A Glorious Noise – Blitz the Ambassador

As hard as I try, my posts are not always necessarily on topic.  This post on Blitz the Ambassador, AKA Samuel Bazawule, is an example!  In my defense, he is African and (as far as I can tell), natural, so I suppose I’m not straying too far.  Sometimes I have to rep for the boys!

I’m a total music hound – a lover of all genres, but with a preference for indie rock and jazz/funk.  Over the years, I have become fairly disillusioned with hip hop and R&B…it’s the high-fat, sugar-loaded overprocessed junk food to my inner fatty – not good for me, but I indulge on occasion (usually via Mr. Parr)…but of course there are exceptions, and many of them are African.

There’s Nigerian-American rapper Wale, whose Nike Boots still makes my heart swell with hometown pride everytime I hear it; K’Naan whose duet with Keen is one of my favourite hip-hop(?) tracks of the year; MC Solaar, the Chadian/French rapper whoseLa Belle et le Bad Boy was played in the closing scenes of the final episode of Sex and the City.  In Nigerian hip-hop, there are crossover hits like 9ice’s Gongo Aso and el Dee’s Bosi Gbangba (more for the production and hilarious lyrics, than the flow).  The list goes on, and on…

Ghanian rapper, Blitz the Ambassador has a flow that is completely ridunculous. Somewhat reminiscent of The Root’s Black Thought but heavier.  He raps over a horn-heavy live band (The Embassy Ensemble) whose sound is very high-life/Fela kuti’s Egypt 80.  Lyrically, he shouts out everyone (rapper, Rakim and artist, Basquiat) and everywhere across the continent (Dar es Salaam, Conakry, N’Djamena,…).  He raps in English and the Ghanian language Twi, switching between the two as in the track Akwaaba (Welcome).  A lot has been said of how the French language lends itself to phrasing/rap, but rapping in Twi? ri.dunc.u.lous!  Who knew?

His first album, Stereotype was released off his own label, Embassy MVMT, last August and follow up Native Son is due out this fall.

Here’s an interview/performance from WNYC from July 6th.