Tribal Spirit - the First Book of Aashid

Aashid Himons, multi-talented musician, composer, singer, sociopolitical activist, documentary film maker, and public access TV producer is one of the best kept secrets of Southern African-American culture. The 14 independently produced and distributed recordings that he has released (both with his group Afrikan Dreamland and as a solo artist) from his Nashville base have had a potent underground impact on the dispersal of African centered musical culture in the deep South since 1981. Over the years, Aashid has received a number of elusive bits of national exposure that have revealed his continued presence and evolution as a conscious artist in the ancient tradition of the African griot. In 1970, during his sojourn in Canada, Aashid performed before 150,000 people at The "Canadian Woodstock" in Mossport, Ontario. He and Jim Byrnes, the actor/musician best known for his work in the television series "The Highlander" and "Wise Guy", performed in the folk blues style under the name God And I. They were popular on both Canadian coasts in 1970-71. His 1985 music video "Television Dreams" was one of the first African-American videos to appear on MTV. He was deeply involved with the production (mixing and drum programming) of Cyril Neville's Uptown All-Stars' dynamic first collection, Uptown Reggae (1988), on which he also played both keyboards and percussion. He appeared on keyboards on the track "Sister Rosa" which appeared on the Neville Brothers' album Yellow Moon (1989). Especially revealing of the high regard in which Aashid is held, by those who know him and/or his music, is the spoken word contribution he makes on A Show of Hands (1996), the solo album by virtuoso bassist Victor Wooten (of Bela Fleck & The Flecktones). On the "Words of Wisdom" track, Wooten has Aashid's words mixed in with those of Martin Luther King, Malcolm X, and Mrs. Dorothy G. Wooten (Victor's mother). However, two of Aashid's own projects, the release of his double CD collection The Leaders (1995) and his book of spiritual writings Tribal Spirit, The First Book of Aashid (1996), are destined to move his recognition factor out of the shadows and up into the full light that his gifted skills and range of artistic conception deserve.

The Leaders, which features a chronology of lyrics composed from 1967 to 1995, provides a comprehensive overview of the depth of Aashid's griot-like thematic concerns and his evolution as a conscious artist griot, performed in his unique style that blends blues and reggae. The Leaders includes definitive remakes of some of his most impressive songs of the past such as "Womanhood", "Grassy Fields", "Dance and Survive", and "Apartheid", as well as the new compositions like the title cut, "The Next Man's Army", "Abu Aha", Mdaiye", and "USA". The collection, which was nominated for a Nashville Music Award in the Best Independent Album category in 1995, has received both positive reviews and airplay from World Music enthusiasts.

Aashid's attendance at the Million Man March/Day of Absence on October 16, 1995 was the immediate inspiration for the creation of Tribal Spirit. The upfull vibes derived from witnessing an event of that spiritual/political magnitude is ever present in the contents of the book's total package. No less than the actual sense of being at the Million Man March is achieved by the shrewd audio editing of Giles Reaves. A musical component of nearly 120 minutes of Aashid's fluent African drumming is expertly mixed with the day's ambient sounds, greetings, conversations and snatches of speeches. As well, the book's text is accompanied by a 20-page photo section (stills from Aashid's video footage), which visually captures the joy and determination of the faces and the gestures of the participants.

Tribal Spirit's 31-piece text reveals the intense fulfillment that this conscious artist and veteran activist experienced in the presence of well over 1,000,000 African- Americans rededicating themselves to one another and to the enormous work that must be done, if we are to rise above the designed squalor of our current American reality. Collectively, these writings are lyrical explorations of the sense clarified purpose, rejuvenation, and unified wholeness that were engendered by the Million Man March. The majority of the pieces are extended spiritualized meditations, arranged as prose poems, that express the author's sense of responsibility, as stated in the Preface, to transmit to and to teach the reader approaches to the attainment of "a heightened sense of knowing." The themes of all of the pieces are reinforced by symbolism that stem from Aashid's long study of the ancient spiritual wisdom of the Ethiopians, the Egyptians, the Dogon, the Hindus and the Native Americans. All of the above is, of course anchored in his eclectic faith in Rastafarianism. Yet because of their conversational directness, most of these works represent a definite departure from the elliptical, poetic lyricism found in his songs about spiritual concerns. I refer here especially to the richly metaphoric, riddle-filled depth, and often-prophetic quality of his songs from the late 1980's, such as "Dancing in Disguise", "Fly", The Current", "Sleeper Awake", "Aummmm", and "Atlantis Is My Home." Thus, works like "Sound, Spirit & Eternal Presence", "When Love Comes", "Tribal Spirit", "Winds Of Time", "Ask The Mother", "Rasta", and "The First Eye" are stylized preachments designed as transformational instruments to awaken and inspire the reader's intuition toward the path of an actively involved, conscious, spiritual wholeness. Some lines from a stanza within "Winds Of Time" is illustrative

This and other pieces seek to unite the divided selves of the externally, as well as internally battered souls of the African-American community nationwide in particular, with the sense of resurrection that the Million Man March manifested.

Seven of the selections from Tribal Spirit, "The Message", "The Holy Spot", "Trilaak", "Center Yourself", "The Drum", and "The Great Atonement", further contribute to the work's feel of the actuality of the Million Man March. These pieces are virtual vehicles for perceiving the event's reality through the author's consciousness. The opening lines of "Center Yourself", demonstrate the technique:

Such pieces offer guidance through providing an uncanny spontaneous sense of being there, responding to the pledges of atonement and rededication to the struggle for justice through oneness. These tend to evoke not merely wonder at his artistic gifts, but spiritually inspired action.

