Sounds of Sudan

like magic in the air. It feels like Christmas Eve, only I also want to throw up and cry every time it's like, oh, maybe this is the time that like that, you know, we really take power. And then actually, no, it's the opposite person, the opposite Yeah, I mean it's it's pretty bad. It's pretty bad. At the time of recording, New Jersey governor is not looking well either. Oh, the New Jersey governor is not looking at What about New York? That's I mean, that's the governor of New York. Album

that's up right now? Or may or whatever like that? Mayor? Oh, well, that was a foregone conclusion. Some what what's his name, Eric Adams? Well, the Democratic primary. I thought that there was some risk with all the anti vax protests stuff though, No, it's fucking overblown those anything. Yeah, I don't know, this is you know, I don't you know, I'm not like a political expert or anything, but this doesn't avode well for the Democrats come to mid terms. Um well, I

mean not passing broadly popular policies. It's bad. Like they gotta they definitely got a succession or this is going to keep happening. I think I think it's like a cornucopia like bad situations, kind of like you know, leading into each other. I think on one hand, there is you know, the aspect that the Democrats can govern more effectively and show a little more backbone and again, like you said, like past these popular policies, but then you

know we can't front. But like a lot of this is based on Republican stupid ship too, you know what I mean. Like, at least in Virginia, a lot of people we're saying that they fell for the critical race theory ruse, and they're concerned about education. The Virginia race swung like thirty points in like in eight days. Yeah, well yeah, yeah, shout out to our friends at the fucking Lincoln Projects getting it all involved for listeners that

may not be aware. But again, project again, it's like a bunch of little things, you know what I'm saying, Like, man, I think that like what is going on with how effectively the right the Republicans are whipping up not just their base but beyond their base into a froth about these cultural issues. I don't know. I think I think it plays more of a bigger role than than people are given credit for, because like Republicans do not care

about policy progressives do you know what I mean? Like like like progressives are sitting out here talking about policies and you know, I mean, what what tax bracket is this gonna be in? And where's this desk will gonna be and stuff like that. In Conservatives are not thinking about that ship at all. They're they're oh, Tony Morrison, Yes, I said, we gotta get to the polls right now. I mean, and then you know, centrist stay at home, the left stay at home either, you know, for there

are separate reasons. Imaginably, Okay, I'm imagining that this is what happened. Liberals were like, well, we oh, Joe Biden's president. We wanted to send it hooray. We don't worry about ship, stay at home. The left just this, what's it disaffected by, like the lack of action by the bride An administration, the fact that he was even in our presidential candidate

at all. Everybody say, so, they're so on both sides there, see the folks that gave up because I thought they we had one and everything was fine and they no longer needed. And then the other side that like stop stopped playing the game, like we don't want to play this gamemore, there's no way to actually win in the system. And here we are. So I don't know. I mean,

it's gonna be it's gonna be tricky. It's gonna be tricky because I I just don't think I don't know, I just don't think that like as the Republicans start to take back power and stuff like that. I think that we're gonna like we're gonna experience ship that Texas is experiencing right now, Like they're gonna start doing stuff that's going to have like actual tangible like effect on all of our lives and stuff like that. So, I mean, it's just gonna be down to what, you know, what

people prioritize, you know, what I'm saying. I'm not gonna be sitting around in about a year when like they implement nationwide stopping frisk you know what I'm saying, and some cops pulling me over for some no reason asking me for my papers and ship like that. I'm not gonna be sitting there and being like, oh, man, if only the Democrats had run somebody that I like, you

know what I mean. So it's like if people, I mean, hey again, I don't I hate doing like the disclaimers of other Democrats are trash, because we all know the Democrats are trash, but the other guys are clearly worse. And it's just like if it's not if the ship that they're doing without motivation enough to at least be like, yeah, they can't get back in power, then I don't know. I don't know, you know what I'm saying. I don't know where we're gonna I don't know where we're going

to be in a year and a half. I'm like, legit worried in that stuff. Yeah, well, good news. What's good tonight? I just got off a commission meeting. We're recording this and like midnight because I just spent five and a half hours, UM, listen to public comment from the local gop and on one side and liberals and prograsses on the other with regards to a public safety

