Light Attracts Light & Everything Else Too

"i'm operating in a system i do not believe in

authoring some stories we could leave for our children

& honestly wish we all approached it different

but everybody's got a high cost of living..."

Gabriel Teodros & SoulChef
"Light Attracts Light & Everything Else Too"
Evidence Of Things Not Seen
A CambioWasHere Joint.
Peace to Alex Riedlinger, Sidony O'Neal & Enjoni for everything. Peace to Hidmo for inspiration.

Also, check this expansive interview I just did with Amira Ali at Africa Speaks 4 Africa. We went in-depth about the new album, the last album, music in Ethiopia and more. It's my favorite interview done for Evidence Of Things Not Seen so far, which is saying something because the press this album has been getting (with no budget + no publicist) has been great!

"Multi-talented and community-engaged, veteran MC Gabriel Teodros releases his strongest album yet."
- City Arts Magazine

"Sunday-morning easy, SoulChef's classic, hearth-warm production fits the "30 Something, Hella Single" wanderer-MC like fresh socks as he steps out looking for love ("I kinda flirt with existence"), meaning, and home."
- Larry Mizell Jr., The Stranger

"Besides depth packed lyrical content, there is something bottomless and heart grippingly soothing about Teodros’ music. It’s like the perfect synthesis of jazz-tinged soul with Hip-Hop, or it’s like when Hip-Hop meets love and love meets Hip-Hop"
- Amira Ali, Africa Speaks 4 Africa

"I was introduced to Gabriel via this collab, and after checking the album out he’s become one of my favorite MCs."
- Mr. Tang, Word Is Bond

Physical copies of the album with a limited-edition book of lyrics available exclusively on bandcamp.

Gabriel Teodros & AirMe - Children Of The Dragon

Gabriel Teodros & AirMe - Children Of The Dragon

I dreamed about making this album. To make an album with someone who spoke the languages of Ethiopian music as fluently as Hip Hop was perhaps as important to me as actually going to Ethiopia for the first time.

Children Of The Dragon was created in the Washington, DC area (aka Ethiopia's 2nd Capitol) mostly in a small office studio (that had no mic booth) that on most days was shared with a graphic designer/film maker, a painter, and a few singers. The conversations and the energy of everyone who shared a space with us is in all of these songs. (and of everyone in the studio I spoke the least amount of Amharic!)

The title is based on mythology I first heard of in Haile Gerima's film Teza. I also think of Audre Lorde's term biomythography when describing the album as a whole. The first voice you hear on the record is my sister Luam Kidane who also just published this incredible piece on calling ourselves into freedom: Black art and decolonial asthetics which you can read on The Feminist Wire now.

This album is the first music I made after my first trip to my mother's homeland. I actually met AirMe and we started working together when I was on a 24 hour layover in DC... between Addis Ababa and Seattle. I didn't take any pictures when I was in Ethiopia but it's all in the music. Needless to say, this album is very special to me. We pushed each other to make the best music we were capable of creating at the time, we're putting it out completely independently, and I hope to break as many so-called rules along the way as possible.

Enjoy an exclusive first listen on YouTube and get the album from Bandcamp (or send it as a gift!) before anyone else has it. If you feel it, please share the music far and wide.

The YouTube stream features footage from traffic in Addis Ababa, filmed and edited by Brandon Eversole (who also is responsible for all the footage of us in Ethiopia that was featured in the video for CopperWire's "Phone Home")

If you are in Seattle, come party with us on Wednesday, May 7th (the actual day I turn 33 1/3) at Jaam Rek (aka the old Hidmo building on 20th & Jackson) Tickets and more information here.

May 7, 2014: "Children Of The Dragon" Seattle Release Party!

Wednesday May 7th, 2014

Gabriel Teodros "Children Of The Dragon" Seattle Release and 33 1/3 Birthday Party!

with special guests
Jennifer Johns (from Oakland, CA and debuting music from her brand new album "Chronicles Of The Aquarian Mind")
Hightek Lowlives
DJ's OCnotes & WD4D

8PM. $15. All Ages.

@ Jaam Rek
(a.k.a. the old Hidmo building - 20th & Jackson - Seattle, WA)

Tickets available at releasethedragon.brownpapertickets.com/
(this event will most likely sell out, you want to get your tickets now!)