The poetic lyrical strength of Aashid's writing is highlighted by the inclusion of a number of shorter works that can be categorized as blends of prayers and songs of praise for the evolution of mankind toward justice and the healing of the nation. There are literal prayers like" The Great Spirit Bird" , "O Jah The Great One", "The Universal Being", and "Shawabsta Inik". Four of the songs of praise, "The Highest Goal", "The Great Anointment", "Blood In The Gourd", and "The Utmost Master", are written with the tight unity of his recorded songs and chants.

Even though the impact of the Million Man March figures prominently in all aspects of the creation of Tribal Spirit, the book is actually the product of a lifetime of study and seeking, as well as three decades of creating and performing hundreds of original songs. Since this writer grew up with Aashid, it is easy to see that the roots of this book's concerns and its artistic techniques stretch back to his formative years spent in the racially segregated, economically exploited black community of Huntington, W.Va. He learned to play piano as a toddler on his grandmother's and gospel preacher-mother's laps and his concern for religious music dates from that familial connection, encouragement and passing down of the feeling and skills. The black community in which we grew to maturity was a proud and history-conscious one, despite being hamstrung by segregation's restrictive facts of life. The community then featured numerous, now atypical, black businesses. We were taught to be aware of the community's legacy of being a station on the underground railroad. The segregated school, which was named after Frederick Douglass, was developed into high school status by none other than Carter G. Woodson, the father of African-American history month. At that school, the curriculum included what was then called Negro history. When segregation was in full effect, we competed athletically and artistically against schools named after the likes of W.E.B. DuBois, Paul Laurence Dunbar, and Booker T. Washington. All of that not withstanding, we suffered and we were wholly dissatisfied under West Virginia's contradictory segregation. When the protests and demonstrations of the civil rights movement hit Huntington, the youth made their move. Aashid was prominent among the grassroots activists that established links with SNCC and other similar organizations. The group he lead was called P.A.N. (Protect All Niggers). While it can't be said that the music Aashid was making as Little Archie and The Majestics, and later with The Parliaments, was of an activist sort, his dynamism as musician, singer, and performer was being sharply honed.

It can be said however, that from the late 1970's, when Aashid returned to America after years of cleansing the "Babylon" of the place out of his soul in Central America, his lyrical and musical compositions reverberated with the conscious spirituality and bravery of his birthright. The essence of Aashid Himons' work is, to paraphrase the title of his 1987 album, in his genes. The Million Man March's magnificent spiritual and political manifestation of the African -American's legacy of diverse and deep religious feeling, blended with the determination to come together and to rise above defeat, is likewise a fitting description of the entire body of Aashid's created work recorded and/or published since 1981. Many of the issues raised by the Million Man March have been the themes of his compositions. In wide frame this is visible in the thrust of the titles of his collection of words and music: Jah Music (1981), Justice Is Coming (1983), One Heart and Black Holiness (both 1988), One Drum and Spiritual Man (1990), and The Leaders (1995). Aashid's gift of reggae conception has served his versions of African-American spirituals like "Will The Circle be Unbroken", first recorded by him as "The New Circle" in 1983. His original spiritual compositions, "Fulfill The Book" and "Nothin'

But A Lifetime" (both from Country Blues, 1988), demonstrate the depth of his religious roots. The spirit of atonement for specific sins is brilliantly evident in several lyrics, notably the anti-macho anthem "Womanhood", and his ironic redefinition of Bob Dylan's "Knocking On Heaven's Door" (both 1981), as well as in "Afrikan Lady" (1988) and "The Stone", (1995). The tragedy of the modern era's doping of African America is compellingly chanted down in "Addiction World" (1981). Aashid has penned some of the most acidic and stridently anti-racist songs of recent years such as, "Indigenous Nation" (1987), "American People" (1988), "The White Man" (1990), and "The USA" (1995). To be sure, he has also composed and recorded some memorable musical meditations on the shape of the future: "Love Is A Lion/Justice Is Coming" (1983), "Welcome To New Afrika" (1984), "Where Do We Go From Here?" (1985), and "The Leaders" (1995).

To those already acquainted with the body of his prior works, it is clear that Aashid's first book is much more than a set of positive ideas that were generated by the Million Man March alone. That event was a dramatic, graphic confirmation of the righteousness of his life's work and a highwater experience in his continuing evolution. Aashid' spiritual writing in Tribal Spirit is an enlightened and enlightening extension of all the unity seeking and consciousness raising of his scores of recorded songs of redemption and awareness, since the early 1980's. In a major (if on-the-down-low way), Tribal Spirit charts the spiritual evolution of an artist's journey from the righteous gospel music of his origin, through the earthy excitement of his early 1960's rhythm and blues era and his solo blues career as West Virginia Slim into the living-in-grace cultural majesty of his blu-reggae band Afrikan Dreamland and beyond. The book represents still another phase of his career, that of Aashid the book-length author. The brother already has other publications planned. A compilation of the best of his pre-Tribal Spirit poetic lyrics should be one of them.

Dr. Melvin T. Peters

Associate Professor of African American Studies

Eastern Michigan University, Ypsilanti

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