Civilian overside board, which we eventually passed unanimously, which was great. UM, And so yeah, we'll have civilians weighing in on operations of and complaints against not only the police department, but

the Sheriff's office, UM, the probation office. And so does broad civilian oversight into policing, which is not gonna like totally changed the game, but given the fact that like many cities, unfortunately too many cities, we had passed zero like meaningful criminal justice anything in the aftermath of the uprisings, Yeah, it's like, yo, it's been a year and a half and we're finally doing the bare minimum. But finally we're

doing something, you know, So that that was cool. We gotta take our victories a week, I take our do take our dubs where we can, Gotta take them where we can. So what are we getting into today? So today we're actually gonna just completely leave these terrible United States behind us and skip across the pond to Sudan, where last week there's a military coon, you know, part of a long history of UM military takeovers and popular

uprisings in the country of Sudan. So we're gonna talk a little bit about that UM when we come back. So we're back. Last week, Sudanese military officials started rounding up high ranking elected it's including the Prime Minister of Sudan. UM dissolved the joint Civilian military military like governing board at the top of the government. And we're pretty much like, yeah, the ships are us now, and the people weren't fucking

stamped about it. For some reason, UM start taking to the streets, UH strikes and sid ins all across the country. But this is not the first time that this has happened Sudan. So let's take, oh, listener's a little bit back to what these struggles may have started. Sudan was colonized by the British from the eighteen nineties up until

about midway through the twentieth century. After World War One, the Sudanese nationalism movement picked up, with the British finally granting autonomy to the Sudanese people in nineteen fifty three. The fairy tale ending the end all you need to know. Just kidding, UM, there's a civil war conflict from nine three to two thousand five in the country between the Central Studanese government and the Sudan People's Liberation I mean

whis the guerilla movement. Um. It was largely a continuation of the First Sudanese Civil War from nineteen fifty five to nineteen seventy two. Because you have these conflict lasted about twenty two years. Is one of the longest civil wars on record. UM. SO. The are a resulted independence for salth Studan six years after the war ended. Um a social so a socialist by the name of Gafar Nimrim. I think, I think, I I feel really good about

that now. But they were a socialist that served as president from nineteen sixty nine up until nineteen eighty five, during which time he eased factional tensions between northern and Central and Southern Sudan. But he was overthrown by his defense minister a while in the United States and five, giving room for al Bashar to take power, which he

continued to hold on for thirty years. And are sorry every country I lived at Senegal, I believe, but when I lived there the president had been president for like twenty years. Cameroon was the same sort of thing. Yeah, So albas here he was the dictator um Up Sudan up until about two years ago. So let's ask forward December ten. There's widespread protests against poverty, corruption and unemployment um first in the northeast region of that Bara and

then within days spread to the capital of Khartoum. All across the country. People started calling for all the year who had led the nation's military leadership. Yeah, thirty years. He staped down because he had been wanted by the International Criminal Court over charges of jennificide, war crimes and crimes against humanity in the two thousand three Darfur conflict, which killed three hundred and three thousand, three d people.

Thousand people. Yeah, that's like who got new numbers. Then in April nineteen, the military disposed of albus here Uh, suspended the country's constitution, They closed the borders and the airspace, and they imposed a three month state of emergency. So thousands of protesters occupied the front of the front of the army headquarters. After that, they demanded civilian rule in the military government brutally crackdown on all the protests that was in front of their headquarters in June and they

killed dozens doing it. So since the overthrow of Omar al Bashir, the transitional government UM was composed of civilians and military are working together under the leadership of the new Prime Minister of dalahom Duck to move the country toward democratic elections. Three. There's been all you know, the fucking military to swoop it in like, oh, we're gonna put you in power, and now we're gonna take you out. And I'm gonna put this guy and I'm gonna take

him out. So trying to move towards actual democracy two thousands of three. What's the goal? Is the goal? We'll see power sharing between the military and civilians have been concreasingly strained because there was a lot of debate over whether to send al Bashir and others to the I C. C UM, you know, to be tried for their alleged atrocities and darfer so off the bat, what is what

are your initial thoughts about all this so far? I mean I just from you know, from like a somewhat naive like American perspective, I'm just so fascinated by UM the role of the military in like sort of controlling the direction of the government and countries that aren't ours. Um, because like I guess when he were like our closest modern day brush with an attempt to cop you know, Genuoy said question to the election last year, people asking like, oh, well,

you know, people in military love Trump. You know, oh, the police of Trump. Whatever. What if they try to align with him and and Mike you know upholds or you know, try to throughout the election results whatever, and like said the country to sense into martial law or something. Um, they kind that wasn't the case. And so just contrasting that with our own circumstances and just like what makes

