I really like old newsreels.

Here’s Louis Armstrong visiting Africa 50 years ago.

I like old newsreels.

And Internet Archive’s got ’em. Here’s one that’s certified kosher for Black History Month:

Speaking of Nigeria...

... here’s a taste of “Nigerian Idol.” (Hat-tip: What Would Thembi Do?)

The Barack Obama of Africa

Here’s a neat little irony or coincidence or something. As the world grooves to the United States having a biracial president, Sub-Saharan Africa last year also got a biracial head of state.

Ian Khama, the president of Botswana, was born in the U.K. His father was Sir Seretse Khama, who led his nation to independence. His mother was an Englishwoman named Ruth Williams.

Their marriage – and its impact on the politics of southern Africa – is the subject of a recent book called “Colour Bar: The Triumph of Seretse Khama and His Nation.”

To check out Ian Khama’s Obama-like swagger, watch this CNN piece:

Pygmies on film

Documentary filmmakers have always been fascinated by the indigenous peoples of the Central African rainforest... the so-called “Pygmies.”

Here are three Pygmy travelogues, filmed from the late 1920s through the early ’50s.

Nigerian humor: Godfrey

In America, the best-known comedian from the Nigerian diaspora is Godfrey Danchimah, better known as Godfrey. I’m sure you’ve seen him in movies, commercials or on cable.

Godfrey has a bunch of YouTube videos up. Odd thing about that is, these standup performances seem to be off the cuff. He’s not delivering a polished set of material. Consequently, much of it isn’t funny.

But these clips do provide insights into Godfrey’s comedic mind. The clip below ends with a bit about “Bill Cosby as a rapist.” It is mean, gross... and somewhat funny.

Nigerian humor: Jocelyn Jee Esien

Jocelyn Jee Esien, born in London to Nigerian parents, is the star of her own BBC sketch comedy show. It’s called “Little Miss Jocelyn.”

Here’s one of her characters... a man-hating Jamaican divorcée named Gladys Kingston. This is kinda scan’lous!

Nigerian humor: Naija Boyz

The Nigerian diaspora is starting to have an impact on the world of comedy, as I shall illustrate in the coming days. Take Naija Boyz. Their latest YouTube video has clocked 195,000 views in 12 days.

Meet an African: Archbishop John Sentamu

With this series of posts, I want to write about notable Africans not only in Africa but elsewhere across the globe.

Such as John Sentamu, Archbishop of York, the second highest-ranking priest in the Church of England. (Sentamu’s full title is “The Most Reverend and Right Honourable the Lord Archbishop of York.”)

The Anglican Communion has an estimated 80 million members worldwide... with more than half of them in Africa.

Archbishop Sentamu was born in Uganda, earned a law degree there and practiced law. Then he emigrated to England in 1974... after being jailed for his opposition to Idi Amin.

In England, Sentamu earned undergraduate and advanced degrees in theology from Cambridge, and he was ordained a priest in 1979.

Since becoming archbishop, Sentamu has been an outspoken critic of Robert Mugabe, the dictator of Zimbabwe. In the 9-minute video clip below, recorded last month, Archbishop Sentamu describes Mugabe as sort of the second coming of Idi Amin:

“He has done exactly what Amin did. And because he is very educated and speaks well, people think he has not been brutal. ... [Mugabe] has been a very very very very vicious ruler, really. Very brutal against his own people.”

Don’t get greedy, dammit!

Archbishop Wilton D. Gregory of Atlanta couldn’t leave well enough alone. Check out this report from today’s Times of London:

“The election of Barack Obama as the first African-American US President could pave the way for the election of the first black Pope, according to a leading black American Catholic.

“Wilton Daniel Gregory, 60, the Archbishop of Atlanta, said that in the past Pope Benedict XVI had himself suggested that the election of a black pontiff would ‘send a splendid signal to the world’ about the universal Church. ...

“Archbishop Gregory said that the next time cardinals gathered to elect a Pope they could ‘in their wisdom’ choose an African pontiff. ‘My own election as head of the US Bishops Conference was an important signal. In 2001 the American bishops elected someone they respected regardless of his race, and the same thing could happen with the election of a Pope.’ ...”

UBM vs. Fisher on Zimbabwe

I don’t like to beef with other black bloggers. But Michael Fisher called me out in ridiculous fashion the other night, posting Rhodesian atrocity photos and claiming that I’d like to see white folks back in control of Zimbabwe.

I decided to flex my serve-and-volley game on the motherfucker.

