Zaki Ibrahim
Posted on June 6, 2008
Filed Under INSIDER, MUSIC REVIEWS
Something has the canucks excited. Across the blogosphere they are getting hot and bothered and they want more of this all-natural brew of sundry flavor. That brew is Zaki Ibrahim.
Born in Vancouver to a South African father and a Scottish/English mother, Ibrahim lived alternately in Vancouver and Cape Town before landing in Toronto in 2001. Since then the transnational songstress has developed a sound that melds the bits and pieces that make up her life into the smooth composite for her current EP, Eclectica (Episodes in Purple).
Ibrahim’s vocals can be lush and Sade-esque, light and smooth like Ladysmith Black Mambazo or float over electronic arias like Beth Gibbons. Although she stays far from the internet, Canadian press and bloggers have been showing much love for her music which is steeped just right in eclectic creativity.
Currently promoting the Eclectica EP and preparing for a set of UK tour dates, Ibrahim chat briefly with me about the album, her influences and the frustrations she has with technology.
For more info on Zaki Ibrahim and two free downloads off Eclectica, click here and stay tuned for her full-length album debut later this year.
Trace: You have a wide range of musical styles on Eclectica — what influenced you to go in the directions that you did?
Zaki Ibrahim: There isn’t one specific influence — I definitely just try to keep it open. I don’t like to think too hard about it. I started off thinking how am I going to bring it all together and how to fit one song with the next or the next. Then I just said forget it.
I got a lot of questions like “what is this?” and “where are you going?” It’s just everything though, old soul, R&B, folk and influences like Edith Piaf, Roberta Flack, Fela Kuti…I just went digging.
T: Your music defies labels, how do you feel then about being called a neo-soul star?
ZI: Neo-Soul is a fairly new title, created out of not being able to describe what that music is. My album is somewhere between urban, folk, something eclectic. You could call it whatever if it fits I suppose. If it fits there, it fits there.
T: You’ve lived in Cape Town, Vancouver and Toronto. I read that you consider all of these places home. Could you have made this album anywhere?
ZI: Yes and Yes, except for Cape Town. In Cape Town I am surrounded by family and I am dedicated to them when I am there. Toronto now is the best place though — it is where I’ve been able to do my music. I’m looking to spend more time in New York and on the West Coast [of Canada] and London. I have a lot of old friends, like, from teenagerdom in New York now saying come down, Brooklyn is where it’s at so, who knows?
T: What is your favorite song on the album?
ZI: I like singing “Computer Girl” because it’s a bunch of mixed emotions and just a fun song. It could be about love or frustration I might have with computers. It’s a bunch of different styles in one song.
T: Your career has been marked by much fruitful collaboration. If you could collaborate with any musician, dead or alive, who would it be and what would you do?
ZI: I would have my dad on percussion, John Coltrane…that would be interesting to see. Stevie Wonder would be rapping and playing the harmonica and Mad Lib would be making the beats. I would be on vocals but everyone would get a chance. It would be a mind and sound experience.
T: Is there anything that you hope listeners walk away with?
ZI: Whatever connection through music and words I can make along the way, I hope to influence positive and reflective things.
Zaki Ibrahim’s time is now.she’s freshhhhhhh