Boobah Siddik represents African Hip Hop in the U.S
Written by African Hip Hop Task Force
Wednesday, 21 November 2007
Msia Kibona Clark
Washington, DC
Ivorian
hip hop artist Boobah Siddik has been active in the hip hop community
since he left West Africa in 1997 and headed for the U.S. For the past
five years he has been recording music and managing the site
UnitedNationsofHipHop.com. Msia Kibona Clark sat down with Boobah Siddik recently to talk about his career and his views on African hip hop artists.
Boobah
Siddik, who now rhymes mostly in English, released his first album,
Shadow Storm, in 2003. His next album, Hipolitics, followed in 2004.
His hard-hitting style and brash lyrics are often infused with reggae
rhythms that speak to important political and social issues.
When I asked Boobah Siddik what influenced his
style and the more political direction of his music, he admitted that
his music had matured over time. Like many youth, his first attraction
to hip hop was to the music’s glittery side. It was not until he delved
further into it that he began to its potential as both a vehicle to
speak out on injustice and as a way to show alternate images of what is
going on in the United States from an African perspective.
The
language in which artists perform is always interesting, especially for
those from Francophone Africa. Rapping in French or an African language
will give an artist broader appeal among the masses of urban African
youth not fluent in English. However, when I asked Boobah Siddik, who
was originally from Côte d'Ivoire, why he used English, he said while
his first album was in French he felt rapping in English would get his
message across to a more diverse audience, especially in the United
States.
Boobah Siddik’s upcoming CD, Dead Goats: Chronicles of a Jindo,
is due out this month on the independent label, Armadawah Records. The
album will feature collaborations with artists such as Wanlov (Ghana),
Lone Starr (Jamaica), Sandstorm Ja and Smoka Seezy (Senegal) and Lord
Cheik (Ivory Coast).
Boobah Siddik’s other
project is his website, UnitedNationsofHipHop. It launched in 2005 and
focuses on African hip hop artists, giving them a platform to get their
message out. In addition to information on artists, it provides
articles on hip hop, including those published by allAfrica.com and other news sources.
With just a small community of African rap
artists in the U.S., comparisons are inevitably made between African
artists who are recent arrivals in the U.S. and those, like Akon and
Chamillionaire, who were the children of African immigrants to the
country.
While Africans embrace both groups as
African artists, those who have recently arrived are part of a new
phenomenon. Artists such as Boobah Siddik, Balozi and Rah P of
Tanzania, and Bataka Squad of Uganda, stand at the crossroads of
American and African hip hop.
They often speak
to both African and American realities and have fan bases both in
Africa and among African immigrant communities in the U.S. None have
been successful in the mainstream of America’s xenophobic hip hop
community, but all have underground followings and form links that
strengthen the African hip hop community in the U.S.
Ivorian
hip hop artist Boobah Siddik has been active in the hip hop community
since he left West Africa in 1997 and headed for the U.S. For the past
five years he has been recording music and managing the site
UnitedNationsofHipHop.com. Msia Kibona Clark sat down with Boobah Siddik recently to talk about his career and his views on African hip hop artists.