Reproduced below is a portion of our dueling commentary, beginning about mid-stream. I have made a few cuts for readability’s sake... but I haven’t corrected Pisher’s spelling errors and typos.

If he (or anyone else) wants to continue the discussion, I’ll do so here, not on Pisher’s blog.

MICHAEL FISHER: ... So let me ask you straight up, Davis.

Are the African people of Zimbabwe mentally inferior to the European people of England or are they not?

UNDERCOVER BLACK MAN: I have no way of knowing. Nor do you. Which is why I don’t make pronouncements about “inferiority.” (If you have evidence that Zimbabweans are mentally equivalent to or mentally superior to the English, please point me to it.)

Anyone, meanwhile, can look at the history of civilizations and determine the advantages and disadvantages of each. Which is useful to do.

The inability of a people to read and write is clearly disadvantageous in a world where the Arabs, the Chinese and the Europeans were not only reading and writing... but applying their burgeoning knowledge base to the creation of wealth by spreading far beyond their borders to buy and sell shit.

FISHER: ... “If you have evidence that Zimbabweans are mentally equivalent to or mentally superior to the English, please point me to it”

I’ll be happy to: ...

You can not defeat a an enemy who is superior in armament, technology, and economic resources by being “intellectually less developed” than that enemy, David.

UBM: Oh for pity’s sake, Michael. You got to come stronger than that.

You know better than anyone that ZANU and ZAPU received money, weapons, political support and – most importantly – military and tactical training from the Soviet Union, Communist China and North Korea. (Could the Zimbabweans have won a war without this help? Apparently they didn’t think so.)

So try again: If you have evidence that Zimbabweans are mentally equivalent to or mentally superior to the English, please point me to it.

FISHER: Once again, you don’t know what you are talking about. ZAPU certainly received military equipment and training from the Soviets, but their army, ZIRPA like the ANC’s Umkonto We Sizwe, put it to very limited use. ZIRPA was useless. In 1973 ZANU had not yet to receive broad material support from the Chinese. Most of the material support the actually received from Tanzania (who last I checked were African),as well as the Pan-Africanist and other black nationalist organizations here in the United States as well as some Maoist formations in Germany, mainly the KBW. ZANU/ZANLA received no support whatsoever from the Soviets and the Eastern bloc.

No matter. Even if the Chinese and the Soviets had trained them in guerrilla warfare to the T, they still were the ones who planned and executed the war.

How is that “weak”? You ever been in the military?

You are such a die hard racist, Mills, that you dismiss any and everything that points to the quite remarkable ingenuity and intelligence of Africans.

The problem with that is, that this is the least intelligent type of racism.

A real white supremacist/racist is a scientist. Else the small minority of truly powerful white supremacists would not be able to maintain the repressive system of white supremacy globally.

They do not underestimate the intelligence, ingenuity, and power of Africans and other non-white people. Else they would have perished a long while ago.

FISHER: Now since I answered your question, how abut you answer my question:

Mills...

“I have no way of knowing. Nor do you. Which is why I don’t make pronouncements about ‘inferiority.’”

Is that so? So what then, Mr. Wordsmith and “Lover of Language”, explains your use of “intellectual” in the sentence “It doesn’t have the history of intellectual... development”?”

UBM: By “intellectual” development I mean such things as a literature and a system of higher education.

UBM: In 1973 ZANU had not yet to receive broad material support from the Chinese. Most of the material support the actually received from Tanzania (who last I checked were African)...

This is getting embarrassing, Fish. The fact is, to this very day, Tanzanian pilots and sailors and military officers are trained in China.

Tanzania receives more foreign aid from China than any other African nation does. The Chinese have been pumping money into Tanzania since 1964, building textile mills and the like.

It was the Chinese who financed and built the Tanzania-Zambia Railway in the 1970s, to the tune of half a billion dollars. (This was China’s largest foreign-aid project ever.)

Ergo... whatever “material support” Zimbabwean freedom fighters received from Tanzania was a byproduct of China’s heavy investment in that country. There is no Tanzanian economy without China.

As for your claim that “ZANU/ZANLA received no support whatsoever from the Soviets and the Eastern bloc,” hmmmm... I was under the impression that by the mid-1970s, ZANU/ZANLA ran guerrilla operations out of Mozambique... at a time when hundreds of Russian, East German and Cuban military instructors were in Mozambique, giving them support.

I know this may not fit your narrative of the black freedom struggle, Mike. But there it is nonetheless.

As for your charge that I “dismiss any and everything that points to the quite remarkable ingenuity and intelligence of Africans”... nonsense.

