Blitz the Ambassador’s Native Sun Blazes and Burns
This is the rare hip-hop album that’s as interesting musically as it is lyrically, in fact more so. That’s because Ghanian-American hip-hop artist Blitz the Ambasssador is also a bandleader, mixing Afrobeat with funk, the occasional slow jam and roots reggae for a completely unique sound. The hooks here are wicked: like Blitz’s lyrics, they come at you hard and fast. There are a lot of musicians on the album: the core band, with Raja Kassis on guitar, Ramon de Bruyn on bass and a soaring horn section with Jonathan Powell on trumpet, Ron Prokopez on trombone and Ezra Brown on tenor sax is killer, with a mix of real percussion and canned beats that sound organic more often than not.
The opening track sets the stage for everything that follows: snakecharmer flute kicks off a balmy, hypnotic Afrobeat instrumental, slinky guitar intermingling with the horns and Blitz’s rapidfire lyrics: he wants to leave no doubt that he’s arrived, “Top ten on itunes without a deal.” A love letter to Africa personifies the continent as a woman: “Most of the men that said they loved you robbed you blind,” Blitz snarls, the sway behind him building to a biting, staccato Afro-funk interlude. He delivers a couple of joints in his native dialect over catchy, Ethiopian-flavored, hypnotic vamps; the reggae-flavored Best I Can gives a shout-out to the American hip-hop artists who inspire their African colleagues, Blitz making it clear that all he’s interested in is rocking the mic, not striking any stereotypical, corporate faux-gangbanger pose.
The next track is a slow jam with a breezy sax solo, segueing into the album’s best cut, the absolutely gorgeous Accra City Blues. A lament for a lost girlfriend in both English and Blitz’s native tongue, it’s packed with delicious touches like a sax solo run very subtly through a phaser, and an eerily twangy, absolutely noir guitar outro. With its mighty horn hook, Free Your Mind is a call for solidarity against corruption and African tyrants that couldn’t have come at a more appropriate time. The brief Victory is the most traditional, American-style rap number here, which segues into the bitter, knowing title track, illuminating the struggle that African immigrants face here as the band works a richly psychedelic early 70s style wah funk groove. The album winds out with a surprisingly mellow, thoughtful acoustic guitar interlude. So many different styles of music here, so many different possible fans: this guy’s no dummy. Blitz the Ambassador plays the cd release show for this one at SOB’s on May 4 at 9.
Blitz the Ambassador Sells Out BAM Cafe
Friday night at BAM Cafe the line at the base of the stairs snaked all the way around to the front doors: those who didn’t have the presence of mind, or simply the good fortune to get to the venue by half past eight, didn’t get in to see Blitz the Ambassador and his soaring Afrobeat band. As the bartender/emcee emphasized before the show began, concerts here on the weekend tend to fill up quickly these days. Yet there seemed to be considerable extra space in the room – there was a good crowd, but by no means a packed house. Take that into consideration the next time you see something on the calendar here that looks enticing.
About the show: Blitz the Ambassador’s band soundchecked at about quarter past eight, and sounded great. As it turned out, they hit the stage a half hour late, at 9:30, undoubtedly cutting into their time onstage. The Ghanian-born hip-hop artist switched between English, French and his native patois, delivering rapidfire, smartly conscious lyrical passages with long breaks for jamming. This band is about the music just as much as the lyrics: it makes sense that he would quote at length from the Public Enemy classic Welcome to the Terrordome at one point. A little later, he asked the crowd if they’d let him play dj, then led the band – a blistering horn section plus tasty guitar, melodic bass and drums – through a series of intros and hooks to famous African songs from over the decades, winding up with a Miriam Makeba theme which resonated potently with the older segment of the audience.
He’d opened his set with a catchy, hook-driven number in his native tongue that translated as “welcome.” The most classic, Fela-style song of the night was a fervent anticorruption anthem: Blitz made no secret of having zero tolerance for that stuff. But the most vivid moment of the night was when he went off on corporate radio. “If you wanna kill the radio, we gotta take it back to the drum, back to Africa,” he insisted, throwing his djembe over his shoulder and joining the band in an insistent, hypnotic, circular groove. The audience – an impressively diverse mix of ages and nationalities – followed his words closely and approvingly.
