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Positive Black Soul
About Positive Black Soul
One of the first rap and hip-hop groups in Senegal, Positive Black Soul represents a collaboration between Didier Sourou Awadi, formerly with Didier Awadi's Syndicate, and Doug E. Tee (born: Amadou Barry), formerly with the King MCs. Accompanied by the rhythmic onslaught of traditional Senegealese instruments -- including percussion, kora, and balafon -- the two inspire each other with heavily political rhyming and DJ-like toasting, mostly in the Wolof language. Forsaking traditional outfits and folklore, the group takes an ultra-modern approach to their performances. The year 1992 proved to be a pivotal one for Positive Black Soul. After stirring excitement with their performance at the Dakar French Cultural Center's music festival, Dakar 92: Mbalax, Jazz, and Rap, the group was invited to be the opening act for the Dakar debut of French rap star MC Solaar in October. Solaar was so impressed by the group's performance that he asked them to continue opening shows for him in France. Positive Black Soul released a self-produced cassette album in 1993, with the project underwritten by the French Cultural Center in Dakar. The following year, the group toured England, Switzerland, and France. Returning to Senegal, the members of Positive Black Soul were invited to improvise with a traditional chorus on one tune, "Swing Yela," on Baaba Maal's album, Firin' in Fouta. They recorded their debut album, Salaam, shortly afterwards with several tracks produced by Boom Bass of La Funk Mob and the remaining tracks produced by Raw Stylus. During 1997, they performed 130 shows in Europe and North America. ~ Craig Harris, All Music Guide
Compilations Featuring Positive Black Soul (3)
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Love Lockdown KanYe West |
| KanYe West keeps on challenging the limits of hip-hop: if "Graduation" was his pop album, the first single from "808s and Heartaches" sees the star going all soulful and expanding the most spiritual side of former highlights such as "Jesus Walk" or "Can't Tell me Nothing". Arguably the first interactive recording ever made, thanks to the KanYe's official blog; when the original mix was posted, many fans reacted sending an avalanche of negative feedback; maybe it was the use of popular pitch-altering software autotune, abused in recent times by everyone from Cher to T-Pain, that led the audience to revolt and ended up with the notorious perfectionist re-recording the vocals and adding some taiko drums to highlight its minimal beat, imitating a heart pounding; posting it again afterwards for general approval. Not happy with that, he later went the Radiohead way, making six different stems (vocals, drums, piano, etc.) available for fans to remix the song themselves. "Love Lockdown" can be seen as West upgrading himself from rapper to proper soul singer and is one of his more inspired and powerful moments to date. A mind-blowing closing performance at this year's VMAs ignited a chart frenzy all over the world and it looks set to last for a few months. | |
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