Gospel Music Spotlight: from KUSH to TY Bello

The brilliant, quirky, beautiful TY Bello was another member of the defunct KUSH. Her debut solo album was also released in 2007. She has since won several awards for her single "Greenland". In addition to being a brilliant singer, TY Bello is also a photographer, and from what I hear, a pretty good one.











First her music:




And in addition to making good music, she is deep too. The song Ekundayo and its accompanying video is focused on our own Mother Theresa in Nigeria - madam Ekundayo.






And her photography:



I think she is a creative genius!! Absolutely fantastic stuff.

So you can find out more about her on her website here and her cd is available for purchase here

I will update on the other two ex-members of KUSH later this week. They are doing great things too.

See ya!

Gospel Music Spotlight: From KUSH to Lara George

So I had to make the previous post to beam the spotlight on one of Nigeria's most successful, though now defunct gospel groups. Each of the members went solo, and have gone on to have amazing careers.



First up - Lara George. Lara an architect by training, released her debut album, Forever in my heart, in 2007. Her single off the album "Ijoba Orun" was a smash hit, and even non Nigerians who had no idea what the song meant still fell in love with it. Lara sings with passion, zeal, creativity and dexterity . Alright, that was a cheesy description, but homegirl can sing!!!!



In case you were wondering, this is what it means:

Ijoba orun lere onigbagbo o (2ce)
(The kingdom of God/Heaven is the reward of believers)

Ma je n kuna, Baba, mu mi dele o
Ma je n kuna , Baba se, mu mi dele o
(Don’t let me fall by the wayside, father, take me there (Heaven))

Owo ti mo ni ko le mu mi dele o
Moto ti mo ra ko le wa mi dele o
Ore ti mo ni ko le sin mi dele o
Gbogbo Iwe ti mo ri ka ko le gbe mi dele o
(My money, my friends, my cars, my degree/education, lands/houses cannot take me to heaven etc.....)


Ma je n kuna, Baba, mu mi dele o
(Don’t let me fall, father, lead me home)
Kin ma ku s’ajo bi eefin, mu mi dele o
(Let me not evaporate like smoke on this journey, please take me home i plead)
Aye loja orun nile, mu mi dele o
Aye loja , orun nile se, mu mi dele o
(This earth is only a market place, God's kingdom/Heaven is our real home, please take me home)



Mumi dele o (8ce)

Mama a je’n kuna

Ile ayo, ile ogo, ile alafia....
(Home of joy, Home of glory, Home of peace.......Heaven...)

Fig Tree - Lara George


Just a few of my fav. Mrs George songs. In fact, I love the entire cd. When I first got it, I played it over and over until I could sing all the songs by heart.


However, Lara is at it again o. She has a new album due in August, and she has magnanimously allowed us to get a sneak peak. The single is called "Kole baje" and it is slamming!!

Hear it for yourself here.

Oh yes, if you are interested in buying her first cd, its available here


Ciao!

Gospel music spotlight: KUSH

Kush was made up of Ty Bello nee Shokefun,Lara George nee Bajomo,Emem Ema and Dapo Torimiro. Kush was an acronym for Kinetically Ushering Salvation into Hearts and Homes. The group was formed after Emem, Lara, TY and Dapo Torimiro met at Rock Solid Choir in Unilag while all pursuing undergraduate studies.

Their debut album was titled the Experience. They were signed on to a record label in USA called DKG music. The album was produced in London, Minnneapolis and Los Angeles.

The group split in 2004

SOURCE













I will be updating you about ex members of KUSH in subsequent posts.

RIP Micheal Jackson

The king of pop died today. Amazing singer, dancer, composer, all round entertainer. He was the immensely talented individual who provided the soundtrack of my youth. I had a huge crush on him as a little girl, and I like most fans feel a personal sense of loss. All the networks have been running stories of his life all day, and it is apparent that he lived a really complicated, sad and lonely life.
His death is a big teaching moment I think: we must all answer the final call someday, regardless of what we have or who we are on earth. We must live life with passion, meaning and purpose.

MJ's music was totally amazing!!