what makes it different? What makes it different? Is the question that like really I don't know took up my brain as I learned more about I'm not sure what

makes it different. Um. I know that this isn't necessarily the first time that the sort of template has gone down in Africa, just in the sense of like military or guerrilla factions kind of taking on that sort of role where it's like, oh, if the civilian government is either corrupt or doing something that we don't like, that we're going to swoop in and take them out of power, and then we'll give power back to the people after

we're done. I mean, like that that concept, you know, and I don't even imagine that that's like something that's exclusive to Africa, but that's something that growing up, I've heard about that sort of thing happening all the time. The only problem is that the military usually doesn't it

doesn't end up giving power to the power back. And that's that's I guess where the true danger of it comes in, you know, So like like from one and from one end, it is kind of like fascinating because it's like, damn, you know, it was cool that they they looked at the situation and they were like, Okay, we don't think that this is working out. There's this dictator in power, or this guy has been in power

too long, or whatever the reason is. It's fascinating that they the military is like a completely separate entity and stuff like that. But in most cases there's usually somebody who's behind there who's looking at it as a power

vacuum grab, you know. Yeah, I mean the only other thing I can think of is that like the concentration of capital in the United States and that like really, you know, it's an oligarchy in the sense of like you know, billionaires own congress, on all the means of production, own everything, and so there's like that there's like greater stability that comes with that. Not in a good way.

It's like it's so um the power is so entrenched of like people trying to uphold this order so that folks can so the billionaires can continue to get richer. Is perhaps a key difference that I could identify. But um, let's see, so where we where where do we? So? Okay, we're caught up a present day. Yeah, so then just

a week ago, we're getting back to Sudan. Now, just a week ago, the Sudanese military dissolve the transitional government and started rounding up and detaining high ranking government officials,

including the Prime Minister. Now, in the wake of this latest coups, strikes and civil disobedience broken out again, particularly heavily concentrated in the capital of cartoon workers at state oil company uh Suda pet joined pilots from Sudan Airways Badar and Tarco Airlines, doctors across the country and striking until the government is back in civilian hands. The military leaders are still saying they planned to hold elections in as previously promised, But just heard us go on about that.

Very that's a very very shaky ground to stand on, and quite frankly, I mean, in this day and age, just like I don't necessarily know, if let's not even un necessarily know, I don't believe that the military has any intention of actually holding that election because this isn't I mean, because it's now you know what, who's gonna do anything? If they don't, what's the next excuse going

to be? Like, oh, well there's inflation and um, food prices skyrocketed, so we took control and we'll we'll do election. Three rolls around like, well, oh, man, really sucks that there's another pandemic or whatever the funk happens, and well, I guess the whole elections, but we promise, and if they I mean, if they don't, what is going to happen? Well, the international community is already starting to freak out a little bit. And this as we'll discuss them, you know soon.

UM might be a part of the conditions underlying previous successful attempts ye successful attempts UM for the public to

mobilize to depose leaders they didn't approve of. So the World Bank called the disbursements for operations since to day and last Wednesday in response to the military seazar of power, and the Biden administration to suspended seven hundred million dollars in aid to Sedan in refeliation for the coup, which brings us up to now at the time of recording, the Prime Minister still a detention is staying he'll never

will really step down. But you've got cap you've got a you know, labor strikes, you've got capital strikes, and the part of international uh, the you know, world governments, etcetera. Um, so the amounting pressure against the military leaders that are taken over. But what to me it's really interesting about this is that the toppling of regime after regime to Mary and then Alba Shir, not possibly the military that has taken over. Um all of these regime changes have

come about through mass, non violent demonstrations by the people. Sure, they've been violent revolutionary struggles in Pseudanese history. You know, in nineteen three an armed guerrilla movement operating out of bases in Eritrea was launch but failed to provoke a more widespread popular uprising, and it was suspended two thousand and six, and then later in two thirteen, protesters turned violent during um civilis direction during that year, but they

got crushed within days and scores of civilians died. And then in two thousand nineteen the people rose up peacefully and power transfer. So just like that isn't other thing that It's baffling to me having just lived through the biggest um uprising in American history last summer and having seen nothing change as a result. Effectively, how the fuck

is this possible? And it's something like that possible here, like could like if we had if we had like mass mobilization density enough such that we could change things in a large scale for real. I mean, I think that we could if we had large enough. But I think in the case of Sudan, you know, there's there's just a number of factors, Like for one, you can't underestimate the motherfucker's just tired of war, man, you know what I mean? Like the two thousand and six is

two thousand six seems like a long time ago. There was a long time ago, but it really isn't that long ago. And when you've got like serious, like national traumas that are going on a show like that. So from that perspective, they just had genocide going on like just the other day, you know what I mean, like her relative standpoint of like two thousand six. So from that,

