K'NAAN, GREEN TARA, BELLADONNA...HAMILTON, FRIDAY

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PJC presents,

the Dusty foot philosopher K'NAAN

Friday, October 14th

with guests Green TaRA(vancouver), Belladonna and the Awakening(t.o.), Jaret Koop(Burl.)

also Dj Raiz on the 1 2's.

Advance tickets $10 available at PJC, Dr. Disc and Screamin Mimi's. $12 day of.

19+, Doors: 9pm

http://www.thedustyfoot.com/

ttp://users.resist.ca/~belladonna/Bio.htm

http://www.greentaramusic.com

www.jaretkoop.com

www.pepperjackcafe.com

As hip-hop passes the quarter century mark, it has evolved in ways no one could have imagined. It has gone from under-ground to mainstream, from black to multi-racial, from American to international. It has reached the very furthest corners of the world and planted its seeds in the souls of kids from every country. K'NAAN is a child of that generation, the first generation of true hip-hop children who have grown out of a very foreign soil.

At age 9, K'NAAN was doing what most American kids were doing. He was hanging out on his

neighborhood street corner, MC'ing for his friends, dropping Nas and Rakim verses, dreaming of a day when he would posses the lyrical skills and the rhythmic flow of his Hip Hop hero's.

K’NAAN, however was very different from those American kids. Firstly, he isn’t American, he is African; and he wasn't on the streets of New York, LA or Detroit, he was on the other side of the world on the dusty streets of Mogadishu Somali. Although he was rappin' verses of all the great American MC's with an almost eerie attention to detail and pronunciation, he couldn’t speak English.

With a unique voice and authentic style, K'NAAN brings an enormous dose of realness and urgency to the hip-hop world in a time when people are desperate for it. From a personal and cultural history rooted in poetry, K'NAAN widens the traditional hip hop perspective. "Where I’m from there are no police or fire fighters, we start riot's by burning car tires." from K'NAAN’s song entitled "What's Hardcore".

K’naan fled war torn Somalia as a refugee at the age of 14. His family departed admist a crumbling soceity on what turned out to be the very last commercial flight to leave the country. , To this day Somlaia still does not have any form of central government. Their journey took them first in Harlem New York and then they settled in Toronto Canada. K'NAAN carried with him a strong sense of purpose. It is this sense of purpose as well as his astounding lyrical gift, which has made him a beacon for other artists as well as those dedicated to global change.

In 2001 after gaining notoriety as a skilled MC and spoken word poet, K'NAAN was invited to Geneva to perform a spoken word piece at the 50th anniversary of the UN Commission for Refugee's. In the presence of the biggest suits in the world, K'NAAN brought the house down with his politically charged poem, K'NAAN explains, "I basically called out the UN for its failed relief mission in Somaliaâ€. The audience was so moved by the piece that K'NAAN received a standing ovation and African superstar Youssou N'Dour, who was also in attendance, invited K'NAAN to Senegal to record with him.

Similarly, in Toronto, 2002 while recording a verse for a War Child benefit track entitled "Keep the Beatâ€, K'NAAN’s flow caught the attention of artist/producer Jarvis Church, one half of the Grammy award winning production team Track & Field (Nelly Furtado). From there began a creative partnership that would lead to the creation of K'NAAN’s' first full length album "The Dusty Foot Philosopher."

www.TheDustyFoot.com

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Bump

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