Here are a few of my very favorites:













Argh! I can't get them all. Dude was a legend. I hope eternity is happier for him than time here on earth was.

RIP MJ.

Homosexuality III - Where does homosexuality come from?

Finally!! I am back folks. Let the parry continue!

Where does homosexuality come from? The argument of many in the gay community is that it comes from nature, while opponents say that it is learned behavior – more popularly called “choice”. The science is also very bewildering – is there a gene? Are you born that way? It is all very confusing. Most Christians are against homosexuality because it is in the bible (wait for Part IV of this series), and so they believe that it must be a choice because GOD cannot create what HE forbids. Gay people say that they are who they are and they have always been that way. Also confusing matters is the large number of individuals who were sexually abused as children. Donnie McClurkin was one of those children, and his life story was made into a documentary entitled “ The Donnie McClurkin Story: From Darkness to Light.” It is a powerful story and I encourage everybody who has not seen it to get a copy. The bottom-line of the story is this: he was raped by an uncle as a young child, and he believes that experience triggered his lifelong struggle with homosexuality. As an aside – he says he has been delivered from it, and he is much hated by the gay community as you can see here .

Both sides believe that their stance is fundamental to their argument – if it is a choice, then they are immoral people, choosing to live in sin. If it is nature, then you have to accept it, because why would you mess with nature?

Mmmmmm! To prove their case, the pro-nature group point to homosexual behavior in animals to point to its “naturalness” so to speak. Check it out

The choice group however refuses to accept that explanation – you can read a representative rebuttal here . Basically, they say that there are a lot of things that animals do that we as humans don’t do, soooooooooo……!

Further complicating matters is this issue of transgender individuals, people who believe that they are born into the wrong sex – and choose to change their gender first by crossdressing, and then later by more invasive surgical procedures. This is also happening at younger and younger ages. Interesting story here

And fascinating video from Barbara Walters below:












Exactly what is going on? Frankly, I don’t know. However, this is what I think – reducing the whole argument to nature or nurture is simplistic and misses the point in my opinion. People are born with all kinds of physical, mental and emotional conditions – Siamese twins, six toes, without legs, blind, deaf, dumb, mentally retarded, etc, etc, etc. I don’t see why logically people cannot be born with gay. The issue for me is not whether people are born with it or not. The issue is whether it should be regarded as an impairment, or as normal. For people with the conditions mentioned earlier, everybody recognizes the abnormality and attempts are made to fix them – twins are separated, extra toes removed, technologies designed to help the blind cope, etc. However, trying to infer that gay people need fixing is very politically incorrect, at least in the West, and can land you in all kinds of trouble.

Most people have heard, or made the plumbing argument – that by design, a guys appendages are designed to fit into a woman’s , errrr, “lack of appendages". (Did I put it delicately enough? LOL!). If you have appendages, you are a guy. If you lack natural accessories, you are a woman. Anything other than that is unacceptable, strange and freaky. So when a boy wants to be a girl, or wants to kiss a boy – the rest of us are taken aback because its not normal. It does not fit the design. For many, the revulsion is religious – all major religions ban same sex attraction. For others, it just ain’t right!! There is just this inner aversion to this same sex thing. Is that nature, or prejudice?

So I guess the bottom line of this long talk is this – regardless of whether you think it is nature or nurture – is it something that needs to be “fixed” or something that needs to be accepted?

I know that I am not going to resolve this argument tonight. I am just presenting both sides of this argument. Besides, homegirl is tired and needs her beauty sleep.

Next time, I will talk about Christian disapproval of the homosexuality, and the gay response. Researching that was a lot of fun let me tell you!!

Health matters: Put down that burger!!

Hi peeps!

