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Together Festival

The last stop on Matt Shadetek’s The Empire Never Ended Spring Tour will roll through Boston tomorrow night (Wednesday, May 15th.)

Having played host to almost every legend of experimental party music in the past decade, Dutty Artz is honored to show up and represent at a special edition of Beat Research for Boston’s growing Together electronic music festival. Since an astonishing number of Dutty fam have represented at Beat Research before, it’s amazing that this will be Matt’s first time playing the party! He will be performing alongside DJ Ripley, Chief Boima, and Beat Research co-founder DJ Flack’s live electronic band The Sublings!

You can also catch Matt and Ripley on several of the daytime panels for the Together Fest. Check the whole schedule here, and details on Matt’s panels below:

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Tra Ba EP CoverWe travel in circles. Our lives move in cycles. Our dreams spin us around. This is something that artist Rafi El understands intuitively. Through his life and music, he’s been constantly circling back to the source of his creativity, the mountains of South America – long a source of cultural wealth and shamanic power. Raised by parents from Argentina’s historical Jewish communities, Rafi was born in Israel and grew up in Los Angeles, where he currently lives. His earliest days were steeped in the sounds and cultures of three continents.

In anticipation of the release of Rafi El’s debut full length album this summer, Dutty Artz releases the lead single “Tra Ba” as a free EP:

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This month, Dutty Artz kicked off a series of monthly livestream/podcast events called the Duttycast.

The Duttycast will alternate between conversations/interactive experiences where we dig deeper into some of the issues all of us, as artists crossing borders and boundaries, have to deal with; and live musical experiences representing the wide range of Dutty Artz talents.

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[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GCiEPsjRCi4&[/youtube]

I just wrote a long piece on the Somali-American Rap group Malitia Malimob over at Africa is a Country. I won’t write too much more here so you can head on over to check out the post, but you DA readers should know that Malitia Malimob will be playing alongside Matt and myself in Seattle at the Dutty Artz Showcase at The Crocodile on April 3rd. The show will be the first out of town stop for Matt on his tour to promote The Empire Never Ended.

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This Saturday I’ll be djing between acts at The Apollo Theater’s Africa Now! Concert. Today, I had an interesting conversation with the Apollo’s director about the different African crowds in New York (last year they had Tiken Jah Fakoly to an enthusiastic crowd of Francophone African Harlemites), got a tour of the building, rubbed the tree of hope, and stood on the stage where every American black performer of significance in the last 100 years has stood. Besides the fact of my inclusion in the symbolic welcoming of a new generation of Africans into the folds of Black American history, touching the log (while the Apollo stagehand watched me unamused) is really all I needed.

Click through for all the info:

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This Friday Wayne Marshall aka DJ Wanye & Wax and I will be holding it down at Bembe in South Williamsburg Brooklyn. It’s my great pleasure to be able to play with Wayne in New York after he brought me up to Boston for so many years. Brooklyn Shanti will be holding down the toasting duties.

It’s also my birthday at midnight  so get your marathon shoes out, and get there early!

Sonic preview for your enjoyment:

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I have recently returned from a trip around Europe, where I played a few gigs, and attended Womex and the Impakt! Festival. Check out my tour mix, and an interview and mix I did for Africanhiphop.com’s radio show in Amsterdam’s Red Light District.

This week I’m back in New York, and I’m not the only one returning. New York is in for a big week showcasing some of Africa’s most internationally popular genres. Read on for a little round up of fun upcoming shows.

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