I'm pretty sure that that weighed. However, these things are calculated, I'm pretty sure that weighs heavily on people in terms of like, hey, we're gonna get out in the street, We're gonna it to us. We don't like this government. But at the same time, ain't nobody's trying to go through another like ten years of your bloody civil wards. You're like that, But you know, it's like knock on wood that that was able to happen if it but those revolutions were able to happen peacefully, I don't know

exactly how they did it. Well, let's look at a few major forces that were going to find at least in the two thousand nineteen overthrow of all this year, so international state chanction, international sanctions, further crippling and already precarious economy. You've got disaffected you who feel they have nothing to lose, So take into the streets and mass like suck it. Um. You have protests all over the

country with diverse class and ethnic participation. UM. Because there's a long history of civil disobedience and violent classes of the military. People have also learned new tactics as a result of their mistakes. So when one's protesters would build barricades and face off with soldiers from behind them, um, and to that's nine. And they learned to build barricade and run, um to frustrate the military's efforts navigating around

the city while also reducing some civilian casualties. And they build these barricades in the middle of the street or something like that, and then take off running. So they're like when the tanks roll up or whatever, people standing in front of it, Yeah, to just get sucking annihilated by the Yeah. Who else we got. We got the Studentese Professional Association, which is an alliance of trade unions leading the calls for general strikes and mass civil disobedience,

which I think is something that we definitely could build upon. Here. I think there, well, you know we just exited where they were calling strictobers your workers on strike. Uh A was a do a w um I A c with the you know, for the what you call Hollywood motherfucker's you know what I'm saying, what you know what? What's the formal start? People who work on sets, etcetera. Almost went on strike. Kellogg's all these people going on strike.

And so this recently in a resurgence and interest in labor organizing as like a locust of power for the working class. But it's still not enough for us to have the same impact as something like the student needs a professional association, I would say. And that like they were like, yo, what's going down? And like the doctors were striking, and the pilots were striking, and the shops

were all closed. Everyone's like, I am be doing this because someone with that sort of credibility and um connection to people's lives like called upon you know, let's do this, and people you know he did the call, so you got that um. Yet people coming together to swerve on attempts to divide and conquer along regional lines, which getting back to the United States, like I tried to think of an of a scenario in which the left and

right would be united. It's because like you know, the same way the North and South and Sudan not the same way, but parallels to there's tensions along like religious and regional lines, but they all were like they all dropped the beats to be like nah, fuck alba shere we're taking this the same with bublic out um and so trying to imagine scenario which here people put aside those differences to be like you know what, nah, we are we are standing up against Well, I think it

has to. I think in order for something like that to go down here, everybody would like a lot of people at the same time would have to realize that they have like a vested interest in getting out in

the street like that. You know. It's just like I don't think we have that yet, even with what we experienced last was last summer summer, Even with what we experienced last summer, I don't think that Americans have viewed their situation in that prison yet, you know, now, like a hypothetical situation that I think could have caused something like that. And this is something that I don't think that like right wingers and g O peers are really

considering themselves. But like if if the election had gone down last time, right, let's say the election gone like went down and all the stuff that we're finding out in the aftermath of Trump being out of office about oh, he tried to do this, and he tried to do that, and they tried to steal it this way, and he tried to stay in that way. Like what if that stuff had happened and that like now we're sitting here, That's what I mean, Like all this like right wing

should is all projection. Everything that they say, they say because that's like actually what they want to do, you know. So like we've been spending the last year, they've been talking about, oh, the election was stolen. The election was stolen. The election was stolen. That's because that's the ship that they want to do. They want to like steal an election.