Wassup na? Long time no write. I am returning little by little and I suspect that I will be blogging a lot this weekend. I hope to return to the series I was working on before life intervened. So I took a break because I had some dissertation work to attend to, and I thought I would share some of my new found knowledge with you. One of the topics I am working on is related to obesity. Here is a passage that peeps might find interesting:

Overweight and obesity in children have immediate and long-term health consequences (Daniels, 2006; Ebbeling, Pawlak & Ludwig, 2002). Overweight has been associated with metabolic disorders in children (Daniels, 2006). These categories of diseases were long associated with adult obesity, but now are showing up in children at an alarming rate. These diseases include insulin resistance, the metabolic syndrome, dyslipidemia (abnormal levels of fat in the blood), and type 2 diabetes mellitus (Daniels, 2006; Ebbeling, Pawlak & Ludwig, 2002; Fagot-Campagna et al. ,2000; Ludwig & Ebbeling, 2001; Klein et al., 2004). Overweight or obesity is also associated with dyslipidaemia, chronic inflammation, hypertension, increased blood clotting tendency, hyperinsulinaemia and endothelial dysfunction. These symptoms combined are called the insulin resistance syndrome, and put the individual at risk for cardiovascular disease (Ebbeling, Pawlak & Ludwig, 2002; Freedman et al., 1999; Greenhalgh, 1997; Srinivasan et. al. 2002). Overweight or obesity has also been known to lead to pulmonary complications and skeletal abnormalities in children. Most common among pulmonary complications are sleep apnea (Patel, 2005, Redline et. al, 1999, Rhodes et al. 1995), and asthma (Figueroa-Munoz, Chinn & Rona, 2001; Luder, Melnik, & DiMaio, 1988). Skeletal abnormalities of note include Blount disease, a mechanical deficiency in the medial tibial growth plate in adolescents that results in bowing of the tibia, a bowed appearance of the lower leg, and an abnormal gait (Daniels, 2006; Dietz, Gross & Kirpatrick, 1982), and capital femoral epiphysis, a disorder of the femur which is rotated externally from under the growth plate, causing pain, creating difficulty in walking, and often requiring surgical repair (Daniels, 2006; Loder et. al. 1993).
Besides the physical consequences of disease, obese children also often suffer emotionally and psychologically. Many obese children have been found to develop a negative self-image (Davison & Birch, 2001), have trouble making friends (Strauss & Pollack, 2003), and be more likely to develop depressive symptoms (Strauss, 2000; Ebbeling, Pawlak & Ludwig, 2002).

In summary, fat aint good for u!!

Chei!! You know after writing all that, I lost my appetite(for a short while sha!). I have been buying salad and hitting the outdoors. What? Pulmonary! Skeletal! Cardiovascular!! Emotional! Psychological!! Ah!

They used to say that the love of money is the root of all evil. Looks like obesity has taken over o! Ehn, wish ones na?

Soo, my people, reduce that red meat o. Drop the burger and the icecream. Start walking instead of driving everywhere. Una see the disease list? Fat is unhealthy for you o. Make it your summer resolution to lose some.

I will be back tomorrow.

Ciao

Comedy + politics = Naija politicians

Hi peeps,
Sorry o, I am still buried under a deluge of papers. I see a light at the end of the tunnel sha, so please pray for this tired sista!! The rest of the series is still coming I promise. Just going through a phase right now.

However, I came across this on Nigeriavillagesquare (NVS), and thought to share.
The video below is one of our politicians. Listen to him, and figure out why the country is in the state it is in. Its funny and sad at the same time!!






The transcript of the big grammer is below. Its even funnier when you listen and read along:

Bosede: Welcome to NTA live from the national assembly… honorable Patrick Obahiagbon …also known as igodo migodo. You are welcome, sir.

Obahiagbon: The pleasure is mine, Bosede

Bosede: so, how are u today?

Obahiagbon: Very good. In a proper order. Very ready. Always ready for parliamentary work.

Bosede: I know you were at the Edo state house of assembly. So how has your experience in the state assembly prepared you for the challenges of the national assembly?

Obahiagbon: Fantastic. Don’t forget I did 8 years at the Edo state house of assembly and by the grace of the don apticate of the universe, that opportunity has assisted me colossally in dotting the parliamentary “I s” and crossing the legislative “T s” and has put me in good speed for the due discharge of my parliamentary onnus probandi ……, because when you examine the relationship between parliament at the state level and parliament at the national assembly, the difference, if any, is one of a twoodledum and twidlydim, little or no difference.

