed out last year was replaced by a small City Pages insert.
While hip hop historically is no stranger to politics, MCs and DJs who voice explicit political sentiments in their songs are the exception rather than the rule. Over the course of two weekends, however, the Twin Cities hip hop community heard calls for change from two fronts. Artists representative of a growing “homo hop” movement staked their claim, both in a documentary and in a live performance at the 7th St. Entry on May 28, for a queer presence within hip hop, while The Coup brought their revolution-seeking music to the Triple Rock on June 2.
Daara J
1.26.06
Cedar Cultural Center
“What is my identity?” shouted Daara J’s three MCs, N’Dongo D, Lord Aladji Man, and Faada Freedy, as a bass-heavy reggae beat boomed through the Cedar Cultural Center. Daara J (pronounced “Daara Gee”) has become one of the most prominent African hip-hop groups, and for them the answer seems obvious: the group gave shout outs to their home turf of Dakar, beneath a large Senegalese flag. Daara J is one of hundreds, if not thousands of hip-hop groups that have sprung up in Senegal as part of the global proliferation of hip-hop from the South Bronx in the late 70s. Following in the footsteps of MC Solaar and Postive Black Soul, other famous Senegalese hip hop figures, the decade-old Daara J, by taking advantage of hip hop’s globalization, has crafted a rich musical and cultural identity, filtering it all through the lens of hip-hop.
Brother and Sister
1.10.05
various locations
For a band named “Best Performer” by the City Pages last year, extravagant concerts from the group Brother and Sister should come as no surprise. However, this past Saturday the band, made up of siblings Michael and Katie Gaughan, organized an event that surely amazed even the die-hardest of fans. Dubbed the “Sister Send-Off Show,” it was all-day extravaganza, part rock and roll festival and part scavenger hunt. The sum of these parts was an experience that its participants will not soon forget.
Konono N°1
Cedar Cultural Center
November 10, 2005
Variously dubbed “Afro-Industrialism” and the more preposterous-sounding “Post-Colonial Electronica,” the debut album of the Congolese group Konono N°1, Congotronics (Crammed Discs), has rapidly gained notoriety on both sides of the Atlantic. The group came to the Cedar Cultural Center in the early part of their twelve day, ten city US tour. The mood before the performance was one of excited anticipation and Konono N°1 did not disappoint.