African Underground: African Hip-hop Throwdown August 19, 2005

cover: FREE | between 8 & 10pm, $5 after 10-3am.
RSVP Email:[email protected]

Nomadic Wax Records and World Up! partner up for African Hip-Hop event of the summer hosted by Toni Blackman

This incredible event will feature the talents of African MCs: TY (UK/Nigeria), The Ambassadoz (Ghana) and Oke (Nigeria) along with DJ Fumni and DJ Tefsa on the tables spinning African Hip-Hop Classics, Afro-beat and Afro-pop. Plus this ground breaking event will be hosted by legendary spoken word artists/hip-hop activist Toni Blackman! Plus an exclusive item raffle to benefit World Up!

Toni Blackman is perhaps one of the foremost artist/activist of her time. Committed to her life's work of elevating the culture of hip hop, Toni has positive lasting impressions on the entire fabric that is hip hop. As a performing poet, as one of the fiercest freestyle MC's, as an educator, and as an educator, Toni was raised the bar for all her peers and colleagues. World Up! & Nomadic Wax are thrilled to work with Toni Blackman on this revolutionary event.

TY released his debut album "Awkward" (on Big Dada/Ninja Tune) to critical acclaim, he has grown from underground mc to an artist who is developing an international reputation. In between working on the all important second album TY is taking time to collaborate with a variety of musicians, for his album which is due out in September which includes TY and Damon Albarn on a track. And in a sense this is what makes TY's music - he allows his complexities and contradictions to shine through, allows us to see him as a multifaceted, awkward, non-boxable individual. It?s an approach backed up by a fierce some technique, one which makes the complex look simple.

Ambassadoz were once called 'third-world citizens', while others said we were 'backwards' some even asked if we still lived on trees in Africa. Truth is, with more than 7 years experience of ripping shows, the Ambassadoz made of (M.O.A & AKAN) operated solely on the underground. Eventually surfacing in the late 90s as recording artists who knew exactly what their audience wanted and what they wanted was something new. Their creation is hip-hop music that can range from hard-core to afro-funk, becoming hard to lock into a specific genre or category. This distinctive hybrid of sound has the ability to dazzle spectators with their 'switching spit' lingo (rapping in different languages and accents) while commanding the credibility from the hip-hop elite. They bridge the gap between all
the different forms of hip-hop vernacular on stage spittin' in English, French, Twi and Pidgin.