Sean Jacobs's Blog, page 559

Joburg label Iapetus brings us unique South African sounds

From Zetina Mosia's upcoming album "The RoundAbout", this track: 'Lately'. We've said this before, but the Johannesburg label Iapetus is an exceptional breeding ground for South African artists — remember Fifi the Rai Blaster, Yugen Blakrok, Robo the Technician or Gin i Grindith — with a special mention for Kanif, the producer behind many of the songs.

The Lagos preacher and the football final

When it comes to football punditry, hindsight is the easy way out. So while your very own and brave AIAC published a  top 10 list of African footballers who could emerge this year way back in early January, pundits, like the BBC's Piers Edwards, waited until after the AFCON to make the same prediction. But our early or Edwards' after the fact predictions have nothing on a Lagos pastor who claimed God showed him the final match in its entirety beforehand.

But before we get to that pastor, let's get back to the players first. No surprise to see the name of Emmanuel Mayuka sitting right at the top of the BBC list. Mayuka was sensational throughout the AFCON, scoring a classy winner against Ghana in the semi and pulling off the tournament's outstanding assist with an outrageous piece of skill to set up Chris Katongo against Libya. The big question, as with all the Zambians, will be whether Mayuka can sustain the level he showed in Gabon and Equatorial Guinea outside of what was obviously an extraordinarily driven and spirited Zambian team.

Younes Belhanda (Tunisia) and Youssef Msakni (Morocco) both look the real deal too. Expect Arsenal to sign the pair of them and turn them into a couple of soft-shoed, goal-shy Rosickys.

Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang was outstanding for Gabon right up until his heartbreaking penalty miss against Mali in the quarters. Not since Baggio in '94 has the world felt so sorry for a man with such a silly haircut making such a hash of a spot-kick. Asamoah Gyan is proof of just how damaging a miss of that magnitude can be to a player, especially if folk insist in immortalising it in song.

Other players who might have been worth a mention are Zambian trio Nathan Sinkala (he of the absolutely stonking penalty in the shootout), Isaac Chansa and Stophira Sunzu, all of whom must have attracted interest from scouts at AFCON.

If those scouts want some really solid predictions, they could do worse than ask this fellow, a Lagosian pastor (he's part of this crew) who predicted a win for Zambia in the run-up to the final. He had the distinct advantage of having God show him the match in its entirety beforehand (using some kind of divine DirectTv, one assumes), unlike we base heathens at AIAC, who nonetheless correctly predicted a Chipolopolo victory after extra time (ok so the score wasn't exactly right, but I think we were a bit more specific than the pastor).

Friday Music Bonus Edition

It's a mixed bag this week. Kenyan artist Ato Malinda created a video for one of the tracks of last year's BLNRB album (music is by the Teichmann Brothers, vocals are by Alai K):

Also from Kenya comes 'Radio Love' by J'Mani, Collo and Lyra Aoko. (Only including this because of the "jabulani swagger" line.)

French-Malian rapper Mokobe shared a new video for 'Boombadeing':

More hip hop from Raashan Ahmad (who seems to be spending a lot of time in Europe lately), Rita J and Moe Pope:

And to slow it down, Y'akoto's got a new video out too. We're still waiting for that debut album of hers:

Shameless Self-Promotion

So I released an album this week, and shot my first ever music video for it as well. This is my personal reflection on Sorie Kondi's original message, integrating footage from his video, and my own from New York and Freetown. I hope you enjoy.

Africa at the 2012 Berlinale

The London film world (and its media) have been turned to the 2012 Berlinale. As film critics and journalists flock to Germany for the annual festival, complaints about the Teutonic cold are routine, as are the proclamations heralding a new masterpiece of world cinema. This year's programme featured a few interesting releases by African directors.

The Moroccan director Faouzi Bensaidi's film "Death For Sale" (2011) screened early on, already marked with a Special Jury price from the Moroccan National Film Festival in Tangiers. Death For Sale is reviewed as a 'gritty thriller', mixing prostitution, trafficking, murder and religious extremism into a heady, forceful narrative mix, as three young men plan to raid a jewellers. Subtitledonline.com describes it as incorporating "… shots that dabble in the sublime, taking in grand views of Tetouan and its neighboring mountains, as if hinting at some kind of higher force existing obliviously above this amoral society."

This is Bensaidi's third feature film since his recognition in 2003 at Cannes, where he received the Youth Award for his film "A Thousand Months," an incredibly ambitious first film that portrayed the passing time of three generations of villagers in the Atlas Mountains in Morocco.