Food & Sh*t presents "Hidmo Back!"

This last weekend Food & Sh*t and Hidmo hosted a night called "Hidmo Back!" on Beacon Hill in Seattle. A bunch of us performed: DJ Daps1, Hollis, Rogue Pinay, si dåko’ta, Daniel Pak (of Kore Ionz), Prometheus Brown and Otieno Terry (who's incredible album with Hightek Lowlives is rumored to be dropping like next week?!) If you missed it, check this video Scott Macklin made above. I did one of the lost tracks (there's at least 7 lost tracks) from the upcoming Children Of The Dragon album titled "The World Is A Hidmo". Shoutout to Thione Diop and everyone holding it down at Jaam Rek on 20th & Jackson now. My song is out of date since the old Hidmo building is far from empty... it's not in the video but I said that at the event too.

If you have no idea what Hidmo is (or was) check these archives, the quickest summary I can offer is something I wrote on the day we closed it titled Honoring an era.

"Thought you knew you did know, Hidmo..." - THEEsatisfaction

Hidmo's Goodbye Jackson Street Party :: VIDEO

So if you haven't heard the news by now, Hidmo closed it's doors on 20th & Jackson last week. Before moving the ENTIRE restaurant in one day (and i mean everything... including several kitchen sinks) we celebrated 4 years and one month of life at Hidmo on Monday night. A classic celebration i hosted with DJ's OC Notes & Seabefore on the wheels, that at one point turned into an Eritrean dance party. It was the winter solstice (a.k.a. longest night of the year) and a lunar eclipse at the same time... which only happens every 450 years or so. Believe it or not, this video only captures a lil bit of the magic of that night (a huge statement coming from me, as this video gives me hella goosebumps... it was just so epic.) Peace to Scott Macklin for the documentation (...for years now) and everybody that came through that night, ESPECIALLY everyone who helped move the next day... and to all the lovely people in this video: Rahwa Habte, JusMoni, Felicia Loud, Dakota Kamacho, Storme Webber, Suntonio Bandanaz & Julie C., THEESatisfaction, Alberto Mejia, Luzviminda Uzuri Carpenter, Arielle Davis, Mark Gonzales... and really thanks to everyone that helped make Hidmo what it is. More information about Hidmo NEXT is at http://www.hidmo.org

PS: If anyone has photos of ALL of us outside during the eclipse... e-mail me. I'm trying to see those!

MTV's $5 Cover: Seattle

MTV's $5 Cover: Seattle

At long last, Lynn Shelton's Seattle installment of the MTV Series $5 Cover is available to view online! The show follows a day in the life of several independent Seattle bands, including THEESatisfaction and Champagne Champagne! As an added bonus, a series of "B-Side Docs" were produced about the Seattle scene, including ones about Gabriel Teodros and Vitamin D. You can watch it all online at http://fivedollarcover.mtvmusic.com/

Honoring an era: 4 years of Hidmo on 20th & Jackson

4 years. The longest i ever lived anywhere was 6... and aside from that family house i never made it anywhere more then 3. 4 years is enough time to begin + complete high school; enough time to attain a college degree; a newborn child learns to walk, talk, develop a unique personality and is almost ready to enter their first school. The last 4 years was an era for us, one no less profound then any of these events in a person's life: 4 years of Hidmo. The 2nd longest time span I've ever called one place "home".

My understanding of home has never really been about places... as the first child in an Ethiopian family to be born in the United States, "back home" has always referred to a place I've never seen, that we always dream of going back to but it seems we'll never return to. But here, Seattle, WA? - this was never home. The United States never felt like home. Here we fight for equality and sometimes still feel like being called "American" is an insult. On top of this, the spaces we occupy here, have constantly been shifting as long as i can remember. From being forced to move every few years due to rent prices going through the roof, unemployment, and neighborhoods that if you are young still feel like a war zone... those years i spent on Beacon Hill, plus the years i spent going to school in the Central District... were just enough to build a community and get comfortable with the city i was born in being one way, and in so many ways now it's completely different. It's like: we make the neighborhood fresh, and then it gets jacked as soon as we do. There are people still holding on, of course, that still make the neighborhood feel like what it was, but it's not enough to say we're winning the battle. When talking about gentrification in Seattle... most people have come to accept it as the inevitable.