Because I guarantee you, if like I mean whatever polls say, if a majority of these Republicans really, really, truly, truly in their heart of hearts, I thought that Donald Trump won, they would be that like January six would be every day everywhere nationwide. They would not stop they like you know what I mean, there there would be no there would be no like wishy washenis that they're having and could the convenience of when they want to be outraged and mad about it, and when they don't want to

be outor so just have hypothetical situation. The election goes down, Trump is like, I'm not going anywhere. I'm staying in office. They do a bunch of smoke and mirrors legallys to like try to pass it off as like, yeah, this is what this is what's going on now. I think that would be a situation where you create it and you look and you're you're like, oh my goodness, Americans are just out in the street. There's there you know

what I mean. There's there's monerance, There's there's conservatives who don't like this, There's liberals don't like this, there's progressives don't like this. This is just people will not stand for this. The you know, I think something like that is what could bring bring about that sort of thing in the US. Barring that, barring us getting to the brink of like democracy not working. We've talked about this

millions of times. There's just there's just too much comfort in America to like elicit that sort of reaction out of the populace. I think, unless like the situation is obviously dire. Yeah, Well, there's a couple of other notable. I think conditions in these in these uprisings that um are worth discussing briefly. You've got strong female leadership in the streets. What's sad? I think that also somewhat mirrors what we saw here last summer of like black women

kind of like leading the thing. So how do you think that affects it? Um? I just feel like there's something I don't I don't not to be biased, but like nurturing about like female leadership of just like's not a bear on the streets get fired up, like oh honey,

do you need a t shoot or whatever? Women just care about stuff more and when you're when you whatever, you're like working in like any sort of like a I don't want to say like a creative endeavor, but like just like any sort of like task sort of endeavor. You know what I'm saying. It's like like women care more about the tasks that they do than men. Do you know what I mean? To feel like that, it's like I don't like the way this is going. Fuck it,

I don't know what it is. Women runsh it around here. I mean like in my political organizing, I was always found that like ladies, kids, should done. You do. I

don't know what it is. It's a beautiful thing. But one of the last um I think pieces of you know, layers to the success of these popular uprising since then is that it is the choice of peaceful protests and ins and strikes which makes it difficult for the regime to depict the movement in a negative light and non violence when met with say violence, drumming up sympathy for the cause that brought more and more people into the streets.

They see images of like innocent people getting gunned down by military forces and they're like, you know, let's fark that, Like, oh, look how peaceful they are. They have a little dance party because I heard, you know, reading reports of the

atmosphere at some of these protests. You know, they got DJs, they got people on the Street's kind of like I've been having a good time, you know, seeing that spirit not even you know, stay violence aside and being like, you know, I want to be a part of that, as opposed to I mean, this is this is just a neutral just reporting, not taking aside on it here, but as opposed to like here where like there was you know, Antifa fucking bashing in the windows of the

Chase Bank or whatever, you know, being people like, oh how dare they they're you know, I don't want to be a part of that mess, and uh not, it is somewhat diluting the message that they're they're in, the message, in the power, the draw of the movement itself. So you also got a factor in how restraint the forces that you're going against our you know what I'm saying.

And I don't I don't know if it's has the Internet or like the boddered times that we're in or because like some of these regimes are like getting softer

and their old day just some ship like that. But I've personally been kind of surprised at some of the rest you know what I'm saying, Like for all the cracking down that they did on the on the uprising quote unquote here, it could have been worse, you know what I'm saying, And like like the protests and like the protests in Taiwan, Like I just feel like if this was like the eighties, I really don't think China will be sucking around with these kids, like like I

think they would really be going to like coming down to them, like real soup, like harder than they're coming down on them now, like the protests in Haiti and stuff that that's going on, Like when we're talking about that same sort of things, like I feel like, damn, if this was like the early nineties and the eighties, would they really be letting these well, you know, would they be really letting the protests go on like this?

Like like would they, you know, with the student with the military, the Sudanese military, if this was two thousand two, be like as restrained as they are right now. And I wonder what I wonder if there is that because of internet and social media or is that another factor that's that's a bluff with that mm hmm, Like are they, like our regimes more concerned in the in modern times about how they look and how things like that like cracking down and just emptying machine guns into a crowd

of protesters. Are they more concerned with like, hey, that's not a good look, don't know? Yeah, Actually, the more the more I think on it, definitely that they can't do as I community because people everyone's watching, you know, through their camera phones, and then whoever it's watching on the other side start like a multi country second protests. We're gonna take a little break anyway. Anyway, I mean the way these lecture results are going. Man, I don't know.

I don't know what else I'm supposed to do. Bro, I don't want Granny to have to be able to afford dentures and ship, Bro, I didn't ask for all this. I don't know. What do you what do you think it's gonna What do you think? What do you think it's gonna happen? In two thousand two? Two thousand two? Space is gonna be? That's going to happen? Oh no, man, we can do a whole separate episode on that show.