Here's the trailer for "Death For Sale":

Also screening was French-Senegalese director Alain Gomis's film "Aujourd'hui" (Today), a quiet and dreamlike film of the last 24 hours of a man's life. The Hollywood Reporter described Gomis's third film to be 'full of extended silences punctuated by bursts of talk', with a 'poetic sensibility', that feels mannered in comparison to Sembene or Cisse's work. Gomis describes the film as: "… the kind of tale that takes place in an imaginary society in which death comes looking for someone. The film starts when he opens his eyes and ends when they close."

Most celebrated among these at this year's Berlinale is Kim Nguyen's "Rebelle" (War Witch), for which the young 14-year old Congolese star, Rachel Mwanza, won Best Actress at the festival.

Here she is receiving the award:

And here's a link to the Rebelle trailer.

It is described as neither simple, nor sensation, a heartfelt story from the straightforward viewpoint of its young heroine, Komona, who is abducted from her village to become a child soldier. Filmed in Congo, Canadian director Nyugen fuses documentary aesthetics with fictionalized narrative; "the anonymity and total availability of all the performers, who ignore the camera and do not play for its benefit, contributes to the authenticity of the entire project."

In the Berlinale Panorama section, the South African thriller "Man on Ground" by Nigerian director Akin Omotoso screened. The film addresses the issues of xenophobia in contemporary Johannesburg, following the life of a young Nigerian refugee living in a tenement building in the city, who is abducted one night. Here's the trailer:

Watch the blog for Sean's review of the film soon.

The Variety blog describes it as "a cross-hybridization of BBC police thriller and Bergmanesque meditation on intra-African immigration" and that "Man on Ground" boasts "… some literally fantastic visual flourishes as well as a bewildering inability to find narrative traction."

However, the film I am most excited about seeing portrays Africa in an oblique and tentative way. "Tabu," by critic-turned-filmmaker Michel Gomes, promises to be compelling, complicated and witty. Film magazine Sight & Sound described Tabu as beginning with 'a prologue of considerable dry wit about a 19th century explorer in Africa who is so hounded by the ghost of the woman he abandoned that he sacrifices himself to a crocodile', beginning the film with a 'flat-on', 'cod-ethnographic' style, reviving a silent-era style in a very different mode to The Artist…  After this prologue, the film takes place in Lisbon, where the narrative follows an elderly woman worried about her neighbor, who complains she is kept prisoner by her Cape Verdean housekeeper.

This is just a brief round-up of the films I'll be keeping an eye out for as they travel to London. Please feel free to add any comments about films you feel should be mentioned from this year's Berlinale!

Music Break. Kaba Blon

Thinking about Mbalax Dub, got me wanting to share some more of Kaba Blon. It doesn't seem like they have uploaded anything online yet, and the only song available for purchase I believe is Moribayassa. But, Mo Laudi was playing me some more of their tracks the other day. He had gotten them from a Malian friend in Paris.

Sacha Baron Cohen's Gaddafi spoof

The trailer for Sacha Baron Cohen's latest comedy, "The Dictator," where he plays a thinly veiled cut-and-paste Muammar Gaddafi complete with Bollywood remix, Hamid Karzai lookalike rival, camels and 9/11 themed jokes. Tons of teenage boys will go see this.

Your no comment moment

The trailer for Sacha Baron Cohen's latest comedy, "The Dictator," where he plays a thinly veiled cut-and-paste Muammar Gaddafi complete with Bollywood remix, camels and 9/11 themed jokes. Tons of teenage boys will go see this.

Yasiin Bey, ladies and gentlemen

The rapper formerly known as Mos Def's take on the Jay Z track with his own song, "N****s in Poorest."

Azonto Germany

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So apparently there's more to the Ghana-Germany connection than the Boateng boys. I think the above Azonto rave in Hamburg this past January is proof of that. It's perhaps an illustration of some of the points we were trying to make about diverse histories and orientations of African pop, the diaspora, and its international dissemination. If anything it is an illustration of the speed with which culture travels now.

When I went to the Ghana independence day bash in Manhattan a year ago there was none of this Azonto craze. This year, with V.I.P. in the building, I'm sure it'll be Azonto all over the place!

But back to Europe. It's not only contained to Hamburg. There was a Christmas Azonto battle in Denmark, and if you look hard it's not only Ghanaians in the building either! I continue to be surprised, but excited by such cultural manifestations, and how we're able to see how global culture is morphing in front of our eyes.

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Till, a Hamburg based DJ friend who represents the So Shifty crew sent me these videos, and has done an Azonto mix. I probably would have been surprised that he was so up to the time with a bunch of tracks I knew from clubbing in Accra, Monrovia, and Freetown this summer, but in the context of all this it definitely makes sense.

Tracklist here.