Africans in Grime

T

Tablet

Tablet
Seems to me this whole "discussion" is based on trying to read into an observation that has absolutely nothing to do with anything. What point are you trying to establish? Grime is better for it? Worse for it? or just different? there have been equal amounts of Afro-caribs and africans in UK Dancehall (Fluff 1, Dolomite), UK HIp Hop and Grime.


Dizzee's flow is influenced by his Nigerian accent? That is not a Nigerian accent it is a bow accent. Most of the people you are talking about have london accents or accents specific to their zones? You all need to slow down a bit,
 
T

Tablet

Tablet
Jungle also had many African MCs and producers as did UK garage. Cant see what is different about grime. Dont see wha point was originally being made. UK dancehall and Jungle were probably equally as successful as grime if not more so (Sweetie Irie, General Levy).

BV and Logan said it: nothing to do with anything, a bunch of white guys getting anthropological about black people is always scary


An interesting point is the number of Ghanaians in the music industry: check this list:

Dizzee (50%)
Lethal B
Tempa T
Twin B
Ras Kwame
Melvin (Ricky and Melvin)
Apple
Statik
"Tony Tagoe (Deal Real)
Richard Antwi (music lawyer Jack Penate, Hot Chip etc)
Tinchy Strider (and most of Ruff Squad)
Reggie Yates
Sway
Kwame Kwaten
Danny D (manager of stargate producers)
Mitchell Brothers
Vertex
Sammy
June Sarpong
Derren B
Napper
Radical D
Slix
Manny Norte
Kanya King
Abrantee
Lisa I'anson
DJ XL
Big L
Blemish

props to the lad who drew for the King David - but check my page, I'll upload the track that dones Afrikiko, Gold Coast, Coronet, Rex, manjaro and every Ghanaian party around the globe and check out Apietous - he is like the Ghanaian version of Pharrell -

"we are dem boys from Ghana and don't pet to bang!"
 
M

mistersloane

heavy heavy monster sound
I'm not sure but I kinda was reading the thread as saying 'what other influences from people making grime makes grime so good?', y'know, what were people listening to when they were brought up, that's how I read it anyway. Which is funny cos the Ghanaians I know listen to Tracey Chapman and Joss Stone.
 
luka

luka

Well-known member
africans form bow and west indians from bow and cockneys from bow all talk simialrly but if you cant tell them apart theres something wrong with your ears.
 
M

mistersloane

heavy heavy monster sound
luka said:
africans form bow and west indians from bow and cockneys from bow all talk simialrly but if you cant tell them apart theres something wrong with your ears.
Click to expand...

and eyes! don't think anyone was sayin that though, was it? Good to hear you had a good year though luka, keep it up man/lady/person whatever, think it was more talking about the music influences but I dunno, I ain't defending a thread.
 
luka

luka

Well-known member
Tablet said:
Dizzee's flow is influenced by his Nigerian accent? That is not a Nigerian accent it is a bow accent. Most of the people you are talking about have london accents or accents specific to their zones? You all need to slow down a bit,
Click to expand...


really?
 
T

Tablet

Tablet
luka said:
really?
Click to expand...

Not being very clear in a forum of journos, what I am saying is that you are looking for things that are not there. For example, take the following artists: Foxy Brown, Seal, Dizzee, Kano. You cannot tell me that by listening to their voice you can pinpoint the coutry their parents came from. You are talking about second generation black people born in London or he UK or the US. They do not have the accents of their parents, Tinchy, Dizzee, Wiley etc sound like they are from East, Bashy speaks like a NW boy, South Boys have their own spin on words, words like mucky and messy came from so solid, their flows are more influenced by their post code than where their parents came from.

To say you ca n hear somehing nigerian in dizzees flow is stupid. rust me, i know what a nigerian accent sounds like. Don't get me wrong there are a few artists that have influenced flows: that kid in firecamp that everyone says they cannot understand (Jamaican) Shizzle (Jamaican) Tempa T (when he speaks you know he is Ghanaian, even some of his spitting) Napper (has a Ghanaian twang). But they all lived in those countries and so have soeech influenced by the country. You cannot pick up an accent from a country without having lived there. You do not get it from your parents.
 
