This is a sister called Shakti who is making commercially-oriented urban pop music and is based as far as I can tell in New York (thanks tipster Sonia!). She’s another MySpace-era striver who has a single on iTunes, a website with more bells and whistles than she has material to fill it, an embryonic line of fashion accessories, and a producer-songwriter-laptop wizard behind her looking to become the next Timbaland. (He has another artist called Asia Minor.)
She’s also generous with the Indo-flavored exotica, announcing “Namaste” on her website and putting forward, in her various materials, the full complement of noserings, silk scarves, saris, and the like, combined with the racy iconography of today’s commercial R&B. There’s also a Kama Sutra reference and a camel (not together). And there’s some really ugly short promotional clips online that truck in cab driver and 7-Eleven nonsense.
And the music? It’s pretty good on balance, although the single for sale (and yo, what kind of viral marketing strategy is it to put your first record out and charge folks for it?) called “Do the Thang Thang,” hardly does justice to Shakti’s extensive classical and jazz training AND Berklee School of Music bachelor’s degree AND Chicago Music College master’s degree with lyrics like this:
Do the thang thang
Freak your body body
Don’t hurt nobody body
Let’s get naughty naughty.
There are a couple of remixes that make things a bit more interesting, thanks in part to the singer on the bhangra version (a free copy of which is floating around online).
The song on the YouTube clip here, “Let Me Dance,” I like a lot more. Now the Orientalism police (which I occasionally roll with, I admit) won’t be feeling Shakti’s thang thang overall, but if you suspend that reservation for a minute the sinewy groove and bedroom themes might just get to ya.
What I can’t figure out is the end of the line that begins “Just like the Kama Sutra…” It occurs twice in the song. Any sharp ears out there able to decode it? Conferral of the official Sepia Mutiny seal of approval might just depend on those hard-to-make-out words…
I don’t know, Siddhartha. There’s the unexpected slant rhyme in the last line, not to mention the unidiomatic but wholly successful repetition of “body” in lines two and three. She’s taken a considerable risk here: her references to the concealed/revealed discourse of the orientalist body might go over people’s heads. There’s also the out/in dichotomy of “freak”: who defines “freak” in a globalized and post-modern ccontext? If she’s says “don’t hurt,” is she open to accusations of quietism. Her interrogation of such othering might, frankly, be lost on the myspace crowd.
But she at least tried, and I think we should applaud that.
I thought the “Thang Thang” single came out sometime in 2005 or so… I heard it a fair bit on my local hip hop stations. At the time I thought it was a decent track, and had no idea the singer was desi. Hm.
Incidentally, I believe the exact lyrics are as follows:
I always read “Don’t hurt nobody body” as a bit ironic — as in, do your thang, be enthusiastic — but don’t be a spazz, okay?
Hahaha, thanks! so glad to see my tip made it! I agree with every point you make. She’s still far off from really being able to express herself in a way that doesn’t fall prey to the “hey orientalists, listen to me, im exotic” trap–but for all we know that’s exactly what she is going for with her image/sound. Hopefully, her career will take off and she will upgrade or someone else with a better sound will come up–either way discovering her brought to the forefront of my mind that this kind of personality has really never taken off before–the concept of an american born “desi diva” who can actually sing in a way that is commanding and powerful as opposed to the lip syncing, docile, flowery icons we are catapulted with through bollywood culture. I would love to see a strong, unrestrained woman take the stage and expose the talentlessness of our female celebrity icons who ride off of their conventional appearances and images of purity. Or maybe I’m just still affected by watching jennifer hudson break it down in dreamgirls and wished she were one of our own!
In the black vernacular “Don’t hurt ’em” or “Don’t hurt nobody” means, you are so fly/skilled/hot/stylish/brilliant that it could hurt someone to contemplate. Kind of like not looking straight at the sun. In other words it’s a form of high praise giving. Case in point: “Please Hammer Don’t Hurt’Em,” the title of MC Hammer’s album way back when.
Nicely put, Sonia. I need to see that movie. Everyone says she’s amazing.
Her resume is quite impressive. Marsalis, Guru etc. Her site claims her to be the first Indian hip-hop Diva. Ture or false? Geeks want to know. And I don’t mean Rakim-Lata or Madlib, J Dilla, Timbaland’s various B’wood samples.
Freak your body body / DonÂ’t hurt nobody body part puts Nas’s Oochie Wally in my head. Will spend rest of the day to shake off that foul Bravehearts memory.
Yeah! Still reeling here.
I think Amardeep is right, the track has been floating around for awhile, since at least 2004. The Bhangra version, featuring the very talented Bikram Singh, if I remember correctly even got some airplay on New York’s Hot 97 and Power 105.
Yeah the bhangra track is nice. Well, this Youtube clip is a performance from last month, so I guess the sista is still out there trying to make things happen…
no matter how hard i try, can’t get into it. but i love seeing desis doing well in non-traditional fields. think i’m gonna buy a song on i tunes for a little encouragement.
