Boobah Siddik

Born and raised in Ivory Coast(Cote D'Ivoire), and living between Abidjan and Dakar, the duality helped him view himself more as a African citizen than a citizen of a particular nation. Early on in his life, Boobah has always been influenced by music. "Borrowing" his Dad's boombox, he used to record radio broadcasts on his mom's old tapes of traditional Senufo music, drawing justified ire from both. Switching from 80s pop, to Italian Pop, mixed with the different African Hits that were submerging Africa at the time (San Fan Thomas, Kassav, Kanda Bongo Man, OUA etc... ), his musical influences were pretty much diverse and eclectic, but in 1995 it focused on Hip Hop, after he got to listen to an old Wu Tang tape made by a high school friend.

This interest crystallized in the formation of the group Shadow Zu in 1995, and the music was made with the available means. They impounded Rash's (original founding rapper) little brother dinky Casio keyboard, created some melodies and free flowed on their creations. From their own production they moved to the model that was used at the time in Dakar, which was to buy a tape of American hip hop hits instrumentals and to do your own songs on top, mixtape style. in 1997, the first official Shadow Zu song was recorded, "Mortel Rap Kombat", which was never released.

In 2003 as part of Shadow Zu, Boobah released "Shadow Storm", which was the first african hip hop album to be released independently in the US to critical acclaim. Again in 2004, the underground release of the album Hipolitics confirmed the rising status of Boobah Siddik and Shadow Zu as leaders in the African Hip Hop movement. The hit song "Hope Dies Last" was featured on countless internet radio stations and helped solidify his status as a unique voice and style. Boobah's style has evolved over the years, and he found his niche vocally in the style of old 1970s chatters like Dillinger, Big Youth.

While maintaining his hip hop roots, he focuses on internal melodies and patterns within his verses, to better deliver the message. A meditative individual, he spends a lot of time reasoning on the daily aspects of life and the nature of the human soul and its struggles with itself and its environment. Boobah is an achiever who works hard to complete his goals, and his reflections, transmitted in his music, deal with the questions of racism, spirituality, morality, religion, social and political activism.

http://boobahsiddik.com

http://myspace.com/boobahsiddik