Hasan Salaam and Baloberos Crew Rep Guinea Bissau
I just came from this show, part of a series called the Impossible Music Sessions featuring a hip hop crew via video feed from Guinea Bissau, the Baloberos Crew. They were represented by Hasan Salaam, an MC from New Jersey who you have to check out if you’re into revolutionary hip hop and repressed american voices.
Sorry for the bad sound and camerawork.
Guinea Bissau’s in a political situation that’s familiar to a lot of the post-colonial world; military coups, corruption, instability, massacre. It’s a hub of the global drug trade, and the drugs are handled by the military, which uses the capital gained from the traffik to assert domination over the country. Baloberos uses their music to communicate honestly and openly with the people of their nation, staying true to the revolutionary tradition of music and hip hop from Fela Kuti to Dead Prez. Hasan Salaam is right there with them; I was blessed to get to see him and meet him–he is an honest and talented MC, a voice that society (our society, not Guinea, now) needs to hear. Though he is Muslim, I get the sense that Hasan rhymes about realities and oppressions that don’t come from being Muslim in America, but that come from being poor in America; the universal weight of capitalism that lies on all our soldiers.
The military arrested and tortured the members of Baloberos Crew for telling the truth of their situation and their country’s situation. They were pistol-whipped and warned to stop their music. It was beautiful to see them standing strong and proud via video feed live from their homeland; we were all reminded just how large the world still is by the squeal, delay, and feedback of internet video, but everyone was determined to communicate despite language and all the technical problems. They had a guy on their end to translate. There was a lot of sign language, the universal sign language of hip hop.
There were a lot of production people and intermediaries who made this moment of global communication and exchange possible. Their presence was a little too noticeable; the producers of the event weren’t as well spoken as the MCs, but then again, the purity of the exchange that they generated was worth celebrating, and it clearly took a lot of effort.
I wish that good works like this would get the attention that they deserve. I wish that honest global dialogue and exchange was easier. But, recognizing that it is difficult, let us celebrate it when it occurs.