I simply point out to you (and any of your doctrinaire ilk) that the “quite remarkable ingenuity and intelligence of Africans” was not the sort that led to the development of the printing press, electricity, the internal combustion engine, the radio, the polio vaccine, the Mars probe, or the microchips which allow us to carry on this conversation across the intertubes.

And that has more to do with Zimbabwe’s current position in the world economy than the evils of white racism.

FISHER: ... While I fail to see what the building of the Tanzam railroad and the Chinese training of Tanzanian military personnel has to do with the innate mental ability of an African to grasp and execute the principles of guerrilla warfare, let’s turn to analyzing your statement:

“By ‘intellectual’ development I mean such things as a literature and a system of higher education.”

Now, that’s quite an interesting (mis)use of the term “intellectual development”, which term (until your innovative usage) traditionally referred to the development of the intellect.

No matter.

So let’s plug in your particular wordsmithian usage of the term into your “non-racist” statement:

“Zimbabwe will never be -- and could never be -- what England is. It doesn’t have the history of literature and system of higher education and economic development.”

So now you are saying that the Zimbabweans can never attain the level of the English because of their past lack of “literature and a system of higher education”.

Now why is that?

Seems to me that exactly what any rational person, pan-Africanist or otherwise, would expect is that with the implementation of a system of higher education Zimbabwe could very well be “what England is”.

That leaves us with two choices of how to interpret your elucidations on the mental abilities of Zimbabweans:

Either

(a) you have a very shallow and sloppy grasp of the English language, David, (maybe those “black genes” you are carrying somewhere in your body are keeping your “intellect” from “developing” despite America’s literature and system of higher education?),

or

(b) you are trying to weasel your way out of having stated some pretty reprehensible (and illogical to boot) stuff.

So which is it? Are you intellectually maldeveloped (and I am referring to your intellect as per the proper use of the term) or are you just being a bigot?

UBM: Now, that’s quite an interesting (mis)use of the term “intellectual development”, which term (until your innovative usage) traditionally referred to the development of the intellect.

How else to assess the “intellectual development” of a culture than by its intellectual products?

The burden is on you, Fish, to justify your apparent belief that a society without an alphabet is as intellectually well-developed as a society that produced Oxford and Cambridge universities.

Perhaps an analogy will clarify my position. A few years ago, I read a news article about an Amazonian tribe that one day simply walked out of the jungle and into a modern South American city to begin living. (I can’t remember which country.)

This tribe had never developed the wheel, Michael. This “society” existed for centuries without a wheel.

I have no way to assess the innate cognitive capacity of members of this Amazonian tribe. But I can make the observation (which you shouldn’t have a problem acknowledging) that a society without the wheel is less developed intellectually than... oh, than any modern nation-state.

Seems to me that exactly what any rational person, pan-Africanist or otherwise, would expect is that with the implementation of a system of higher education Zimbabwe could very well be “what England is”.

Why do you expect this? On what basis could you expect this? That Zimbabweans could very well produce and maintain universities comparable to Oxford and Cambridge? Really? That’s your position, Fish?

How long might that take to accomplish? How could Zimbabweans make up a 700-year head start by England in the area of education? England is what it is because of the remarkable ingenuity and intelligence of the English, as attested to by its accumulated literature in areas such as political philosophy, economics, physics, etc.

Albinos in Africa catch hell.

Ever wonder about albinos in Africa? Reportedly, one in every 4,000 Africans is born with albinism. Which would add up to nearly a quarter million black albinos on the continent.

Now brace yourself: In Tanzania, people with albinism are being murdered and mutilated... so their body parts can be used for magic.

Embedded below is a 12-minute video report about this phenomenon, broadcast last month on Al Jazeera English.

The second video is about albinos in South Africa. Thankfully, they are not targets for murder... but they do face social ostracism. You’ll meet a young woman from Soweto whose father abandoned her due to her condition.

That 8-minute piece was produced in 2006 by London-based Journeyman Pictures.

Sonny Okosun (1947-2008)

Only while putting together my African Music Weekend did I learn that Sonny Okosun, an international music star from Nigeria, died in May.

This didn’t make big news in the United States, even though Okosun died at Howard University Hospital in Washington, D.C., from colon cancer. (The Washington Post still hasn’t reported his passing.)

Sonny Okosun – whose name is often spelled Okosuns – created a style of music he called Ozzidism (“message music”), fusing Nigerian highlife with rock ’n’ roll. He later added reggae to the mix.

Okosun was the first African pop star to perform in post-liberation Zimbabwe.

