Wednesday, January 14, 2008, Oakland, CA Today, like last Wednesday was electric, inspiring and empowering. Oakland stood up and demanded justice. In a collective outcry we all shouted "I AM OSCAR GRANT" as we followed youth leaders like Franceyez Jackson in a peaceful rally at Frank Ogawa Plaza. After hearing the words of very spirited OG's like Dereca Blackmon and Tony Coleman, we marched peacefully but intently all the way to the District Attorney's office. United under a banner of justice, unity and strength, we showed BART, The Oakland Police Department and our clown mayor that the people of Oakland, California are an organized body of nonconformist activists that will no longer sit still for the massacre of our young black men. Despite subconscious fear tactics ensued by the powers that be such as choppers overhead and a mobilized police force in full riot gear, we moved with love and force. Families, community leaders and everyday civilians all transformed into freedom fighters today. Moved by messages from Too Short, Mark Curry and Oscar Grant's grandfather and coach, today we celebrated truth. Demanding the prosecution of all the Bay Area Racist Transit police officers involved in Oscar Grant's apprehension and murder. We are now an organized and orderly mass of civil dissenters. I urge everyone reading this to get down with CAPE (Coalition Against Police Execution) if you aren't already. This can be done by emailing joincape@gmail.com or calling 415-748-1556. You can also find us at Facebook and Myspace and I strongly suggest you all join this movement. This is not a sedentary moment in time for we have not yet won. We soon shall win but we gotta keep pushing. We have to make sure that another Johannes Mehserle action does not take place as we have to make an example of him. An arrest is not enough as murder can easily be delineated to manslaughter and if you read between their stutters, it's written all over their lips. This would have been a perfect moment in time, if all that took place was our triumphant display of noncompliance with injustice. But of course that's not all that happened.... When will we learn to stay completely disciplined and stick to the script? The mainstream media won tonight. They got the ratings they wanted tonight. They have once again sensationalized the situation. They spent the last few hours, from 8pm to now, reporting the rioting and damaging of the stores near Frank Ogawa Plaza. Very little talk of the peaceful protest, and the drummers and the unity. Very little commenting on the presence of reputable agencies like Leadership Excellence and Ella Baker Center downtown but tons of footage of Jamba Juice, Wells Fargo and Club One store windows broken. It's all good though, We got footage and I'm finna share some soon. Nonetheless let's keep it rocking. Let this be a full wake up call and start to unite for real, from the heart. It's time to put aside our petty differences and become selfless and become one. We have to really support one other and get behind all who work to heal our community. One such entity is Cov Records and they need our help. Their 28th and Telegraph location is being shut down this Friday, January 16, 2009. Mind you now Cov Records has been serving 30-50 youth per day, every week for the past 6 years. And as they seek to transition their community-based music and video production center into a Green Youth Media Center they can really use your support. As a matter of fact Grind For The Green and Destined Nation Media are major partners of that center and we beseech you to please help in this effort as much as you can. They need financial support and contributions can be made at support@artinactinworld.org. Also several healing events will be taking place this Saturday, January 17, 2009 where we can reflect and honor Oscar Grant and our movement. I will be hosting and performing at one of these events called Cultivating Town Solidarity that will take place at Merritt College's Huey P. Newton Auditorium located at 12500 Campus Drive in Oakland from 12:30pm - 5:00pm. This event is being presented by Oakland Leaf, BUMP, Youth Movement Records, Cov Records, Art In Action, Weekend Wake Up and with me, Grind For The Green and Destined Nation Media is supporting it. Please join us in this day of unity and culture. Three other Day of Remembrance events will be going on as well in Oakland at: East Oakland Youth Development Center - 8200 International Blvd. (East Oakland) Arise Charter School - 3709 E. 12 St. (Fruitvale) Poplar Recreation Center - 3131 Union St. (West Oakland) These event will all take place between the hours of 12pm - 4pm. Finally there will also be a March for Justice coming up on MLK Day this Monday, January 19, 2009. It will assemble at 11:30am at West Oakland Bart and will begin promptly at 12:00 pm. Brought to you by the International People's Democratic Uhuru Movement. Check them out at www.inpdum.org. Big up all you my comrades in this struggle, progress and evolution. Big up Zion -I, Jakada Imani, Alli Starr, AshEL Eldridge, Ryan Peters, Trinidad, Salim, Jon, Dave and the whole LE crew, KEV, Kev Choice Jennifer Johns, Ise Lyfe and everybody mentioned in this article.Let's Fight The Power and reclaim our spirits of peace, community, and justice. Let's use this current turn of events as an impetus for spiritual and communal enlightenment and empowerment. One Love, Ambessa Negus/Cantave aka AmTheArt

