South Africa's luminous band Blk Jks plays Bed Stuy's rootsy music festival Rebel Soul at Weeksville on July 5th, 2009. On July 4, 1827, New York state declared emancipation from slavery for Africans. Unable to celebrate openly on Independence Day due to threats of violence, the black community honored newly won freedom publicly July 5. So the day was one of liberation in commemoration of our Independence with Blk Jks offering liberted sounds that conjured the Ancestral Spirits of Jimi Hendrix, Fela Kuti and King Tubby and framing them within traditional South African and Zulu sensibilities. It was a day that the Brooklyn Renaissance was honored by our South African bredren in the sunshine of Brooklyn with grass beneath our feet.
