2012 was such a transformational year for me... I was off the blog mostly, so I'm taking the New Years as a chance to catch up, and hopefully I'll keep ya'll updated more regularly from here on out. Releasing music was obviously a highlight, and I did take every opportunity to let ya'll know what was happening with the
Colored People's Time Machine record and
CopperWire's
Earthbound, as well as the my brother
Bocafloja's
Patologias del Invisible Incomodo (which featured a song we did together entitled
Agonia about colonization's affect on our bodies through the foods we eat... which last time I checked on youtube the video has over 50,000 hits?) The CopperWire tour was especially incredible... getting to rock cities like
Seattle,
New York,
San Francisco,
Detroit and
Los Angeles with so many of our heroes including
Tamar-kali,
Invincible,
Maya Jupiter & Aloe Blacc,
Quetzal,
Black Stax and
Bocafloja was an awesome experience. We also had heroes in every crowd. So much love and appreciation to every single person who supported us along the way. I also want to shout out
my Instagram... from the moment I downloaded that app until the moment my phone died, it caught so many great moments from this last year. In a way, the photos I posted over the course of the year
there, tell a better story than anything I'm able to write here.
So being one-third of an
Ethiopian Hip Hop Space Opera launched us into a world of
African Science-Fiction in 2012, and that has been an absolute highlight of my entire life... starting with the first conversation on the phone I had with
Nnedi Okorafor, that happened on my birthday last year :) Nnedi is a Naijamerican novelist alien sorceress (as stated in the
legend of CopperWire, which she was so gracious to write) and she wrote the best new novel I read in 2011,
Who Fears Death; an epic story set in a post-apocalyptic Saharan Africa. It's been wonderful and so inspiring to read more of her work this year.
Later in the year, when I found out I was getting this incredible opportunity to go to
Cape Town, South Africa, Nnedi and my good friend
Tigist Selam both introduced me to my new favorite film maker,
Wanuri Kahiu. Wanuri is based in
Nairobi, and meeting her, learning about her process and what she has cooking, was such an inspiration. Her short film
Pumzi is one of the best things I saw in 2011... do yourself a favor and look that up on Netflix now if you've never seen it. She introduced me to the music and videos of
Just A Band... which are amazing and all have a sci-fi element, and during my time in South Africa I also got to meet
Mbithi from Just A Band, and another incredible Afrofuturist film maker from Nairobi by the name of
Bobb Muchiri. Bobb is the creative force behind
Kichwateli (posted above) which was easily one of the best things I've seen in 2012. In June, the
BBC did a special featuring Nnedi, Wanuri and others entitled
"Is Science Fiction coming to Africa?" I'd say the answer is a resounding
yes, along with it's always been there.
What was I doing in Cape Town you ask? Well... thanks to a few of my close friends and some of the most amaazing people I met in
Ethiopia in the Spring of 2011, me and my sister
Walidah Imarisha (who's yet-to-be-released project with
Adrienne Maree Brown entitled
Octavia's Brood: Science Fiction Stories from the Social Justice Movement is the reason I even got so deep into Speculative Fiction again after all these years) got invited to participate in the
OpenForum 2012; a conference that brought together leaders in many different fields from all across Africa and the Diaspora to talk about
"Money, Power & Sex: The Paradox of Unequal Growth."
We were inspired, we were challenged, our lives changed, the world got smaller and our family got bigger... all in one week. So many of my 2012 highlights stem from this trip that it deserves it's own blog. I'll try to stick to what I can link you too.
Warsan Shire; I had been checking out her poetry for a while now, but getting to know this sister and being able to call her family in 2012 is a highlight for real, she inspires me to be more honest with myself and the world around me, and she happens to be one of the funniest people I know :)
eL Seed; incredible Arabic calligraffiti artist from
Tunisia. Every piece I've seen him do involves the entire community around him... this brother is also hilarious, crazy inspiring and he's got a
2013 calendar making our kitchen more beautiful right now.
Illume Creative Studio; So good to finally meet
Anne from
Rwanda, after years of internetting back & forth. Her crew from Illume was there to document the entire journey and they felt like family right away.
Ian Kamau; my brother from another hometown (
Toronto) inspired me again by doing what I wish I did when he stayed in South Africa, and then got to tour the whole country along with Kenya, Ethiopia and Rwanda. His blog is great so I felt like I was right there too. Now, if you can imagine everyone I just mentioned in an empty hotel lobby, and all of us spitting verses along with
Tumi (of the legendary
Tumi and the Volume) and
Zubz the Last Letter... you have one of my personal favorite moments of 2012. I wonder what Bobb ever did with that footage...
Another one of my favorite moments at the conference was learning from
Hakima Abbas and
Jessica Horn about the
MBBC: Movement Building Bootcamp for Queer African Activists. Their website is incredible... almost as incredible as being in a room full of Africans from all around the world who care about the same issues. Thank you
Mazuba and everyone who helped bring us together!