I just saw the YouTube clip and listened to one of the MySpace tracks. First, as far as the performance goes, I was expecting stronger vocals given her extensive training. But, for now I’ll give her the benefit of the doubt and chalk it up to poor sound quality on the recording and possibly poor stage sound. I wasn’t feeling her music, generally, but that’s my personal taste. To me it’s just another example of over-produced pop music. The fact that she’s desi might earn her some points, but not enough to separate her from any of the other wannabe Christinas and Britneys. As for the desi tinge to her music, it does doesn’t seem all that sincere to me and I still see it is little more than a marketing ploy. Here’s hoping that she finds her own voice and decides to put more of herself out there.
Pardon the threadjack, though it does involve a desi musician, but my band is playing in NYC on March 3rd. I posted the show on the events tab, so hopefully I’ll get to meet some of you folks in person. It’s going to be our first time playing outside the D.C./Baltimore area, so please come help us celebrate.
From the bio on her website:
Nitpicking.. but Amida Bachchan..and Aadesh Srivitava…WTF??.. maybe the guy who wrote it for her was japanese or dyslexic or both.
somewhere around here i have the beginnings of a liquid-funk DnB remix i started for “do the thang thang.” it never got finished for various reasons. my boy Bikram Singh (same name.com for the website) is the punjabi vocalist on it. I gave him endless amounts of shit for “do the thang thang thang shakti gonna make you dance.”
FWIW Shakti has a very nice voice and she and her producer, marcus, have a good synergy going. glad to see that she’s still in the game. Also– and this is important–whatever hype ‘thang thang’ earned was 100% independent; it was really cool to be out record shopping at normal DJ haunts, like rock n’ soul, and see a professionally done, localy produced, desi hiphop record for sale.
I think last i saw her we were in a jeep on the way to a gig @ great adventure. i love it when stories end like that. boh!
edit: the song came out in early 2004.
That sounds pretty cool and, if feel like sharing, I’d be interesting in hearing what you have so far.
Do you produce professionally? If so, under what alias?
That should say “if you feel like sharing,” sorry.
“Just like the Kama Sutra got to Gandhi in the end.”
(You can hear it more clearly on her website, track 4.)
I’ll take that seal of approval now.
Oh no. How unfortunate. I guess I should have been careful what I asked for. Thanks, SC.
I was bombarded with myspace friend requests from Shakti.
I humbly propose a catchphrase to describe desis who unironically co-opt brown stereotypes, symbols, and terminology: “Shaktified”
Example usage:
“Shakira was looking all shaktified and glam in her VMA Bollywood dance number.”
“Hank Azaria’s Apu voice needed more of that authentic desi flavor so he shaktified it through special secret training. Now his Apu sounds more stereotypically desi than ever.”
Related terms: shaktification, shakticize
Remember, if you want to “exude glamour and verve like a glistening eastern jewel”, you must shaktify yourself.
An even better kamasutra song reference – look up Adassa – she’s a Latina artist, and even better, she has a track w/ Pitbull called “Kamasutra”. She has done the track in Spanish as well as in English, and they’re both equally amusing.
As for my thoughts on Shakti – she was my “friend” on MySpace back in the day. I tried to listen to her with an open mind, but honestly, I don’t feel like she does any particular genre justice. Her voice and music just aren’t that good. She’s trying to cash in on her brownosity and is trying to come across as if she has an edge, or is doing something different, when the truth is simply to the contrary. And her addition to the “Do your thang thang” track just effs it up.
“brownosity”? She’s better than K-Fed, I’ll give her that.
Man, the Beatles did it better.
Oh, my goodness, Siddhartha Bhai, I was just joking. I don’t really think she’s saying that. It just kinda sounds like that.
Brilliant. I had always used the term “self-exotification” but “Shaktification” is even better.
Preach on, sister.
I heard that this is actually a cover of a hip-hop song. You can hear it on http://www.desihits.com on their Urban Desi podcast show. Cool show with soem very cool music
so i just want to say i saw shakti perform on tv a few days ago it was vh1 or soemthing shes really got it. i couln’t belive someone so talented was so humble she has way better stuff then the old song i keep hearing different stuff pop up. i hope she blows up. her albumn has timbaland on it too for the person talking so much about the producer.
I’ve been following Shakti since that 2004 release and for someone independent with no major label behind her she really is Doing her thang thang and going for it from what I can tell. I heard that song in a lot of clubs in New York. I can’t say the same for a lot of other indian artists that have tried to come up. (exception: PMC..but he’s a DJ) I hope she does blow up cause we need some type of representation out there in the mainstream and M.I.A. just aint it.. Maybe Shakti is gonna be the one? I heard that she could really sing and do all this crazy stuff..wasn’t she doing like wierd jazz stuff at some point? Anyway..
I found the lyrics somewhere for the let me dance song..it is actually
just like the bellydance the gypsys did to please their men just like the Karma Sutra’s practised by the Indians..
Ghandi..LOL..I heard his name in a track that showed up on her myspace for like 2 days a couple of months go…she was rapping and said something about Ghandi and there will be no peace…or something like that.
I want to hear that DnB remix the other guy was talking about. how can I get a copy?
Oh yeah..don’t sleep on that guy that did her production..he has some good tunes on his myspace..you can get to his page thru her myspace page.