We'll see, we'll see. I like to have hope, you know, optimism of the pastimism of the intellect, optimism of the will. I don't know. I feel like hopefully this will be a wake up call, that's what That's what you know. People would be like, oh, ship chocked out of there, you know, complacency on one side, or like to making up more of your stance and the other I'm like, well, I guess the best we can do is defeat fascism

and like, you know, get back involved. If they had fallen out because they were not blues with the way things are going. M well, well let's I'll just if Democrats want to win, they just need to parade Texas, like keep that in the forefront of everybody who had that. Look. You need to not to turn the country into Texas. And then you need a little bit of this stick, a little bit of the carrot. You gotta give the people some material, you know, uplift, pass some bold you know,

social spending that will make people's last material be better. Um, because if they're already living in misery, threatening them with more misery, they might just be like fucking brand On, I don't care. I don't care about anything. Everything is terrible as it is. Make it, make Georgia Texas for all I fucking care. You know, you can't. You can't threaten people if they're already at what they perceived to be their lowest. Give him something good. You're not robbed,

you're you're not wronged, you're not wrong at all. Like thinking about this like for like uh, like young working class, like you know, work sixty hours a week, Like I don't know, grocery bagger here in Georgia that like six roommates to pay the rent, you know, maybe got they got kids, they got student loans whatever, like to them, abortion is already like functionally illegal, and that like they can't afford it, They can't get off work to go,

they can't afford child care to go and get the procedure. They you know, might go to a crisis pregnancy center and get told misinformation about it, and then I got the adiyada, Like it's already functionally inaccessible to that person. So to tell them that, oh now we're gonna make it like really illegal, it's like fucking what was I going to do in the first place. I can't I can't afford five hundred dollars at abortion. I can't like I can't get time off work. I don't have a car.

I can't drive three hours to the next the nearest abortion clinic. So that's what I mean by like you can't scare people with how much worse things could get. Things are already so fucking dad for so many people. And to illustrate with an endcode and as always like you're absolutely not wrong, I mean I I don't. It's not so much as like, oh man, how come people

don't aren't looking at it? In this big picture, macro way, because of course it's hard for people to look at things and these like long scale like views when everybody's like worried about the immediacy of their own lives. And

that's totally understandable. But at the same time, you know, for two cats like us who are talking about it, you know what I mean, and like, you know from somewhat of a you know, we're having a political conversation about it, and one that's like encompassing the long term of how the thing goes in I'm I'm thinking about, you know, like environmental policy going forward if the wrong people are in power. I'm thinking about like just like ten fifteen years from now with like the civil rights

movement and slavery being taught less in school than it is. Yeah. Yeah, I'm thinking about like the most powerful, one of the most powerful cultural voices in the country being like, hey, trans people are weird, and everyone like you know what I'm saying, and having millions and millions of people Yeah, yeah,

trus people are weird, are you know. I'm it's like I think about how these things like are affecting, like the long term effect that it's going to have, and it's just like from that, you know, it's like I understand why nobody is concerned or why people are more concerned about what's gonna happened next week than they are concerned about what's gonna happen in ten years. I get it. But also looking at ten years, it's like, shit, man, this is it's not good. It's not good. It's not good.

You know what is good? Rap music, rap music, musical about let's talk about it, all right, let's we're gonna get into a music discussion right after the jump. All right, part of people, we are back Dope, knife Linger Franco waiting our reparations, music discussion time, mother, Yes, and up. First we have omarm majeed Um it was the theme

is almost theme the theme? Okay. So we got a mixture of Sudanese hip hop artists and UM and folks with the d spora who either draw influence from UM you know, the sounds of Africa or who themselves are UM you know, the Sudanese American, Sudanese Canadian. I think one of these cats is so Proba and some surprising names you might not you might not have realized had

Studentese heritage. Um. But first we're gonna get into, you know, some political raps which are our favorites with Omamajied and his song with Sudania Sudania I don't know, uh, featuring um Gee, Sally at a Proof and a k A Keys. So this song it's going in on. He's calling that the corruption of the Basher administration. Um that goes on while people starve and go without medicine. Um, it's just as a scathing indictment of the previous regime. So let's

get a little listen. You've been eating off of Plato, you well, fare when they're struggling for prey, putting pullings and they're handing it int really matter. They won't say, homie, you don't gotta be Yeah. So the music video has really graphic depictions of violence against what I presume our