Hosted By: Evarize/ MuiMui Studios/Destined Nation Media
When: Friday Dec 05, 2008
at 5:00 PM
Where Old Oakland
481 9th St
Oakland, CA 94606
United States
Description:
Evarize/ MuiMui Studios/Destined Nation Media

Click Here To View Event

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A7vIMqCgqUM

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lKv0emHMuDI

Runnin' Away http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lKv0emHMuDI

Hey folks have you heard of Banished? We just saw a screening of it at the Oakland Museum and I finally reached past the point of being tired of being mad at this country and it's conspiracies and such. I'm back to what the fuck, pass me my rocket launcher and mob of angry regular folks and the blueprint to the mother of revolutions. To get you up to speed It's basically about how Afrikans-(fuck the american part) in the 20th century were driven out of hick counties ,after one of their members would be hung, literally by being shot at, bombed and attacked by hordes of whites in the those counties, in an ethnic cleansing fashion, and had their lands taken from them. It's like the second Afrikan colonization. After seeing this and being reminded that we still didn't get reparations, while both the Jews and Japanese did (no attack on those groups now), it was like watching Sankofa or Malcolm X again.

Now I don't usually show my ass on an arena as public as the internet a lot like this but, I gotta ask will there ever be justice or are we gonna continue to just have a few Oprahs, Jordans, Puffy's and JayZ's while African American youth are concurrently getting lower on the education totem pole and higher in the prison and murder rates. Why does 2008 feel like 1950 in Selma, Alabama or Mississippi. I know for my non-African American peoples on here, this is a black thing, but don't sleep in the words of Haile Selassie Today it's me tomorrow it's you. What do you think?

Holler

music | family | progress | life

Greetings family far and wide,
It's been a while since we wrote ya'll, but worry not cause in that time we've amassed a wealth of experiences that has left catalogues of details with which we're dying to entertain ya'll. First, biggest and best things first, as many of ya'll know in 2005 we were blessed with the most divine creation that we could have had come through us, our daughter Aissaade (pronounced, follow the bouncing ball now, aah-yee-saah-day) and as you'd imagine FIYAWATA living has changed tremendously. Honey girl is like running the house now, short of paying bills and working. And of course why should she? Royalty of her caliber just don't do the job thing, besides she has slaves, I mean parents for all that.

Our next divine happening was the release of our first studio album Live In The Raw, which with online distribution from IODA (www.iodalliance.com) and placement onto I-tunes, Rhapsody and Burnlounge has and continues to sell hundreds of copies. This afforded us 3 NYC shows during the 2005 holiday season and a plethora of shows in 2006 in the bay. Some other major highlights were: Our production of L.O.T.U.S. with Korise (my mellow ace) of The Boogie Shack (Affiliated Music in it's fullest effect), Grind and Glory which was managed and organized by Big Zakiya when working with The DJ Project, and finally our 2nd ALLURE show which featured J'Davey, Kirb n Chris and Trackademiks. So as you can see professionally for FIYAWATA 2006 was the bomb of all bomb weeds.

