Stuff I’m Loving Right Now
I’m a bit preoccupied with Africa as a continent this week. I think it started when I saw two fashion spreads about Africa — textiles, jewelry, etc, being ‘in’ for spring. Combine that with a recent gift of beads from a friend’s visit to Nigeria, and recent purchases of music from Nigeria, Morocco, and Somalia by way of Canada, and well, I’ve been All-Africa-all-the-time this week.
- White African
- Erik Hersman, a white African (he grew up in Kenya and Sudan) living in the United States. He blogs about African technology use and people to watch in the African tech space.
- App+frica
- Led by Jonathan Gosier, an African-American living in Uganda, App+frica covers about technology use and adoption on the continent, particularly in Uganda, Kenya and Tanzania. Gosier and Hersman will participate in a panel at SXSW on web applications and African markets.
- GlobalPost
- Drupal-powered. A new, interestng source for on-the-ground types of news stories from around the globe. If I ever decide that I need to be a foreign correspondent covering North Africa, I’m going to try to get in with GlobalPost first. [Disclosure: I know the design team]
- Nigeria 70: Lagos Jump, by various artists
- 70s-era Afrobeat, funk, and Nigerian pop-roc that sounds like American surf rock if surf rock was Nigerian.
- Mani Ghribe by Nass El Ghiwane
- Nass El Ghiwane are the elder statesmen of modern Moroccan music. It’s straight-up Gnawa, mixed with some elements of rock.
- Troubadour by K’Naan
- Somalian-born, Canadian-based. K’Naan raps about love, hope, being an African-Canadian, as well as Somalian and east African life. It’s definitely happy-hop — comparable to the Black Eyed Peas, Wyclef Jean, Q-Tip and Akon. Lots of pop, rock and soul influences, plus some (I assume) Somalian lyrics. Kind of refreshing to be honest. But what should shut every gangster rapper up is this bit from this NPR profile of K’Naan:
He says he doesn’t think that American rap has much credibility, because even the toughest American neighborhoods aren’t nearly as dangerous as Mogadishu.
Word.