protesters by the military. Um morning if you look it up. Um, but the good hard they just really to call out the economic inequality, the people who are hoarding on the goal, eating off the platter, you know, sitting pretty um ordering the military to go crack down on folks who have nothing. Who are you know, going going without basic necessities and you know, filling the streets with nothing to lose um in you know, in retaliation in response to the deprivation

that they're living through. So I'm not sure if this song came out in twenty nineteen, but it's got it. The YouTube video that we're watching from it's it definitely has um the same sort of energy and some that some of the music that was being made in the wake of the George Floyd you know, like that that's sort of you know, I'm on the I'm on the ground in the thick of the ship, and I'm observing it,

so I'm writing about it. It has that sort of vibe to it, but obviously feels a lot more pressing because the stakes in the situation feel a lot more are a lot more dire, I would say in the video accompanied with it too, like brings that all to home.

Like Mariah said, it's it's really graphic. It's it's showing, you know, the same sort of scenes of protests that you would see on the issue if you're watching the news, but because it's you know, music video, they're afforded the ability to show you like the real effects of the violence. So instead of you just hearing oh, some the police cracked down and some protesters and twelve of them died. The video is actually showing you dead protesters and stuff

like that, so you could put faces to it. And yeah, also on like an aesthetic note with regards to the rhemen, the bars the bars are good. Oh yeah, first verse, the first verse, No that stays stays, yeah, stays clean throughout the big shout out to Omama GI. Up. Next, we've got Sudanese American rapper Odyssey. Did you know honestly what Sudanese? Yes, I did, honestly, not always honestly Sudanese. But he's also from DC too, so it's like apparently, yeah,

apparently a lot of Sudanese and other African communities up there. Um. But yeah, he's with Melo Music Group. And in this song You Grew Up off of his album The Iceberg, he tackles the experiences of being you know, in Africa, sport in America. Um. His born name is Amir Muhammad al Khalifa. He's the son of a Sudanese father an African American mother. Grew up like I said in selfistream

Maryland um. And in the song he discusses growing up, growing apart from a white childhood friend who blames his father for sealing his job. Let's listen to this song by Odyssey. You grew up the mob was aless what in the mid western tent wouldn't were a many brown people. You can see reflection get picked going. I mean, I really like, I feel like it's a it's a unique like it's not unique but underutilized UM format, like the narrative structure and a rap song. And I think here

is a great example. He tells a really interesting story, you know, painting a picture of his um working class childhood, going to six Flags and hanging out UM with his little best friend. And then it's interesting like class wise, I think this is like a much interesting, very interesting, broader commentary. So class wise he identified that he was both working class trying to make it out of hood UM, and they talked about being best friends despite they were

different colors. UM. But then his like the influence of his parents. He played my father for the loss of his job. He said, immigrants robs and this his jobs and I better never set foot again in his yard. Um. You know, let's this is this is essentially what happens if we're just to add like some poetic license. Essentially, he's telling the story of this childhood friend who he had, who was a white dude, and as they grew older, pretty much his friend kind of falls down the maga

maga or something. Yeah. Yeah, it's like he's got this part where he says, uh, have you ever had a friend become a fanatic? Most of y'all haven't, but if you ever did, you'd understand the one thing that they have in common that somebody took advantage of their damage as a kid, Like you know, yeah, I didn't think

about that part. I was looking at like, oh, this divine conquer thing of Like they're both working class, but oh, I gotta blame someone for the loss of my job, so I'll blame the African immigrant rather than blame like the CEO of that shipped that job overseas actually, or is you know, undercutting wages to pay immigrants last to exploit them and they're both actually getting fucked. Yeah. He goes on to say, got picked on in school during lectures,

graduated hating everybody in his class. Picked on because uh now he's talking about himself, and picked on because he prayed to because he prayed it five to the east and he didn't get didn't eat meat. That all I said, it was bad. One day a man approached them in a mosque changed his life when he asked him a question, do you ever feel your life is? Your life was a loss? And what if I could teach you that life is a weapon, that's fine? Oh yeah, no, don't

sleep people. People sleep on Odyssey easily is one of the like if I if somebody, you know, put the put the pistol to my head and say, hey, you gotta come up with a top fifty. You know what I'm saying, Odnestly is gonna be on my list, Like, and not only as an MC, but Odessly as a producer to mother would be making his beats Like Obnestly is the real deal. And you were saying you were

talking about how the narratives underutilized um delivery too. I think it's because it's it's one of those aspects of hip hop that just like whenever you're wrapping about like an issue or something like that, it's one of those things that it's very easy to make it sound corny.