Personally, however, let's just say "HAPPY 2007, Year of the Boar". So focusing on the positive, @))& (oops that's a typo) 2007 is very kick ass so far. We been in the "stuud" bangin out two sizzlers for the past few months. The first one is our album that has production from BIG TUNES aka Korise-J3, Boogie aka Lazerpro on Myspace, and Luq Frank. All bay love all the bay time. This project whose name we won't yet tell you (to keep our mystique) is due sometime in the Leo season. In the Taurus season we're set to drop the "THIS IS A JOURNEY INTO SOUND" mixtape and if we didn't have to clear samples or "P-Diddy methods of producing" it would be an actual album. But for now we'll just relegate this state of the art manifesto to being a mixtape. I mean our album is bangin, but putting this project out along with our sophomore LP will have us owning the next 3 years (who's your daddy).

Finally we got some hot tours scheduled for the spring, summer and fall 2007 so let me tell you now get ready, at least for more newsletters. And for all of ya'll that had me remove you from our list, even though you're not reading this now I guess, you fell off. Toodles.

2006 Memorables (in no particular order)
1. Legendary "Godfather of Soul" James Brown transitions on Christmas Day.
2. Three hella dope Damian Marley visits to the Bay Area.
3. Saddam Hussein gets sentenced to execution (as if he was the problem).
4. Myspace officially becomes part of the evil empire with just one Rupert Murdock check.
5. More wanna be Myspace sites pop up out of no where (Warning: remember the dotcom BUST not boom BUST).
6. Azeem's One Man Play, Rude Boy
7. Great Bay Area Artist releases: Jungle Electric by the Attik, Niggas and White Girls by Kirb N Chris, Town Bombing by Co-Dees and Luv Ones family, Leftism by Sake-1 and J-Boogie.
8. FIYAWATA gets tired of flakes and do they own thang.
9. The continuous love and support we got from all o' ya'll.


Fiya Fav's (again in no particular order)

1. Engine Runnin Talib Kweli & Madlib feat. Consequence
2. Ghetto Int'l Jennifer Johns feat. Zion-I, Gift of Gab and more
3. Hip-Hop Is Dead Nas
4 .Still Dreamin Nas feat. Kanye West,
5. Dolla Day Mos Def,
6. Undeniable Mos Def,
7. Trouble Jay-Z,
8. Warm It Up Kane Big Daddy Kane,

9. No Sleep The Attik

10. Say It Loud James Brown

Loooooong time no chat ya'll. What it doooo.

It's ya most favoritest dubrockin soul hip-hop duo., what it do yo !!!

Okay, I'm writing like as if I was on stage and ya were in the audience. (Okay Ambessa, let's re-group, this IS a newsletter AND NOT a show, AND WE'RE BACK!!!) So "it's been a long time and sorry we kept you", we just had to knock out some projects and we're happy to say our next joint is just on timer, browning in the oven and will be out soon as you hear that PING!!

Word life... we've spent the last few months going through it and MAN, we could breathe again. Not to complain, but to come plain I've always been the dynamic type of task master type that covers a few bases at a time and Za a go with the flow type that auric bleeds dopeness, so when we had to like hibernate and stew in the studio for the last few months and focus on just brewing this mixtape that has turned into a classic, shit got real. We made friends, lost friends, lost nights and tempers and through it all we've concocted some dope ass shit. I can't even call it a mixtape anymore, it's really an album but we got another album coming after that, so we call it a blendtape? project? compilation? I give up ya'll figure it out for yourselves. Hey if I could get one of my sample clearance friends to pull some favors then ey WE DROPPIN TWO ALBUMS SON!! But for now let's say blessings are abound.