The only difference of course being that, whereas in the state house of assembly you only impact on a micro pedestal plane, at the national assembly, you are talking at a macro level. So if you ask me, there is a dialogical rapport between parliament at the state level and parliament at the national level. It is one of a micro cossum in a macro cossum.

So in a nutshell, I want to say that my experience in serving as a legislator for 8 years, and my experience when I was leader of the Edo state house of assembly for 4 years, put me certainly in good speed for this assignment at the national level.

Bosede: Is that why you have been a vibrant member of this national assembly as it were?

Obahiagbon: Partly yes. Partly yes. It is terra ferma for me and not terra incognita. It is familiar to me and once you were ceased of the muances of parliamentary discourse and discobolus it follows therefore that it will be familiar to you too, partly…but again, partly it is equally responsible…, for the fact that you cannot succeed as a parliamentarian if you are not cosmopolitan. You must be prepared to immerse yourself in societal dialectics for you to be able to contribute efficaciously in a utilitarian modus.

So, if you are a parliamentarian and you don’t go through the ritual of even reading newspapers, you don’t bathe yourself in the aqua of the political cross currents, then you are going to be deuced, you are going to be paralytic in your contributions. So yes, my experience in the state of assembly has been responsible for my vibrancy in one breathe. At another breathe, my desire to perpetually entrench myself in political, social and intellectual currents have equally contributed in its own stead.

Bosede: So in essence, what challenge are you giving to your other colleagues?

Obahiagbon: Sactas Simplicitas. They must avoid regular big stouting , suyaing , big stouting and peppersouping. Those are not the real issues. They must be prepared to immerse themselves in societal dialectics. They must put their nose to the grind stone. Chief Obafemi Awolowo the ikene philosopher said the difference between me and my other colleagues, was that when my other colleagues are cavorting in the dark alleys, I am in my library working myself 19 to the dozen.

You cannot succeed in life if you are not disciplined. You must be puritanical in your
predisposition, you must engage in an exercise of self purification and mortification, you must engage in an exercise of self abnegation, you must engage in an exercise of spiritual emulation. You must discipline the flesh. You must conquer the flesh. You must allow the spiritual aspect of you preponderate the material aspect, especially when you have been chosen to represent the people. So that at the end of the day, you can really say: vendi, vidi, vicki

Bosede: what is the meaning of that?

Obahiagbon: I came, I saw, I conquered.

Bosede: Sir,just like I told you that you are vibrant contributor to debates on the floor of the house at times does it really bother you whether the people get to understand what you say because of those big big grammar.

Obahiagbon: Well, let me say that I have been maniatally bewildered, in the words of Peter Pan, “overghasted and flabberwhelmed” when I am confronted by people as to what they stigmatize as my verbabodical dimosophy gyrations .But let me use this opportunity to say that I have never set out…, I don’t deliberately set out to confuse my audience. Certain you want me to be dumb, when I talk, they just come, misuse less packadoo . I bet you don’t give what you don’t have, what I have, I give.

Bosede: So what is your parting word to Nigerians?

Obahiagbon: My parting word to Nigerians is to be patient with the president of the country President, Umaru Musa Y’aradua. I appreciate that a lot of people at this time are becoming very critical in assessing the president because they believe that 8 months is enough to chart a visionary trajectory. I share those sentiments, but at the same time, let us not forget that the country was in a state of economical quagmaya, political fantasmagorie and social stupor at the time the president came on board. So I appeal to Nigerians to be a little bit patient with him.

But at the same time, I want to appeal to Mr. President to see the victory in the cause as a wake up challenge, for him to leave the position of recupensy into one of recusansy. 8 months, people should be able to say “this is the direction of Mr. President”. 8 months, people should be able to say “Mr. President’s stance for this”. There is a difference between amiability; there is a difference between decency and activism. The president must leave his position of political, and social and administrative lethargy and take the driver’s seat.

As Mr. President, he drives, and others follow. So whereas I appeal to Nigerians to be patient with him, I equally call on Mr. President to ascend the challenges of governance, and he cannot do that except he take the driver’s seat as the political do edger, the political emir of trans Jordan, and the political major dobo, the buck………

Enjoy!