In Okosun’s honor, I’m streaming a track from his 1981 album “3rd World” on my Vox blog. Click here to hear “Olu Ebube.” The rhythm-guitar part would do James Brown proud. (This album, re-titled “Liberation,” is widely available in digital form.)

Here is an editorial tribute to Sonny Okosun from the Nigerian newspaper ThisDay.

And below is some supremely cool footage of Okosun working on his 1979 album “Power to the People.”

If you want to dig deeper into African music...

... may I recommend some reading materials?

I’ve previously mentioned the Nigerian blogger known as Comb & Razor. I am happy to do so again. He writes about the kaleidoscope of African pop music with much humor and affection.

Also, he shares some tasty tracks. Like “Happy Birthday” by Harry Mosco, a hardcore funker known to few outside of Africa. As Comb & Razor blogged in April: “If you ever attended a birthday party in Nigeria in the early 80s, I’m sure you’ll remember this track!”

C&R’s isn’t the only African music blog on my blogroll. There’s also Likembe, done with love by Milwaukee’s John B.

Here’s John with Oliver de Coque, a Nigerian bandleader who passed away last month.

John B. also shares obscure and out-of-print tracks. Such as “Goodbye Hully!” by Kenya’s Brother Charlly Computer & the Gloria Kings.

John wrote in May that this single, from the early to mid 1980s, was among the last 45s to be pressed in Kenya... because “record piracy pretty much killed the format.”

An old reference book also has been useful to me in learning some basics about African music. The 1989 edition of the U.K.’s “Penguin Encyclopedia of Popular Music” provides pithy histories of various national styles, from juju (Nigeria) to mbaqanga (South Africa) to ziglibithy (Ivory Coast).

There is so much out there to explore!

A free Les Amazones de Guinée download

Les Amazones de Guinée are an all-female Afropop band from Guinea. And that’s not the only thing unusual about them.

All the band members serve in the Guinean army.

The track “Decembalou,” off Les Amazones’ 2008 album “Wamato,” is available as a FREE MP3. To stream it on my Vox blog, click here. To download it, click the song title below.

“Demembalou” (MP3)
Album available at iTunes Music Store
Album available at Amazon

Playlist: African singers, American songs

Y’all know I like covers... especially covers “with a twist.” So this is a natural for African Music Weekend.

Click the song titles below and hear some good ol’ American tunes interpreted by vocalists from the Motherland!

1. “Inner City Blues (Xhosa version)” – Lungiswa

One of the artists I discovered during my first binge of South African CD-purchasing in 2000 was Lungiswa Plaatjies. Born in Cape Town, Lungiswa sings in an appealing pop-funky style.

She got her chops performing with the traditional-music group Amampondo (one of Mandela’s favorite bands).

Amampondo was founded by Lungiswa’s uncle, Dizu Plaatjies, and she started with the group at age 9.

Lungiswa’s self-titled solo album from 2000 contains this smokin’ cover of the Marvin Gaye classic... sung in the Xhosa language!

2. “Voodoo Child (Slight Return)” – Angélique Kidjo

I have blogged before about international pop star Angélique Kidjo. She’s from Benin, but it was a South African TV producer who introduced me to this track in 2000.

A critic at All Music Guide calls it the best Jimi Hendrix cover ever. I’m not fixing to argue. (Here’s the music video, which is as superbly produced as the track itself.)

Kidjo’s 1998 album “Oremi” is widely available to download.

3. “Bad” – Bony Bikaye

I should’ve blogged about Bony Bikaye by now as a paragon of “eccentric blackness.” His 1996 album “Computer’s Dreams” is a complete head-scratcher.

Singing bizarrely over a homemade hash of cheap drum-machine beats and toy synthesizers, Bikaye has the audacity to cover some of the greatest pop songs of all time. Like “Let It Be.” “Superstition.” “When Doves Cry.”

Michael Jackson’s “Bad” sort of sucks anyway, so this is not as grave an insult.

Unbelievably, Bony Bikaye – who’s from Zaire – is not a delusional amateur. He has a minor reputation as an experimentalist based on his previous collaborations with French composer Hector Zazou.

4. “The Look of Love” – Gloria Bosman

Gloria Bosman, raised in Soweto, started singing in church. Then she won scholarships to study opera in Pretoria.

Now she’s a classy jazz singer who knows how to handle American standards like “Summertime” and “Smoke Gets In Your Eyes.” I dig what she did with this choice Bachrach-David tune.

5. “I Got You (I Feel Good)” – Gnonnas Pedro

Gnonnas Pedro, who died in 2004, was a major star in Benin. A bandleader since the 1960s, Pedro gained international exposure during the ’90s as a vocalist with the Afro-Latin supergroup Africando.

