This will be a (mercifully) short post this week, since I have only recently 'discovered' the artist in question and am still just discovering his music.K'naan (Pronounced /keːnan/) is described as a Canadian poet and hip hop artist. I was fortunate enough to catch his set at Friday's Canada Day celebrations in London, and was impressed with his style and the authentic feel to his music.
Born into the civil war in Somalia, K'naan grew up in the violence of Mogadishu. His father -- who left Somalia to work in New York -- sent money back to K'naan's family, and it was from the hip hop albums he sent to his young son that K'naan taught himself phonetically the diction and style of the genre. After escaping Somalia on the last commercial flight out of the country in 1991, K'naan and his mother joined their family in New York -- before later moving to Canada.
K'naan dropped out of school in 1993 to rap at open mike events around the country, and in 1999 he landed a gig speaking before the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees. It was here he performed a spoken word piece criticizing the UN for their failed aid missions to Somalia, and attracted the attention of singer Youssou N'Dour.
The rest of K'naan's musical history to date I will leave you to look into yourselves, if you're interested. I like his music's passion and energy and so today, I leave you with two offerings -- the title track from K'naan's debut album The Dusty Foot Philosopher. On first listen, it seems very similar to Eminem -- but if you listen to the lyrics, the content is very different. I also include a video of a song I saw him perform on Friday night (although this performance is another time entirely) -- the quality of the video is terrible, but the audio is good, and that's what counts.
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