And yeah, you get that kind of slick rick like yeah, once up at a time, No exactly, Like if you're if you're if you're in the like a casual headspace where you kind of like just want to wrap or you just you know, you don't necessarily want to sit down and think too hard about what you're wrapping. Then don't try to write like a story or a narrative because it's just gonna come out sounding like the fresh

Prince of bal ar Ti. You know what I'm saying, Like you really you really got to sit down and really think about you know, how am I going to convey this information but not be so you know, nail on the head with it, you know, and like best reserved for masters of the craft, like honesty, let's being a master of the craft honestly being one touch master with regards to beats as well. Our next artist is also a very talented beat smith um and it's kind

of an R and B singer. But this song that I picked out by Sitting Archives not for sale um kind of has like a bit of a flow to it, like sort of like maybe she got a little empty in her two Well, let's listen to the song or quick not for sale my strings propagate space attack here and there at the same time. Really, Viggo's funk gorgeous for this ship. I think it's safe to say that she reps. I think it's safe to say she wraps. I think it's a it's a it's a trend increasingly

in like R and B singer. I mean we should hear that with Beyonce hold out a whole lot of ladies out here that are sort of blurring this line between R and B or like they are adopting like a cadence that's so stiffato that it feels like you're singing but you're rapping. And she does it really well. I think I think that r V has been getting away with a lot of rapping for the last like ten and fifteen years. There's been a lot of rapping with a singing voice going on. Not no hey, no

shade at all. Let's wrapping raps when I hear raps, but I'm not this ship is this is dope? Yeah, so rapping uh Stone Star Records in archives. It's a self taught violinist and beat baker. We're have actually in since Hattie Ohio. But her work, um, she says draws on the violence side of Northeast Africa, UM and musicians including Camerooney and electronic musician for instance Baby and Sudanese violinist GARAGEI mhm, this is this is dope. I'm actually

really interested in hearing some more for them. Oh wait, she got a little breakdown wrapping this too. Yeah. Yeah, I gotta hear some more of her stuff, definitely. But I don't even know what context I heard the song before, but this is dope. I heard it like a goddamn cole is commercialists. I mean that, I mean that it's high price. Yeah, I don't know where she's actually, I mean other than she grew up in Cincinnati. If anybody finds out, what does that let me know? Yeah? Hey,

you know what. As a matter of fact, I know that we have been talking about this pretty much from the show's inception, but I am going to take the time to actually start setting up some of these playlists that we were telling you guys about. So if you guys, um, I think we'll spread it out between my uh maybe my Spotify page or something in yours or something like guys,

go follow follow me on Spotify. I'm going to start putting up exclusive waiting on reparations playlists, So we will actually start one like right now, the African Dysphoria yeahes or something like that, and start putting a lot of the stuff in. We'll make one with Brazilian hip hop, will make one with where else, the where else? What have we globe trotted to? Maybe but anywhere in pain. We've been all over this bitch, all of the music discussion themes that we've been going on. We'll just have

some ongoing playlists. Well, we'll just continually add songs to those playlists that fit those themes, stuff that we didn't necessarily get to mention in the songs and whatnot. So from this point going forward, if we do an episode where we're like, I don't know, talking about vegan rap or something like that, we will get a vegan rap playlists going so that you guys can go check those out. Um. I think that's all we got for today. We got

for this week. We'll see you next week. Maybe we'll do get into the election results a little bit more. Who knows, we could do anything, fucking do whatever we want. Free negroes. But if you know what's really free until we have the economic freedom to fully self determine our destinies. So we are waiting on reparations, and I think maybe time we should have a little bit. Yeah, let's let's get into some rhyme. Give us, give free a Joel. Let's bust it Joel. Oh blue collar on the beat? Yo,

what's happening blessing the beat on West Africa? Your hood looked like Sesame Street. So when the military wanted to take executive reach, then we're really here to go ahead and get on our feet. But you know they're really trying to overthrow the government. This is how we do it in the Motherland. Get up on the street and then go match without a gun in hand. Strong man stretched like a rubber band. Now give a hug to your brother man. It's a freestyle. Hey, my name's Dope Knife.

My name is La Franca. You are listening to Waiting on Reparations, Got me my check? See you next week. Waiting on Reparations production of I Heard Radio. More podcasts from My Heart Radio. Check out the iHeart Radio app, Apple podcast, or wherever you get your podcasts. M m HM