Sean Jacobs's Blog, page 682

'Who was the best rapper of all time?'

…The Hip-Hop Word Count is a searchable ethnographic database built from the lyrics of over 40,000 Hip-Hop songs from 1979 to present day. The Hip-Hop Word Count describes the technical details of most of your favorite hip-hop songs. This data can then be used to not only figure out interesting stats about the songs themselves, but also describe the culture behind the music. How can analyzing lyrics teach us about our culture? The Hip-Hop Word Count locks in a time and geographic location for every metaphor, simile, cultural reference, phrase, rhyme style, meme and socio-political idea used in the corpus of Hip-Hop. The Hip-Hop Word Count then converts this data into explorable visualisations which help us to comprehend this vast set of cultural data. This data is being used to chart the migration of ideas and to map a geography of language.

Serious.

Fact Checking Mandela

It's unfortunate the New York Times Book Review handed the appraisal of three recent books about Nelson Mandela–including Mandela's own new book–to J.M. Ledgard, identified as "the Africa correspondent for The Economist."* The books are Richard Stengel's Mandela's Way, David Smith's Young Mandela, and Conversations with Myself by Nelson Mandela

First, there are the factual errors–at least three leap out. First, Julius Nyerere's name is spelled incorrectly. Then Ledgard writes: "… Mandela met with the head of the apartheid intelligence service, Niel Barnard, in the 1980s. Two other Robben Island prisoners were delegated by the A.N.C. to talk with Barnard: these were the future South African presidents Thabo Mbeki and Jacob Zuma."

But Thabo Mbeki never served time on Robben Island. He left South Africa as a 19-year old in 1962 and only returned in 1990. As for Jacob Zuma, he was released from Robben Island in 1975 and also returned to South Africa in 1990. Both men–Mbeki and Zuma–did secretly negotiate with Barnard, but they did so in various locations in Europe during the mid- to late-1980s.

Second, we're forced to swallow a graphic depiction of Mandela's circumcision as though it reveals something about him and the three books Ledgard is reviewing, "For Mandela, the circumcision was something that linked him with his Thembu ancestors; in losing a part of his manhood, he became a man." Ledgard claims to be highlighting through this story the extent to which all three books contain an "African quest narrative." Is it the public circumcision that is supposed to convey to readers Mandela's "African-ness"?

Clearly the least interesting part of Mandela's life has to do with circumcision if you read Conversations With Myself (which one of is doing now). Yet Ledgard goes farther in extrapolating strange details from Mandela's life in his exploration of the books in his shaky portraiture.

In Ledgard's concluding remarks, he references Mandela's two failed marriages and estranged familiar relationships. Does it give us a better sense of Mandela's humanity, or life, to speculate about these relationships without any context? Surely the average person can imagine the toll prison places on a relationship, and the choices political figures must make to advance their cause. Mandela reveals much himself about the gravity of these choices in "Conversations of my Father." From Ledgar's writing one would imagine Mandela a Lothario of sorts–and yet again even the beginning historian can imagine Winnie Mandela's disturbing political evolution during Mandela's imprisonment contributing to a troubled marriage.

Ledgard says of the three books, David James Smith's Young Mandela is the one to read. But we'll stick with Mandela's own words, Conversations with Myself, because only Mandela experienced his life.

* Who is the Europe correspondent for The Economist?–Caitlin Chandler, Sean Jacobs

Somewhere in Africa (The Remix)

Remember Meta and Cornerstones' tune "Somewhere in Africa"? It got a makeover as a remix (with a new video) featuring Peeta of Jamaican reggae band, Morgan Heritage. Have to say I like the remix better.

The Grammys

Distracted by Cee Lo's chicken suit or Lady Gaga's latest stunt (she hatched from an egg), you may have missed Vieux Farka Touré accepting the Grammy for Best World Album on behalf of his father, Ali, and Toumani Diabate.

Via Modiba.

Shameless Self Promotion

The second episode of "What's Up Africa," the  Radio Netherlands Worldwide 'creative vlog on African culture' went up on Friday and includes a surprise at the end.

The Commonwealth Writers' Prize

The Commonwealth Foundation has announced its regional shortlists (Africa; Caribbean and Canada; South Asia and Europe; and South East Asia and the Pacific) for the 2011 edition of The Commonwealth Writers' Prize. Regional winners will be announced 3 March; and overall winners announced on 21 May. Here are the African finalists:

Africa Best Book:

The Memory of Love by Aminatta Forna (above, Sierra Leone)

Men of the South by Sukiswa Wanner (South Africa)

The Unseen Leopard by Bridget Pitt (South Africa)

Oil on Water by Helon Habila (Nigeria)

Blood at Bay by Sue Rabie (South Africa)

Banquet at Brabazan by Patricia Schonstein (South Africa)

Africa Best First Book:

Happiness is a Four Letter Word by Cynthia Jele (South Africa)

Bitter Leaf by Chioma Okereke (Nigeria)

The Fossil Artist by Graeme Friedman (South Africa)

Colour Blind by Uzoma Uponi (Nigeria)

Voice of America by E. C. Osondu (Nigeria)

Wall of Days by Alastair Bruce (South Africa)

More information on the process and the judges.

