-Tionne (aka T-Boz) in “Belly”
 
So today’s post theme is Africa. A couple of albums have finally made it on the ipod that are a bit African-inflected that I find very interesting

First up from Stones Throw is the new instrumental album by Bay Area native Oh No called Dr. No’s Ethiopium.

I have to say I really don’t enjoy a lot of instrumental hip-hop (ish) albums. I just get bored after a while. Especially the super-jazzy ones. Its great background music but I’m not a background music kinda girl. I like my stuff to knock and grab my attention always. However, I have made exceptions in the past for the following beatmakers-Madlib, Dilla**, and MF Doom. They manage to make instrumental albums interesting-from cutting in TV/movie dialog to adding a bit of texture with dirty elements like hand claps and record static. Oh No comes from this same school of beat-cd making. I would imagine he would, since he’s also Madlib’s younger brother.

Ethiopium reworks samples of old Ethiopian songs into dope beats. I’m trying really hard to refrain from comparing it to Donuts-just because Mountain’s “Long Red” is used and there’s some handclaps and manipulates vocal samples from the songs to sound like words that make those with immature senses of humor giggle doesn’t mean anything! All jokes aside its a great beat CD. I’m sure its only a matter of time before someone uses this as the base for their next mixtape.

Next up is by Shafiq Husayn of Sa-Ra fame (wasn’t I talking about them not too long ago?) and his solo venture Shafiq En’ A-Free-Ka.

All beats were done by Shafiq and he brings along some Sa-Ra affiliates such as Bilal and Rozzi Daime and even Om’Mas Keith (who now works for Diddy and is all over MTV’s Making His Band andlooking quite handsome if I must say) to bring forth singing vocals to his spoken pieces. Honestly, he talks too damn much on this album and most of the time it hurts the song rather than helps but its his album so do you Shafiq! Its still a great album if you can get past whatever it is he’s saying. I definitely plan to work in a few songs off the album into future mixes.

Both albums are out now and I encourage you to check them both out.

Buy Dr No’s Ethiopium
(download a quick taste of it here)

Buy Shafiq En’ A-Free-Ka
(download a quick taste of it here-this is actually a remix of a track off the album that was done by Nottz)

**you’ll learn as this blog progresses that I’m a huge Dilla stan. I may look familiar to some of you if not by DJing, by the fact I’m the girl who serves you donuts and begs for donations every year at Donuts are Forever