VIDEO: Akala "Find No Enemy"

I found out about Akala via an article on the Independent's website about British hip hop. There were many artists who were mentioned throughout the article, but Akala stuck out for me. Here's one of his quotes from the article:

"I think rappers have found our voice within the UK to some degree, but we have to be very careful with what we label hip-hop and what we label rap music," says Akala.

He goes on to say:

"A diluted derivative of the culture can be paraded as the culture and then people lose the essence of what it really is and actually think hip-hop is about trying to sell people champagne and jewellery."

The article also included three tracks from Akala's recently released project. This is where I got pulled in.

The first was "Peace" and it caught me off guard because the article was talking about hip hop and grime music and what not. So I expected something uptempo. And you guessed it, "Peace" is not uptempo at all. As a matter of fact, it was nearly beatless. More like poetry w/a piano in the background. That's how I figured, well, this ain't your regular hip hopper.

"Yours and My Children" provides that tempo that I thought would be in "Peace". Akala comes hard on the lyrics: "Muslim, Christian ... all of our sons"; he goes on to name countries where there's war and strife and says "yours and my children".

The last track was "Find No Enemy". Incredibly cool track. It's melancholy w/the guitar as the pleasant backdrop. It's thought provoking too. It's six minutes of 'I've got something to say'. It's the kind of lyrics that's missing too often from music these days. I mean, I don't want every song to be socially conscious and political, but I also don't want every one to be that other thing either.

So check the vid hip hoppers ... and please know that fat meat is greasy. kfox.