Before we left South Africa, Walidah made sure we visited
Robben Island, where members of the
African National Congress were imprisoned during Apartheid, and where
Nelson Mandela was held for 18 years. The feeling of even for a moment leaving Africa on a boat, on a stormy day with wind and water stinging our face... is such a deep feeling I couldn't even put it into words... but Walidah said it perfectly right here:
"Robben Island" by Walidah Imarisha
Soon after leaving Cape Town, I took a road trip with a few of my best friends from
Toronto back to
Detroit for the
Allied Media Conference, another highlight of 2012.
When I think of Detroit now, I think of our future. What happens when the industry of an entire city collapses, over half of the population moves away, and the people left invent new ways to cooperate and survive and thrive for over 50 years? Welcome to the D... cold winters, hot summers, and the pride is infectious. I have to thank
Invincible for welcoming CopperWire to the city, rocking with us, and giving all of us our first tour of the D when we were on the
Earthbound tour. Invincible makes me want to do more as an artist every day. The first night we were in the city this time, they introduced us to the
Detroit Future Youth Network, which brought together 12 different youth organizations from around the city, and all the youth gave workshops and developed curriculum that was then distributed as the
Detroit Future Youth Network Curriculum Mixtape on flash drives you can now purchase! Brilliance.
The AMC Opening Ceremony
"Experiments in the Species Self" was incredible, and it was inspiration behind the closing line in
my TED Talk. Autonets, wearable electronics, storytelling as the future of the human species... you should really just
watch the whole thing here. Another highlight of 2012 was getting to know
Adrienne Maree Brown, who's workshop on Octavia Butler's
Lilith's Brood was amazing, and who's
blog has been a regular source of inspiration all year. The AMC was a lot of fire, a lot of love, good information, inspiration... and kind of a continuation of what happened in South Africa. I'm looking forward to going back this year, and to all of our worlds getting closer as we grow.
After Detroit, and thanks to my soul sibling
Julay (aka the genius behind the
Colored People's Time Machine artwork) I finally made it to
Montreal... and it completely took me by surprise! Three words:
Kalmunity Vibe Collective. The largest musical collective in Canada.
Imagine an improv night, with 10 musicians that revolve every week, and 3 main vocalists that also revolve every week... out of a cast of 60-100 people. (So more than 3 vocalists usually sit in.) The music is Hip Hop, Soul, Jazz, Reggae, there's spoken word, they might Rock out... it's all rooted in Black music, and is always about a feeling. The part that blew my mind, (and I feel so fortunate to have gotten to sit in as a featured vocalist my first night), is that it's
story-based improv with multiple vocalists. One of the musicians might start something, and all the other musicians start adding to it as they feel... while us vocalists are off-stage listening until inspiration strikes one of us. It might be a word, a whole chorus, a verse... whatever it is, we say the concept, chorus, or bridge to the group... and somebody else might have something that goes with it (or is ready to make something up in the moment) and then we just go and perform the song.
What I love about the way it's organized is that it's non-hierarchical, it forces everyone to listen, step up, communicate, trust their own strengths and know each others as well. If society could organize itself the way the vocalists of Kalmunity do, we'd be in a much better place. There's no particular genre, it's very gender-balanced, and you almost always hear multiple languages on stage too.
After multiple nights of Kalmunity (I sat in with them at the
Montreal Jazz Fest where they did 3 nights in a row, the same week) I realized how powerful it is for the whole city, to be able to go to a show every week because you know your going to have an experience, as opposed to going to a show to see somebody perform. I realized then if you decolonized music... took the industry out of it, took away the ego, and even the idea of a celebrity... every city would have something like Kalmunity.
Also, while at the Montreal Jazz Fest, I got to see my brother
The Narcicyst rock an incredible emotionally-charged last set as a Montreal resident. And then, the same week,
Nomadic Massive put on one of the best shows I've seen anyone do all year. Live band, 5 emcees (2 women + 3 men) spitting bars in at least 5 languages, completely in sync with choreography, and energy through the roof. Check out all their music, and go see them if you ever can. Montreal... I'm crushing on you. Tear'd up when I had to leave & everything.
And all of this brings us back to
Seattle, where I am now. There were more show highlights from
The Bay Area earlier in the year, particularly the release party for
Aisha Fukushima's
RAPtivism, and the
UndocuNation event at the Yerba Buena Center for the Arts. Highlights from Seattle include the show with
Jennifer Johns at Langston Hughes (what a gift), the
Bocafloja show we did at
Washington Hall,
Ahamefule J. Oluo's
"Now I'm Fine" (I will cry next time I hear that melody), and the
OuterSpaces tour that just passed (which featured Invincible, Climbing PoeTree and Krudas Cubensi) was the best show I saw anyone do all year. Oh, that and
Bamuthi's Red Black & GREEN! That was a whole nother level. There's so many highlights it's hard to name them all.
In general... I'm feeling very grounded and cool with being in Seattle for the time being. I'm in a house I love, I work 5 different jobs with no boss... can't complain. The future is very uncertain, but what else is new... it's
2013, we've outlived every scheduled apocalypse... time to keep inventing the future now. Hope to see ya'll more this year...
bless!
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