Cultures are much more similar than different: DJ Rab Bakari

• I just got off the phone with Hip-Life Godfather Reggie Rockstone:: he confirmed the report that his brother-in-art Rab Bakari joined the ancestors. Mr. Root Eye messaged me back: ‘Rab drowned this morning at Busua – Asa Baako‘.
• Marh 10, last year, Rab came to the Ama Ata Aidoo Centre at AUCC with international model Afua Boni and dynamic impresario PY for a long overdue visit out of which came the excerpts from this interview.

Behind every great musician is an even greater, dedicated producer/engineer: Mac Tontoh had Mike Swai; Kojo Antwi had Kwame Yeboah; Lumba had Bodo Staiger. Undoubtedly, the most significant agent around whom the youth cultural movement of this generation has evolved is Reggie Rockstone [for he’s to hip-life what Kool Herc is to hip-hop]. Well, Rockstone had Rab Bakari! This truly remarkable gentleman has done for Africa what Nujabes did for Japan, or J Dilla did for the lo-fi community, or what Grandmaster Flash did for the larger sound. Not bad for a native New Yorker who packed up and moved up here three decades ago to reconnect his past to his future through beats.

Growing up in New York

NANA S. ACHAMPONG: What about your childhood has prepared you for the life you live?

RAB BAKARI: Although, I was born in [and lived my early years] in the very famous borough …of Brooklyn, New York City, I discovered the early elements or pillars of modern Hip Hop sub-culture in Queens, the new residence of my parents. Around 10 years old, I witnessed and imitated disc jockeying, up-rocking dancing, aerosol and marker graffiti tagging, urban fashion, human beat-boxing, vinyl breaks and grooves collection and, of course, the rise of the emcee. This was in the late 1970s, before the 4th June Junior officers’ uprising in Ghana. All this took place in South Jamaica, Queens, facilitated by mentors just a few years my senior. Apprenticeship was highly important in my personal development as a human in a hostile American environment in addition to honing the skills to compete against the thousands of youth using the creativeness of Hip-Hop to discover a path out of misery. Soon enough, my young street peers proclaimed me Djay, breakbeat vinyl LP collector, human beat box, and emcee. Later I added the elements of New York City subway train graffiti writer, breakdancer and the digital art of music sampling to my skill set. Growing up in New York was actually more like a contact sport.

NSA: When was the last time you shed tears?

RB: The last time I shed tears was a few years back when it finally dawned upon me that I no longer had a meaningful relationship with my wife who I had been involved with over 25 years. I had to tell myself it was over and time to move on.

NSA: Are you an observant Muslim? How has your faith helped you in your life?

RB: I am not an observant Muslim. I do not impart or reject any of its tenets either. But, no one can take my faith in a higher omnipotent being, force or entity called Allah. I stopped actively practicing the daily way of life of Islam when I was seventeen years old. Islam opened my eyes to various sciences and the nuances of human behavior when dictated by a religion.

NSA: What one thing do you miss most about New York?

RB: The physical, cultural and spiritual representation of all cuisines, ethnicities, religions, sciences, mannerisms, histories, languages all rolled or mixed into a plate of 784 square kilometers.

NSA: When you visit NY – as you do from time to time – how do your boys view you?

RB: You mean the boys who are now men that I grew up with? Many see me as a person who ‘escaped the Matrix’. They see me as enlightened and righteous for some reason because I identify with the continent of Africa more than the miscegenation of North America. They see me as a ‘master’, one who can perhaps point them away from their wayward, non-elevating lives towards a better form of existence.

NSA: What do New York and Accra have in common?

Both cities have the idea to exploit business opportunities that ‘hustle’ mentality where everyone gravitates toward the big city to realize their wildest fantasies of dream occupation. Both have the sense of areas, neighborhoods or even communities where each area within each city has its own unique history and vibration. Both cities are highly music-based. Both are not sleepy villes or quiet towns. Both have access to the mighty Atlantic Ocean.