Shoot I need some blessings now, remember that little email snafu we had in April, if you don't then good. Let's just say I almost inherited the name SPAMbessa. But none the less all the most. Life has been good. Maximum big ups to LEADERSHIP EXCELLENCE my new job site aka 5 on the black hand side, my man Khufu (graffitti mad genius) my home girl Queen D (pinnacle of poetesses) BRIDGE TEAM REPRESENT and our die hards KoriseJ, BoogieShack, FEMI, RyeNicole, Sake1derful, House of Mamasan (Kila and Drea what it dooo?) Sakima (Co-Deez), Kirby Dominant (yes we are rocking those beats blood), Ariel Sheppard, The Attik, Aeble Dee, Mpenzi, Nicacelly, Weyland, EDL, Ahsabi, Boze (Hardoo), Trinidad, the entire studio crew at soundweezy (Tone, Fleet, E, Trunks), Angel Magik Massive, DeeCee, Mariposa, Imani, Pam, Fran Boogie, Crystal and the super stylist Felicity, can't forget Mike P and Eric Arnold for the monumental support, love and just good vibes ya have thrown our way. You all were our Nag Champa during funky moments. And yes that was the shout out that were supposed to go on our liner notes so don't check the cover.

We got gigs coming up: stay tuned on our myspace page (www.myspace.com/fiyawatacrew). Also check me out at Levende on 6.14.07 with Korise and Ariel hosting PST Father's Day special and if you into Reggae TOK at Club 6. And very lastly despite appearance Everything is God so please don't hate, sleep, judge be jealous, envious or snakish - cuz you really doing it to yourself. The world is crazy, but divine, as it is enough,

JUST SPREAD LOVE.

One,

Ambessa The Articulate

Okay ya'll, it was a cute and real smart marketing move for Nas to name his latest studio classic "Hip-Hop Is Dead" but gimme a flippin break. If one more "jumped on the hip-hop bandwagon in the mid 90's but think they overstand the essence of the shit" novice (not Nas, but one of you mudder falkers) utters that phrase to me one more time, I personally will take a ghetto militia with me to every mainstream record label and thrash the building down. Of course for victims with media fear tactic mentalities, that was a joke, off the record, a euphemism or whatever you need it to be to understand that I am just totally talking shit. AND for all you rumor loving nobodies that like to blow statements into the ocean, I LOVE Nas' latest joint except for tracks # 2,3,4 and 6. Remember Nas is from the old school where geriatric emcees would think it okay to have some wack beats on the album just as long as they "dropped science" on it.

But for real though, Hip-Hop aint dead ya'll, the record business is, major labels are, as a matter of fact the music industry is undergoing one of the most profound and exciting changes it has ever had since its inception: the liberation of the artist Point blank DO YOU! Anything a major, minor, independent or whatever label could do for you, you could do for yourself. I mean a lot of folks go to clubs and spit this same game to the opposite sex for sex like they know this, but they still want somebody else to put them on. Stop talking nonsense Hip-Hop aint dead are you? Every genre of music is going through it but you don't see Usher talking bout R&B is dead. The Dixie Chicks didn't say we gotta save country music when they won 5 Grammy's and that shits has been dead for decades now.

It just aint easy but we gotta keep trucking along. Truck Tuner biyotches! For example check out our sonic bids page at www.sonicbids.com/fiyawatamovement and if you missed the blast about our vintage video interview here's the link I know PLUG, PLUG, PLUG. Speaking of plugging I wanna shout out my bredren Abba Yehuda's new music and Boogie Shack for plotting a crazy hot video for their soon to be released song "Party Girl", all I can say is stay tuned. We're also venturing into the spiritual music scene these days. On March 10, 2007 at the Linen Life Gallery at 5pm we'll be performing at the One Life Institute's Transformative Visions a showcase dedicated to a vision of peace, justice and healing on the planet. Later that same day at 8pm the dub bombastic soul duo (that's us, FIYAWATA if you forgot) will be rocking a Women's History Month show at Laney College entitled Her Story Our Story alongside Akosua, Ahsabi Monique and more.


