The Kafa Beanz: Andromeda: The Chronicles of Blackopia Vol. 1 is finally being released to the world! Available exclusively on
AddisTunes.com, starting this Friday September 25th, 2009 - which coincides with the very first
Ethiopian-American Appreciation Day.
If your just tuning in, The Kafa Beanz is a group comprised of Ethiopian/Hip Hop fusion pioneer
Burntface,
B. Sheba, Grammy-nominated singer
Wayna,
AP, and myself -
Gabriel Teodros, with special guest apperances including
Hermela Mulatu (daughter of Ethiopian Jazz legend
Mulatu Astatke) The music is where Hip Hop, Soul and Ethiopian Jazz all meet and decide to create our own planet. We released the album in the Summer of 2008, and distributed all the discs almost exclusively in
Washington, D.C. (where most of the group is based) at the ESFNA Soccer Tournament. The album has been pretty impossible to find since then... and it's too good for you to not experience the whole ride. I mean, my guy designed a Meskel Spaceship! (see the video above) We also produced a whole series of music videos for this project... (check
Tizita,
Fly Away, and
iRock.)
See what
Larry Mizell, Jr. of
The Stranger and
KEXP 90.3 FM's
Street Sounds had
to say about The Kafa Beanz, after i passed him a very limited-edition physical copy of Andromeda, last summer for his column, My Philosophy:
"Speaking of, I just ran into my man Gabriel Teodros, who's all over the map these days finding inspiration from D.C. to Toronto to Vancouver, BC. He hit me off with Andromeda: The Chronicles of Blackopia Volume 1 by Kafa Beanz, a collective of Ethiopian-American hiphop artists that includes Teodros, Burntface, BSheba, Wayna, and AP. Yo... this shit is dope! I'm particularly impressed with Burntface's ill, commanding flow (just hear him skate on the Afrobeat of "iRock"), but there's definitely no slouches here; there's some gorgeous soulful vocals from Wayna, and BSheba gots way more swag than most females on the mic—I expect to hear more from her. AP brings a street-born wisdom and Gabe himself sounds more inspired and his delivery more refined than I've yet heard—whatever he's been up to since he peaced out of here is clearly working. Much love, homey! This is a very strong debut from the Blackopia collective- consciousness, street and revolutionary. "
Get you some of this at AddisTunes.com - 9.25.09!!!
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