This track here? Gnonnas Pedro does his best James Brown impression. And his best is rather iffy. He cannot speak English so he sings the words phonetically. (For the “sugar and spice” line, he just utters random syllables.)

I found this vinyl-ripped MP3 (from a 1980 album) here... on Comb & Razor’s splendid music blog.

I’ll have more to say about Comb & Razor before the weekend is over. (Matter fact, I blogged about him back in January.) His Gnonnas Pedro post is a delight. C&R celebrates African pop music as it is lived.

He describes Pedro as “[a] dazzling showman who hewed to the old school entertainment ethos of giving the people want they want. You wanted to hear a bolero in Spanish? Gnonnas Pedro would sing it for you. French chanson? He was up to the task. American soul? Congolese rumba? Nigerian-style highlife? Your favorite country ballad? No matter the song or the style, you could count on Gnonnas Pedro to give it the old college try.”

That’s what I like about this job. You learn stuff.

African Music Weekend rolls on...

... with live concert footage of Alpha Blondy at my UBM-TV spot.

Born in Ivory Coast, Alpha Blondy is one of the most popular reggae artists in the world. His latest album, “Jah Victory,” was released last year.

(Blondy was due to headline at San Diego’s renowned reggae festival in February – replacing South Africa’s Lucky Dube, who was murdered last year. But he had to cancel because of illness.)

My favorite Alpha Blondy song is “Jerusalem,” from his 1986 album of the same name.

That album was recorded in Jamaica, with the Wailers as his backing band. (Click here to hear the track on my Vox blog.)

Blondy performs “Jerusalem” in this concert clip. The band gets cranking about 2 minutes in. They rock it to the bone, y’all.

UPDATE (07/28/08): Click here to watch the live “Jerusalem” video.

Steve Reid in Dakar

Last December, I pointed you to a free download from Steve Reid’s latest album, “Daxaar.”

Reid, an American jazz drummer, has a deep interest in African music. He lived in Africa for three years during the 1960s, learning from the legendary Ghanaian drummer Guy Warren and performing with Nigerian superstar Fela Kuti.

“Daxaar” was recorded last year in Senegal. It features the nation’s top guitarist, Jimi Mbaye (pictured), who has been a sideman for Youssou N’Dour since 1979.

Listen to Mbaye rock out on the cut “Big G’s Family,” streaming here on my Vox blog.

The album has a loose, jammy feel, but I’m digging it. (And you can’t beat the iTunes price: $5.99!)

What I really enjoy is this 12-minute video below. England’s Domino Records documented a “Daxaar” recording session at Jimi Mbaye’s home studio... and also a nightclub gig.

A free Thione Seck download

Thione Seck is a huge star in Senegal, but he isn’t well known globally. I hadn’t heard of him until I stumbled on a FREE MP3 at Calabash, the wonderful world-music site.

Senegal’s signature pop-music style is called “mbalax”... a fusion of traditional drumming, Caribbean grooves, Islamic singing and other elements.

Youssou N’Dour is the most renowned architect of mbalax, but Thione Seck also pioneered the style in the 1970s with his band Raam Daan.

Descended from a long line of Wolof griots, Seck also acknowledges the influence of South Asian music. (Yes, Bollywood films are quite popular in Senegal.)

In fact, Seck’s 2005 CD – “Orientation” – was partially recorded in Madras, India.

Today’s free MP3 is off that album. It’s called “Mouhamadou Bamba.” I am blown away by Seck’s voice on this track. Click here to stream it on my Vox blog.

If you like “Mouhamadou Bamba,” follow this link to Calabash. (You must be registered there to download it.)

African Music Weekend at UBM

I want to try a theme this weekend. (I’m feeling frisky.) So for the next couple of days, this blog will be devoted to African music... via audio, video and text.

Let’s start with the music vid in my UBM-TV corner. The track is called “Oyi Oyi.” The artist is Arthur Mafokate, known simply as Arthur. (You’ll need external speakers to appreciate the bass.)

Born in the South African township of Soweto, Arthur went from being a pop-music background dancer to a pioneering producer of kwaito, the groove music influenced by house and hip-hop.

I got turned on to kwaito whilst visiting Johannesburg in 2000. I dig Arthur’s stuff in particular (as I blogged in February).

Arthur’s CDs are impossible to find in the U.S. But I can vouch for the South African online music store One World.

UPDATE (07/27/08): Click here to watch the “Oyi, Oyi” video.