Then there's Hip Hop. The music and culture that has kept me alive, that accepted and saw me for who i am even when my own people didn't. The style... the dance that is present with my first memories of life. A traditionally Black & Brown form of expression like every form of American music that came before it, that is now being white-washed and taken away from the people that make it what it is - just like our neighborhoods, and every form of Black music that came before it.

Enter Hidmo. From the very first day Rahwa & Asmeret Habte took over this space (which also was my first failed attempt at bar tending) it was clear: Hidmo was the first place where every piece of me lived under one roof. Hidmo was hood, Hidmo was East African, Hidmo was Hip Hop, Hidmo was community organizers & activists, Hidmo was all these things and more. It was small-business owners who respected the space they occupied and the people who came before them. People who risked their business to do something positive for the community, time and time again. Despite police harassment, new neighbors who blamed crime in the surrounding neighborhood on the restaurant, the Habte sisters + the Hidmo family nurtured an entire community; several communities, in fact - that prior to Hidmo i never saw live in one place.

If you know me, inside the Hidmo you've probably heard me say the words "this place is more home to me then my house is", or heard me refer to it as "a community center cleverly disguised as an Eritrean restaurant"... and after the last 4 years, i honestly don't know who i would be without Hidmo. But also like i said before, "Home is not a place".

When i think of home now, i think of people. I think of my family, who have never been stationary for too long, yet wherever they go, that's home. I think of the true friends I've made in life, the people who have seen me for everything that i am, the people who have fought with me and still loved me unconditionally. I think about music and all the places it's brought me, and every single person that's welcomed me into their homes. And i will always think of the people that made Hidmo what it is, when i think about home. No matter where life takes us.

Hidmo is entering a new phase now... which involves closing the restaurants doors on 20th & Jackson, while working with 4Culture and Historic Seattle on plans to become an anchor tenant at Washington Hall. It's a very exciting transition, one that has the potential to leave an even deeper impact then the last 4 years at 20th & Jackson has. All the details, plus ways to keep in touch, are posted on Hidmo's website www.hidmo.org Sign up for the e-mail list!

Much love to Rahwa & Asmeret Habte, Heidi Jackson, and the entire Hidmo family (there's so many of ya'll) for supporting us all for this long... the years, the hard work, and the sacrifices you made for our community these last 4 years will never cease to amaze me. We all should be stepping it up now. Thank you for helping so many people's dreams come true. Thank you for making me believe anything is possible with love. I'm sure entire books will be written on the subject soon. Looking forward to Hidmo NEXT!

-- gabriel teodros

PS: Do check www.hidmo.org for more information... and there's lots of videos posted on this very blog - http://gabrielteodros.blogspot.com/search/label/hidmo

* Located in a neighborhood that used to be the only area where Hip Hop shows were allowed to happen, where by 2005 none were happening... and on a street with a rich history of jazz clubs dating back to the 1920's, where currently no music venues exist... it's a little-known fact that police often come to small-business owners in the CD and South End and "advise" them against doing any kind of Hip Hop music, because they think it will attract violence. (I doubt business owners in Fremont and on Capitol Hill are getting this same "advice" from the SPD) Yet despite all this... Hidmo is now known as an all-ages Hip Hop venue in the Central District, and a safe space.

LIVE @ HIDMO: Seattle Fandango Project featuring Son Tequio, Gabriel Teodros & Mark Gonzales

The Seattle Fandango Project & Son Tequio featuring Gabriel Teodros & Mark Gonzales... Live @ Hidmo! It's a true honor to get to build, and do music with this group. So excited for future projects! Check the videowork... peace to Scott Macklin. Later that same night i was at Neumos rocking a sold-out show with Khingz, opening for Digable Planets. Seattle is on fire right now! Look out for Air 2 A Bird all over the city this next month... starting with Bumbershoot (Upcoming dates are listed under the CD's on the right...)