Ghana

NSA: How did you make the decision to move to Ghana?

RB: Quite personal. No mentor needed. Family connections and just a perfect jar of variables that aligned. Living in Ghana in the early 90s was a life lesson that I could not have received in the United States of America. It was like I was in an alternate university. Ha! I was already in a university studying Electrical Engineering and Physics as an undergraduate. That allure of the alternative life-lesson university in Ghana sealed the deal to complete my remaining years on this Earth. So, it was easy to make the first permanent move in 1997 immediately after graduating from university. The idea of connections with family, actually producing my own rap artist, the idea to mentor promising Djays and to become a ‘headmaster’ with regards to correcting what young Ghanaians at that time thought Hip-Hop was, all that made it easy to move here.

NSA: Has it been worth it?

RB: A hundred times over. It has been a very natural path up to this point. No regrets.

NSA: If you had to do it all over again, what would you do differently?

RB: I would have really banked money (a dollar cost averaging savings plan) to acquire various lands outside of Accra, and buy old or abandoned properties within the Accra metropolitan area. I would have also partially invested into one of the media networks that hold FM radio and terrestrial TV broadcast licenses.

NSA: What ONE experience in Ghana can you not get anywhere else in the world?

RB: Anywhere else in the world? That is hard to answer directly, because I have been around the world… many continents. You begin to realize that humans and cultures are much more similar than different, regardless if something was forced upon them, appropriated or naturally curated and expanded upon. As for an experience unique to the geo-political boundaries of modern Ghana, I would state the high convergence of European trading posts, forts, castles and outright dungeons that were situated here to convert humans into cargo – slaves. I have researched this phenomenon. This historical footnote does not exist like this in any modern nation. The experience of seeing many of these structures and the historical notes behind them point out that Ghana was a major player in human world affairs commencing almost 600 years ago.

NSA: Have you experienced any form of discrimination up here?

RB: I have faced discrimination in the personal sense that I am different combinations of ethnicities…from physical facial features, body mannerisms to skin shade and hair texture, but it’s not an institutionalized system of prejudice. For me, the surface appearance/book cover that people use to ‘discriminate’ when they meet me is acceptable to me.

NSA: How would you diagnose Ghana‘s ailment?

RB: Ghana: one step forward, but in the next breath, two steps backwards! In all aspects of human, social, political, economic, technological, judicial and environmental levels.

The Music Professional

NSA: DJ? Producer? Agent? Culture exponent? Who are you?

RB: All the above, and then some. My life profession has not been a path of an Electrical Engineer or lab Physicist. Hip-Hop laid the pillars for me to become a music business professional. That does not mean going around practicing the use of a musical instrument, but rather understanding that humans adore being entertained. There is a business in that. Everything you listed above was or continues to be a chapter in my life that is still quite relevant.

NSA: What it is that makes you maintain your focus?

RB: “I’m the driver toward my own destiny and the architect of my own fate. Allah just watches over everything”: it is this phrase which keeps me self-aware and focused.

NSA: What is the Rab Bakari style?

RB: I’m a total Minister of Enjoyment. Generous smiles, rarely forced. Silly, but balanced, with a sense of deep knowledge and seriousness. Frugal, but simply stylish where I can fit into any social situation.

NSA: What‘s your favorite African city?

RB: I’ve been to many: I’m highly impressed with Nairobi, Abidjan and Dakar. Accra is an obvious favorite.

NSA: You and Zapp Mallet

RB: We was supposed to be the Babyface + L. A. Reid, the Louie Vega + Kenny Dope, the Huff & Gamble, the Jimmy Jam + Terry Lewis, the Pharrell + Chad Hugo of the various iterations of Ghanaian modern music. Our lives took similar paths after those early Hiplife days. We both chose life partners…you know…spouses. We both lent our genetics to produce children. Those choices had a great effect on both our destined music careers in Ghana. We have grown distant over the past decades precisely because of those reasons. Not because of a music artist or musician. Zapp’s talent is immense: he has cemented himself in the oral words and pages of Ghanaian history. I forever remain his respected associate and compatriot.

