You know how we feel about Zaki around these parts so we won't write some long thing about her latest single. "Don't light my fire 'less you can burn with it," she cautions a potential someboooady in the colourful Go Widdit video. And to think Dude looked at me funny when I told him I'd like to draw a mustache onto my face. Psssh. You like? I mean the video, not the bit about me and a fake mustache.
We love Tumi Mpye aka Njumps and her voice. She's sung alongside and behind Ill Skillz and Zaki Ibrahim, respectively, but her soundcloud page is really the best place to try and get a sense of who she is. The Cape Town based student by day covers quite a few songs but the voice and potential is undeniable. The joints we really like from the young singer are these:
We don't care about your tax drama - or your explanation for evasion. We care that you made Ex-Factor and countless other songs that bear both personal and pop culture significance. There will never be another. theblagg loves you and so do these artists, by the looks of things:
John Legend
Beyonce
Quadron
Bonus:
Teyana Taylor covers the song at the end of Her Room
Zaki Ibrahim, or ZakBird as her father (Bush Radio pioneer, Zane Ibrahim) calls her, just released her new album, Every Opposite. One of the joints theblagg loves on the Iqra/Motif Records offering is Kids Are Talking. We asked her how it came about and she said, “It’s like a childhood experience, you know. On the playground when kids are telling you who you are. Here, I say the kids as in the masses. They’re the ones telling you what you are, what’s wrong with you, why you don’t belong. The whole world revolves around ‘kids’ talking. I remember when I was younger and I was complaining to my mom, who is a caucasian woman, about a kid who’d made a racist comment about me. Kids would call me ni99a and paki and just navigate in an ignorant environment. [My mom] didn’t know how to deal with what I was telling her, I guess, and she said that the kids were just jealous of me. I was like, the kids aren’t jealous! But then she told me to not be afraid of how much love I have inside. To stop listening to what people say. So the song is about that and also about how you can’t hang on these things. Remember your identity as a child of God and a person who can rise above and you’ll be a beautiful human being.”
When The Ordinary Girl still had an internet friendly J-O 9and when Solange still had a weave), she came across this, changed the format and shoved it down Dude's ears for dayyyys. No Nonhle. So I thought I might share it with you guys. The sound quality is dodgy at times but hey, she's hella cool so...try and enjoy it.
Jealous down, Erykah Badu is all kinds of magnif. Two years ago, Steven Lopez, an artist who is well known for his After Midnight series of paintings did something really special with the Analogue Girl In A Digital World. Lopez’s series sees him paint vibrant portraits of the artists whose music influences him, while the chosen joints are being played. So when painted Seven’s mommy, he didn’t really know how far the art would go. But Badu actually hooked up with Lopez to sign 100 limited edition prints of the painting to sell in aid of her charity, BLIND aka Beautiful Love Incorporated Non-Profit Development. The After Midnight initiative is quite a cool series featuring the likeness of Sade, Jill Scott and many more soul powerhouses. What do you guys think of the work?
A year or two ago I saw the head of The Mothership and her sister at some hip hop gig. They were looking particularly radiant with a berry lipstick that induced envy. So she told me where to go to get it and I went. I put it on right after I paid for it and Dude burst out laughing. Needless to say, although I'm going to say it, that I never wore it again. What does this have to do with anything? Well this is the same moonberry what-what lipstick shade that Rox is wearing. I discovered this English soul singer through a friend last year and have been a fan of her music and her style ever since. I totally didn't know the woman who has worked with Al Shux (who produced Mr Knowles' Empire State Of Mind) had a video for her infectious My Baby Left Me. The summer band tour-like video just makes me look forward to gate crashing a fratpack tour where, you guessed it, I'll wear my lipstick proudly. What do you think of the video?