VIDEO: LIVE @ HIDMO featuring okanomodé & THE CAROUSEL

Last Friday, September 11th 2009, we had the final edition of our beloved summer concert series Live @ Hidmo. The show featured okanomodé & THE CAROUSEL which is okanomodé (a.k.a. SoulChilde) on lead vocals, Sirius & Maya Jenkins on additional vocals, Camilo Estrada on bass, D'Vonne Lewis on drums, Chad Red Light on keys, and a surprise cameo appearance from Yirim Seck! If you haven't seen okanomodé live yet, do yourself a favor and catch the next show... my brotha makes timeless music and will lift your spirit no matter where your at. Scott Macklin was there to document the evening, so check the video! And stay tuned for the next Live @ Hidmo series... we're working on one for the next season that's gonna be ridiculous!

VIDEO: LIVE @ HIDMO featuring OHMEGA WATTS

Ohmega Watts, the genius behind our Live @ Hidmo graphics, and triple threat as an emcee, producer and deejay, came and rocked 20th & Jackson last Friday. Scott Macklin was there to document the evening (we missed you Scott!) Live @ Hidmo has been going so well... every single performer brought their very best to the Hid this summer, no ego, all love, and such excellent performances... with so many different perspectives and styles. It's been an honor and a pleasure to work with every one of these artists and help make a series like this crack! Thank you Rahwa, for such amazing ideas, for creating a home for all of us, and this gift to our city. Seattle, God-willing you won't have to wait til next summer for the next series! Much love to Cristina Orbe, Felicia Loud and Xperience... you all had such breath-taking performances... we have the tapes, they should be edited and put online soon! The final edition of Live @ Hidmo is THIS FRIDAY, September 11th, with okanomode & THE CAROUSEL... as always... 8-10pm, All Ages, and Free. don't miss it!

VIDEO - LIVE @ HIDMO featuring J. PINDER

J. Pinder had the Hidmo packed last Friday! The video posted above is a taste of things to come, as Pinder debuted new music off his unreleased Sky Is Falling EP! Live @ Hidmo continues every week with some of the best music Seattle has to offer... Cristina Orbe tore it down earlier tonight... and next Friday we got Felicia Loud on deck! Live @ Hidmo is Every Friday from 8-10pm, All Ages, and Free. 20th & Jackson - Seattle, WA. Peace to Derek Edamura for the footage!

Video - LIVE @ HIDMO featuring ORBITRON with Yze, Circle of Fire/Soulshifters & DJ Gumbeaux

If you missed Live @ Hidmo this last Friday i feel bad for you. I've never seen such a high percentage of people at a Hip Hop show with genuine smiles on their faces. One cause the music was so dope... Orbitron, Yze, Mozest, Free and DJ Gumbeaux all went so hard! but mostly cause the crowd was comprised of so many youth... some still with pacifiers... up front dancing the whole night. This Friday (8/7) is sure to be another classic night... as J. Pinder will be rocking it with brand new material off his Sky Is Falling EP! Peace to Derek Edamura, Case and Scott Macklin for the footage!

Video - LIVE @ HIDMO featuring PIECE

Live @ Hidmo kicked off this last Friday with Piece & DJ B-Girl, and continues every Friday with a Free, All Ages show featuring some of the best music Seattle has to offer... 8-10pm @ Hidmo on 20th & Jackson in Seattle's Central District. This week (7/31) is Seattle's B-Boy Universal Orbitron featuring Yze & DJ Gumbeaux. Come throo! And check the videos posted here every week... Thanks to Derek Edamura, Angelica and Scott Macklin.

Seattle Weekly's "Best of Seattle 2009"

Many highlights in the Seattle Weekly today... including Khingz winning the Reader's Choice for Best MC, and features on Hidmo - Best Sisterly Love in the CD, Faire Gallery and Cafe - Best Little Cafe That Could, The Corner - Best Reason to Go Out on the Fourth Friday of the Month, Randy Engstrom - Best Anti-Isolationist, and SoulChilde BlueSun - Best Glamazon, who you can catch rocking the Live @ Hidmo series in September! gyeah!

LIVE @ HIDMO: The Summer Concert Series

Hidmo, 4Culture & KBCS 91.3 FM Communty Radio present...

LIVE @ HIDMO
A Free Summer Concert Series, Every Friday.