T

Tablet

Tablet
Turn the bass up on this

Alhaji

<object classid="clsid:d27cdb6e-ae6d-11cf-96b8-444553540000" codebase="http://fpdownload.macromedia.com/pub/shockwave/cabs/flash/swflash.cab#version=8,0,0,0" width="335" height="85" id="divplaylist"><param name="movie" value="http://www.divshare.com/flash/playlist?myId=3708489-15d" /><embed src="http://www.divshare.com/flash/playlist?myId=3708489-15d" width="335" height="85" name="divplaylist" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" pluginspage="http://www.macromedia.com/go/getflashplayer"></embed></object>
 
luka

luka

Well-known member
so you are really trying to tell me that if you took 40 boys from bow, 10 'indingienous cockneys' ten 2nd generation bengalis, 10 3rd generation west indians, 10 3nd generatoin west africans and 10 2nd generation somalis you couldn't tell me which was whch in a blondfold test. cos i know i could.
 
luka

luka

Well-known member
give them a script to read out. same words for everyone. it would be so easy. you can tell lethal b, dizzee, etc have african roots, you can tell devlin is white, you can tell trim has west indian roots. or at least you can if you grew up in london.
 
T

Tablet

Tablet
luka said:
so you are really trying to tell me that if you took 40 boys from bow, 10 'indingienous cockneys' ten 2nd generation bengalis, 10 3rd generation west indians, 10 3nd generatoin west africans and 10 2nd generation somalis you couldn't tell me which was whch in a blondfold test. cos i know i could.
Click to expand...

I'm telling you that you can't listen to Trim, Demon and Akala withou seeing them and tell where there parents are from - the difference is less pronounced between west indians and africans,
 
T

Tablet

Tablet
as i said above there will be those you can tell - but answer this: can you tell Ras Kwame is from Ghana?
 
luka

luka

Well-known member
but seriously though, imagine that experiment. did you go to school in london? cos if you did you know i'm right. i know 2nd generation african kids don't speak like the comedy nigerian student in the real mccoy anymore but c'mon. to say that if you are 2nd gerneation your accent no longer reflects your parents place of birth is absurd.

this is a non-issue though.
you don't think i should be speculating about any potential influence 1st and 2nd generation africans may have had on grime. ok. don't talk to me then.
i think its a pretty interesting topic for ideal specualtion. i was born in forest gate hospital. i grew up in stratford. when i was in primary school there were very few children from an african background. those there were were usually teased by the children from west indian backgrounds. by the time i got to 6th form there were gangs like the network and african devils, mcs like dizzee and lethal b. things seemed to have changed. i find those changes interesting.
 
luka

luka

Well-known member
that should read
idle specualtion
not ideal.

and i can see why you might feel uncomfortable with the opening post on this thread. i don't have any desire to pontificate on 'hard working' africans or 'feckless' west indians.
 
Z

zhao

there are no accidents
some of these points have been mentioned earlier but:

specific accents and speech patterns aside, there is also the question of deeper musical influence. characteristics like polyphony, seemingly chaotic polyrhythms, double-time flow, "harsh" textures, raw sonics, a-tonality (in western sense), the setting aside of melody and intense focus on rhythm. all of these things in grime, IMO things that makes it so interesting and good, can be construed as having, maybe not always directly, at least partial African influence.
 
T

Tablet

Tablet
zhao said:
some of these points have been mentioned earlier but:

specific accents and speech patterns aside, there is also the question of deeper musical influence. characteristics like polyphony, seemingly chaotic polyrhythms, double-time flow, "harsh" textures, raw sonics, a-tonality (in western sense), the setting aside of melody and intense focus on rhythm. all of these things in grime, IMO things that makes it so interesting and good, can be construed as having, maybe not always directly, at least partial African influence.
Click to expand...

Speaking only for the Ghanaians - I can say that the above description doesn't fit the ghanaian music they would have grown up with Ben Brako, Kwadjo Antwi etc... ineresting adjectives: chaos, harsh, raw.. there are many other things that the above description fits but we won't get into that


I think the sound is more a reaction to the "sweetboy garage" that went before and owes more to Bashment, hardcore, jungle, hip hop sonically than it does to african music... I don't think you can demonsrate indirectly how africans in grime (predominantly nigerian and ghanaian) have shaped their sound by way of their musical upbrining (Hilife etc) give us some reference tracks instead of adjectives... only obvious exception is Sweet Mother (Prince Nico Mbarga) and skepta's rehash
 
S

stelfox

Beast of Burden
the african influence is way more important to the way funky house is developing than it ever was to grime, as far as i can see
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Top