Hiplife

NSA: How has African hip-hop influenced you?

RB: Not much really, especially since I played such a part in its development. My peripheral vision cannot see the influences since all elements of it have been quite familiar to me.

NSA: What can you say about the documentary “Is it sweet? Tales of an African superstar in New York“?

RB: That documentary by Jesse Weaver Shipley did not go far enough. It captured an interesting time in North America and Africa that many could take some serious bullet points from.

NSA: How did you and Rockstone meet?

RB: I introduced myself to him in 1994 at a popular nightclub in Adabraka, Accra called Miracle Mirage. I had not heard of him in The UK or Ghana nor had he heard of me in the United States of America. I was there that night with Kwesi Nyarko Ofei [Mr. Root-Eye] who I had be-friended several months earlier.

NSA: How would you characterize Rockstone‘s legacy?

RB: He can be viewed in chapters, so there are multiple legacies. But his greatest is when he combined with me in the mid-1990s. He always states that I made him; I always state that he made me. That was the period when we consciously begun crafting the idea of ‘HipLife’.

NSA: When was the first time you heard the phrase ‘hip-life‘?

RB: In 1994, at a table in a residential house in Labone, Accra. At that table were me, Reggie ROCKSTONE, Ricci Ossei and Freddy Funkstone.

NSA: How far has hip-life come? And what else can be done?

RB: Not far enough! There’s no Ghanaian cinematic story of triumph/tragedy or perseverance/resistance solely based upon Hip-life. There are no TV series out of Ghana based upon Hip-life. These two should have been penned, produced and executed the latest back in 2005. Cos Ov Money was highly interesting as a musical, but the majority of viewers did not walk away with a character (or characters) embedded in their psyche to leave a cultural stain or reference point of Hip-ife.

Wait: what’s the correct lexicon? Is it “Hiplife” or “Hip-Life”? This needs to be academically settled if one wants to have consistent and accurate documentation of this Ghanaian culture. It had been decided many years ago that one should write “Hip-Hop” and not “Hip Hop” or “Hiphop”

NSA: Is the Hip-Hop generation still relevant?

RB: No. Not in the popular sense of modern Ghanaian culture. Very niche at the moment. That niche does not create movements nor does it attract investors to finance projects.

NSA: Which two new hip-hop/ hip-life artistes must the world watch out for?

RB: Yung Pabi + Slim Vhim for the raps; GrandMaster Que for djaying; Moh Awudu for the graffiti; Incredible Zigi for the urban street dance, and Tubhani for the modern beats, composition and production techniques. Oh, you requested TWO. Ha! There are levels to what these guys bring to Hip-Hop & Hip-life.

For the record

NSA: What thing in life is still a mystery to you?

RB: I used to think death (living creatures) as a whole was a complete mystery until I removed religion from the thinking and concentrated on science. Science disciplined me into a logical way of thinking. The human is composed of three separate energies: the life force (soul), the physical force (body), and the spiritual force (mind). When death occurs, the three energies go their separate ways. Where? That is a mystery. But not that heavy. We as humans in our finite wisdom barely understand the body, much less the concept of soul and spirit. So the mystery lies more in understanding the life force and what is the outcome of the spirit.

NSA: Anything else you wanna add?

RB: In fact, yes. For Ghana to be GREAT in regards to music and its associated businesses, Ghanaian performing music artistes (wordsmiths, rappers, singers, instrumentalists, beat-makers, producers, composers, djays, curators) need to abandon the comfort of Ghana and ‘Ghanafuo’ and venture to other nations, cultures, cities, scenes, particularly on the African continent. They need to put in the effort and show the continent (at least) how bad, in a good way, we are. The creativity is endless. The world should experience an exported Ghana.

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