A little hip hop, a little storytelling

Greetings,

Photo by T.J. Breshears on Unsplash

I feel like a broken record. Life happens and I struggle to get this newsletter and my podcast out. I have to keep remembering to gentler to myself. Plus, sometimes it feels like I am doing too much.

In my last newsletter, I had just started reading Oliver Burkeman’s Four Thousand Weeks: Tim Management for Mortals. I have now finished it. My biggest takeaway is that we have a finite amount of time and we will not be able to do everything that we want to do. Taking solace from that whenever I have to push out the newsletter, don’t get the time to record an interview for the podcast or continue to delay the launch of my merchandise store.

Anyway, here are seven things I thought were worth sharing.

1. Since I first heard Plantation Lullabies in 1993/94, I have been a Meshell Ndegeocello fan. I have loved every single album she has released and have been getting into a newest offering The Omnichord Real Book. For Meshell Ndegeocello, blurring musical lines has provided a clear path provides dope insights into how the album was birthed. And here’s a playlist of some of favourite Ndegeocello tracks.

2. With hip hop celebrating its 50th anniversary, there are lists, op-eds and playlists galore doing the rounds. The reality is, because it is subjective, there will always be disagreement. I did enjoy reading 50 Artists Who Changed Rap. I also created my own Hip Hop Memories playlist with tracks that have meant something to me in the 40 or so years since I first heard about hip hop, as a preteen in Lesotho. 17 hours of music and there is still so much missing.

3. In keeping with the hip hop thread, I just finished watching the Ladies First: A Story of Women in Hip-Hop docu-series and it is so dope. A must watch. One of the executive producers is dream hampton who influenced my writing from an early age.

4. In the last few years, I have been consulting for companies and brands on content editorial strategy and storytelling. This had led to my talking a bit more about storytelling from a business and brand perspective, which is forcing me to develop a more coherent about storytelling in general. I just started reading William Storr’s The Science of Storytelling for inspiration.

5. In 2015, Ogojiii was launched as a print magazine focused on African innovation in design, art, culture, enterprise and current affairs. In 2021, I was part (as Editor) of the relaunch of Ogojiii as a community on Medium, open to writing from across the continent and the diaspora. While it is still a work-in-progress and we are exploring different project ideas beyond online publishing, I have a monthly newsletter that we put out. Check it out here.

6. There is a lot happening on the continent as we seek to take carve out our space in this so-called global village. I was raised by a pan-Africanist who came of age in the lead up to the independence of Ghana, in Ghana. Watching the goings-on, I was inspired to reread Kwame Nkrumah’s speech at the founding of the Organisation of African Unity (OAU), the precursor to the African Union. “We must unite or perish”

7. I don’t think I am doing productive procrastination right. Or at least sometimes … there are times when bouncing between multiple projects can feel a tad overwhelming.

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That’s it for today. If you enjoy receiving the Zebra Culture By Kojo Baffoe newsletter but are not subscribed, please do subscribe.

I would also appreciate it if you shared with a friend who might also like it.

I welcome comments, thoughts, etc. A big thank you to those of you who have sent me messages. I have been experimenting with both Substack’s new Chat and Notes features.

And if you would like a copy of my book Listen To Your Footsteps, it is available online and in bookshops (primarily in South Africa but also on Barnes & Noble and Amazon) both in digital and physical form. If it isn’t available in your local, South African bookshop, ask for them to order it. Or you can mail me and I can make arrangements to get a copy to you.

Easy

Kojo