New Nunulooloo! By the looks of things (read twitter) Nonku is a workaholic. But when your work is your talent then who are you to deny yourself an opportunity to create? She's been putting in work and as reluctant as she is to unleash what she works on, Nonku's done a pretty good job of keeping people interested. Last night she put a track called You on the 'nets. It's such a pretty little love song. Listen here:
And another track that's been speaking to The Ordinary Girl is Divine Intervention. Sometimes you do have bad days and want to be left the fruck alone but you can't sing vulgarity as well as she does. So we'll let her do it:
We heart Asa! Her new album, Beautiful Imperfection, is a decidely more feminine departure from her self-titled, soul classic debut. Even her image has changed - but we're not complaining. We came across this new video for Why Can We? while visiting the dope sisters over at afriPOP! mag. We loooooove the chic fashion sense and Asian persuasion meets retro American Band Stand and Soul Train feel. What do you think of this video?
How awesome is this picture of Zaki? We found it HERE
It's no secret, we love Zaki Ibrahim. And we love Richard III too - we'll tell you why one day. So to know they collaborated warms theblagg's heart. Richard's EP, Dragonfly Slip, has been out and online for a couple of months now so we know we're late on it. However, classics have no time limit so how about you stop judging us and vibe to Dragonfly. Now I can't get "I don't feel you holding me, I don't see the need" out of my head. Enjoy!
afriPOP!'s Phiona and her friends have even come up with a name to describe his fans: Frankenstans. There are plenty of things that I could tell you about the kid but google is better than me. The long and short of it is he has managed to capture the hearts of everyone from his crew's (you've heard of Odd Future by now) hardcore fans to the ordinary joe, or girl. We All Try, a song from his latest mixtape, Nostalgia Ultra, struck a chord with people from near and far. First up is our girl Nonkulululu With 3 Lu's who was moved to record a cover of We All Try on Slum Village's Dilla-produced Climax beat. On the orther hand, Young Money's Tyga was so moved by the We All Try instrumental that he jacked it and sampled Adele's voice to give us Reminded. What do you think of the two songs?
This is Nonkulululu With 3 Lu's:
This is Tyga and Adele:
And this, blaggers and blaggettes, is Frank Ocean's original We All Try:
The Ordinary Girl loves, loves, loves Nonkulululu (yes, 3 lu's). The Capetonian is one of my favourite people to stalk, I mean follow on twitter. And with good reason. The songstress keeps bringing that heat. We first encountered her stuff - by chance, really, while doing the soundcloud browse thing last year. At first the thing that came to mind was this sounds a little like J*Davey. But upon listening some more, Nonkulululu, aka nunulooloo, has given us a delightful variety of ear candy. And since then we've heard some pretty dope stuff about her. This morning she put out a snippet of a song called Whatever and being theblagg, we just had to share. Let us know what you think and hit her up on @nonkulululu or check out what we think is her tumblr here. I think this song must be far outed. Just me?
The Ordinary Girl stans haaaaard for B.O.B aka Bobby Ray. So yesterday I downloaded his MTV Unplugged set. Love love love love that he brought Melanie Fiona out for Airplanes. I know this isn't a popular belief (sorry Dude) but that Paramore chick needs to go to the left.
What was also pretty impressive - to me - is that Bob brought Paula Patton's husband out to sing Nothing On You. Maybe Bruno Mars wasn't outta the clink to make an appearance. What I do know though, is that you need to check this out:
And yes, I'm fully aware that this is a bootleg. Pardon the coughing camera guy. This was the only visual evidence that I could find...
Don't wanna time travel no more? You just want to be here? Since we already have you here why not stay and take a look at Erykah's new video for Window Seat. It's caused quite a stir in these mean internet streets but I guess as long as people are engaged in dialogue it's all good right?
Oh and Puleng, you might want to pay attention to that "Groupthink" concept.
UPDATED TO SAY: Rap Radar had The Analogue Girl's breakdown of why she made Window Seat this way off twitter first. See it below:
One of The Ordinary Girl's favourite female artists has leaked a little something-something from her new album New Amerykah Part Two (Return of the Ankh) to whet our appetites. The new album is slated for release March 30th. Apparently this is just one of ten different versions with ten different emcees (yes Ms. Badu fcuks with errbody!! And that wasn't a hit at her choice of babydaddys) who jumped on the joint with a verse. Here's "Jump In The Air (Stay There)" - this version features Lil' Wayne and Bilal.