Top 10 Reasons Hip-Hop Aint Dead
1. White folks aint done exploiting it yet (see the White Rapper)

2. Old school emcees are resurfacing faster than roaches i.e. Big Daddy Kane on the new Rza track, Ghostface Killa's More Fish, AG's new album, C.L. Smooth's American Me and so forth and so forth. Shit so many old schoolers coming back they'll soon be endorsing Centrum Silver

3. Good ole underground heat: Saigon, Immortal Technique, Papoose, Crown City Rockers, FIYAWATA, Zeph and Azeem c'mon

4. NAS. What's up with his album with Premiere, damn that aint coming out no more?

5. P-Diddy got to keep making albums to promote Sean John

6. Jay-Z has to retire and return at least 5 more times

7. What A New Pharoah Monch album??????

8. FIYAWATA hasn't sold a million records YET (operative word: YET)

9. We haven't found a suitable genre to replace hip-hop with yet.

10. Repeat after me while visualizing a bouncing ball Iiiiinnnnduustttrrrryyyy Puuuubbbbliiiccccciittttty Stuuuunnnttt.

Aiight ya'll, real talk here...

Where is the Love?

Now I'm not talking about that lust, fake love, get ahead love, convenience love, acting like you love to not let your true feelings show love, giving you love so one day I will Blow love, I wanna find out about you to report back to haters love, I'll give you pounds but talk shit about ya and maybe even try to get in your way love, we're both spiritual and or vegetarian so I have to be fake love, you seem to know people that could hurt or help me love, my trife ass aint find no reason yet to backbite on you love, my phony ass can't look you in the eye love, oh you got a man love, oh you aint broke up with her yet, I mean how is your wife love, Nigga don't look now but ya girl aint here love, I think you should help my shit out (I mean do a solo project) love, can your wife sing a hook for me love, call her yourself love, people-pleasing-psuedo-ass love, you want to like me but just MUST HATE love, I don't want to love cuz I don't want to make a mistake love, We're boys so you really should let me get on first love, Muthafucka get out my face love, If you let me hit your girl I'll put you on love, if you take this line with me you could blame it on the drugs love, you're just too cocky love, I'll put you on a show but first pass out these flyers for 12 months love, I just don't wanna see you shine love....SHIIIITTT.
What kind of world are we living in. To me it seems like DeLaSoul, hate "is here to stay like racism". I'm kinda fraid of that ya'll. Cause Ambessa's like the wound exposin healer with no apologies in a world of disease flinging shapeshifters. Or maybe that's just the music world, naa it aint. I just don't get it, cause I feel there's enough good, prosperity or ashay in the world to get around to everybody. But between the facetious-assed "oh you being doing your things" and "ya hella gos" followed by surprise hypocritical runnings with them same folks in the scene acting mad suspect, I don't think I know folks anymore, shit I don't know if I wanna know folks anymore. Now I really am not directing this to any one person in particular, I'm directing it to all you fake snakes slithering about.
But really, your salvation or success will not come through any agent out side of your damn so self. So go and do the damn, naa mean. Don't talk about it be about. Shit, just be what you want to be and it will be you and trust me penis pills can't get harder than that.

Stop snitching, stop bitching bout ya life, stop watching other people and STOP HATIN!!!!

Ambessa the (preachy ass) Articulate

NOTHING. This whole music game is like an acid tweekin' old man walking hump backed hoping some one will soon kick it out of it's misery. This Hip-Hop generation's drive towards entreprenuership is unprecedented. I am personally tired of waiting to be "discovered". Being talented intellectual artists, we have ventured to manage our groups business affairs and welcome our fellows of here ay Myspace to discuss how can we all help represent each other in our respective locales in a manner where we all can facilitate each others gigs, bookings and exposure. In short, the Bay Aea needs some of the hot acts from your neck of the woods to come and expose yourselves out here. NYC the same. Any body feeling the same? Any ideas????? Let's build then. Holla Ambessa the Articulate/FIYAWATA