True Blood or Sushi

S: What does this say about contemporary white Afrikaans speaking culture?

T: That Van Coke Kartel prefers True Blood over sushi?* That Francois van Coke is still a better actor than he is a singer?* How I wish they'd come up with something fresh… I hope these guys (in this video) have got the crediting all sorted:

S: The tune's not that great. Sounds like your average Country Music Television band.

T: That tune's terrible, no need to be diplomatic, I was pointing to the fact they're now even openly recycling. It's as if the only one getting something right/original is director/animator Louis Minnaar (who, admittedly, also did some stuff for Van Coke): check his work (and lyrics) for Bittereinder for example:

S: I like how the Bittereinder video is shot.

H: This is the first time I've seen/heard Willim Welsyn, and the first time I've seen the Bittereinder video–just recently listened to their CD for the first time. But this brief first listen did not impress me much–their music struck me as rather lame and clumsy (there's one track on the CD with Tumi and the Volume which is not too bad – the parts with Tumi in them). The Welsyn song's politics are predictable and transparent–perhaps a cheap trick–but there's something in the tune's nihilism that I quite like – like it could have been made into a decent song by a band that had a sense of humour about bleakness (I thought of e.g. the Belgian band Gorki).

T: About Tumi: a fair piece was published on Mahala today.  There's a video of that Bittereinder/Tumi/Jack Parow song as well: A Tale of Three Cities:

I grew up with Gorki. Their song 'Mia' anually ends up in the Top 3 of Radio 1's "Tijdloze Honderd". Rightfully so, but then I wonder whether it would resonate across our borders (apparently it does, H?). I don't think Willim Welsyn resonates beyond the Afrikaans festivals. Do they appear on MK at all?

H: I'm not sure Gorki resonates beyond weirdo's like me. I once interviewed them when they were invited to an Afrikaans festival in Potchefstroom (in the Northwest Province, a highly repressed Calvinist outpost) and nobody seemed to care about them. Afrikaans audiences only like Dutch/Flemish stuff when it's schmalzy like Stef Bos or Herman van Veen.

T: Don't forget Dana Winner (got ripped off by her manager when in South Africa during her last tour, forcing her to cancel many shows, disappointing hundreds of tannies). I've done five months of fieldwork in Potch. That was enough, really. On the other hand, I saw an Afrikaans interpretation of Festen (the play) at Aardklop. Now that was quite something.

H: Five days in Potch were enough for me.

T: Ethnographic fieldwork can bring you to the most interesting places. Speaking of festivals: have you seen this year's Woordfees line-up? With the exception of a handful of authors, all of them were also programmed the first time I attended it five years ago. But I read Arnon Grunberg has also been invited. They don't know what's gonna hit them. Oh, and there was one other song I liked last year: Will Mono & Jan Joknie's "Seks vir Plesier," [Sex for Pleasure] nominated for this year's MK awards in the category 'Beste Pornster':

[image error]

Music Break

Illa J, younger brother of J Dilla, teams up with Belgian producer Cris Prolific. February is Dilla Month. - Tom Devriendt

Found Objects, No.10

There's something about American comedians and Africa. You're not sure whether they're laughing at us or with us. African-Americans comedians, in particular, always return to the subject. There's an essay in there somewhere. I swear I once saw a notice for a talk at Columbia's Institute for African-American Studies or NYU's Africana Studies, on this very subject. I wrote to the departments, with no luck. Maybe someone can help.

Anyway, I can think of a few examples of this trope. For starters, take this legendary mid-1970s stand-up bit by Richard Pryor on "The African Jungle." (Pryor, incidentally, visited Kenya in 1979 after which he swore–in an interview with Ebony Magazine–to never use the N-word again):

Then compare Pryor's subtle humor to the more recent, weak, attempt at laughs by Jamie Foxx, who visited Mozambique and South Africa (both countries standing in for 1974-era Zaire) while filming "Ali" with Will Smith.

Or the predictable punchline from Chris Rock, who filmed his most recent special partly in Johannesburg:

Finally, there's the more edgy comedy of Wyatt Cenac. [Cenac, btw, is also a very good actor (ref: "Medicine for Melancholy") and makes his living working for Jon Stewart]:

And as an extra I could not leave out this clip of white American comedian, Robin Williams, channeling the atrocious "The Gods Must be Crazy" on Jay Leno:

Music Break

[image error]