July 24 :: Piece w/ DJ B-Girl
July 31 :: Orbitron featuring Yze & DJ Gumbeaux
August 7 :: J. Pinder
August 14 :: Cristina Orbé
August 21 :: Felicia Loud
August 28 :: Xperience
September 4 :: Ohmega Watts w/ DJ Puerto Roc
September 11 :: okanomodé & THE CAROUSEL

8-10 PM
ALL AGES
FREE!

Hidmo Eritrean Cuisine
2000 S. Jackson St.
Seattle, WA

Xololanxinxo & 206 Good Life :: VIDEO

Xololanxinxo, Neila & DJ ESP rolled throo Seattle and did a show at Hidmo (our favorite community center cleverly disguised as an Eritrean restaraunt, ever) this past Thursday, to set off 206 Good Life... Seattle's newest all ages open mic (Every Thursday - 20th & Jackson). I helped host the gig along with my brother Suntonio Bandanaz and a whole grip of emcees came throo and got down on the freestyles... peace to H-Bomb, Praxis, SistaHailStorm, Lioness (of Canary Sing), Beloved One, Josiah, and everyone who performed or got down on the open mic, DJ OMG for spinning the cuts, Jonathan Matas for doing the incredible live paintings all night, and Mani Sue for bringing this idea to life! Looking forward to seeing how it grows... Scott Macklin was there to document the evening... check the video posted above!

Hidmo presents "Future Talk Back" VIDEO

Rahwa Habte and Hollis Wong-Wear of Hidmo Entertainment put together an amazing exhbit at The Moore Theater last Saturday centered around a post-apocalyptic Seattle B-Boy. The exhbit "Future Talk Back" (a title inspired by The Physics) featured live painting by Jonathan Matas, photography by Canh Nguyen and Jannea Jones, artwork from the homies Maya Uemoto, Lindsey & Mahroo, clothing from Triple Crown, it highlighted the music of Shabazz Palaces and GMK's Songs For Bloggers, the film work of Scott & Angelica Macklin (who did the video posted above) and a room full of memorabilia from my very own bedroom! You ever feel like your lifes on display? An estimated 3000 people rolled through to see this one-day only exhibit, much respect to everyone that helped bring it together!

"Hidmo Means Home" :: Documentary Online Now!!!

Hidmo Means Home is online now! A 15-minute documentary by Jill Irene Freidberg about our home on 20th & Jackson. This is how we do in the 206. Check it out!

http://www.seattlechannel.org/videos/video.asp?ID=3170904

"Hidmo Means Home" :: Airing 3/23/09 on the Seattle Channel!

Don't miss the documentary Jill Irene Freidberg did on a day in the life of Hidmo Eritrean Cuisine! Our beloved community center masqueraded as a restaurant. Hidmo Means Home premiers on the Seattle Channel (channel 21) on Monday, March 23rd at 7pm. It will be online after that at http://www.seattlechannel.org/CommunityStories/

Slingshot Hip Hop in Seattle!

"Slingshot Hip Hop braids together the stories of young Palestinians living in the West Bank, Gaza and inside Israel as they discover Hip Hop and employ it as a tool to surmount divisions imposed by occupation and poverty. From internal checkpoints and Separation Walls to gender norms and generational differences, this is the story of young people crossing the borders that separate them." - SlingshotHipHop.com

The video above was just the afterparty of Slingshot Hip Hop's debut screening in Seattle, WA. The films premier screenings in Seattle & Olympia had the director, Jackie Reem Salloum on hand to answer questions, as well as artists from the film - Sabreena da Witch and Mohammed Al-Farra of PR... and i had the honor of performing alongside these incredible emcees in both citys! All i can say is... wow. Palestinian Hip Hop is DOPE... Slingshot Hip Hop might be one of the most important films on Hip Hop i've ever seen... and it's been so life-affirming to get to know these artists, and really see how powerful a tool for liberation this music can be... all across the world. Both lineups were off the hook... the Olympia show also featured SKIM, Mark Gonzalez and Canary Sing... and in Seattle the show also featured 1st Quarter Storm, Language Arts, DJ WD4D, Canary Sing and some group called Abyssinian Creole... hosting, laptop dj'ing, working the sound, and beatboxing all night.... whew! if you get a chance tho... go see that film!!! we'll be bringing it back soon...

and yo!!! check what Seattle Weekly had to say about it too... Reverb - Last Night: Slingshot Hip-Hop at the Hidmo