Jonathan Mannion
Brother Ali came up through the underground, briefly grabbing a bit of mainstream success before stepping out of the spotlight. Now the Minneapolis emcee is back, promoting a new, critically acclaimed album. Isthmus caught up with him in advance of his July 28 headlining slot at Live on King Street to learn about his life over the last 39 years.
July 30, 1977: Jason Newman is born in Madison. His family soon moves to Michigan.
“My dad went to school at UW and was really proud to have been involved in some of the radical anti-war protests that happened there.”
1984: In school, he is bullied for having albinism, which causes an absence of pigment in the skin, hair and eyes. Because of this, he is welcomed into the black community and finds hip-hop.
“I was treated like a person [because] albinism is really common among African people. [That] turned me on to the wisdom and beauty of the black experience — black tradition, black culture, black music. Rap was always an entrance point. I found that hip-hop kids and [rapping] was my way to bond with them.”
1990: Records his first song.
“It was basically a rip-off of KRS-One’s song called ‘Poetry’ — mine was called ‘Kicking Poetry.’ KRS-One came to Michigan State University and did this really brilliant lecture about the history of the world. Based on his suggestion, I started reading The Autobiography of Malcolm X and that book is what really led me to want to be Muslim.”
1992: His family moves to Minneapolis and he converts to Islam, becoming Brother Ali.
1998: He meets Slug, Ant and other Minneapolis hip-hop artists who would create Rhymesayers Entertainment, which produces all of Ali’s music.
“It was a crew of people that developed into a record label and I joined them right as that transition was happening. I started hosting their events and they started to have me open up shows.”
2002: The Orpheum Theater in Madison is the first stop of his first tour.
“I went on the “God Loves Ugly” Tour with Atmosphere. We did something like 70 shows.”
2003: Ali drops Shadows on the Sun, which contains the classic tribute track “Forest Whitaker.”
“I still haven’t [talked to Whitaker about the song]. He has to know about it. Maybe he doesn’t like it, maybe he feels insulted. It’s supposed to be praise of him, but I have no idea what he thinks of it.”
2007: Releases the Undisputed Truth album with the highly political song, “Uncle Sam Goddamn."
“[The ‘Uncle Sam Goddamn’] video was the first one I ever did and it ended up being the first underground rap thing to get a million views on YouTube really quickly. All the big magazines covered it [and] I did the late night talk shows. It was really my breakout moment [and] I started headlining my own tours … [Then, while on tour] in Australia, the U.S. Department of Homeland Security seized a wire transfer for a concert. To get them to release it, I had to check in with them. That started my relationship with them tracking me and interfering and holding me at the border. They’ll stop me at the border and say things to let me know they’re reading my emails.”
2010: He makes his pilgrimage to Mecca.
“Our friend Eyedea died. Also my father died of suicide. It was a big year commercially, but it was a really difficult year personally. I came back from my pilgrimage like ‘What’s really important? What do I want to do with this life I have, with this audience, this voice?’ So, I started doing a lot of community organizing things that culminated in the Occupy Homes movement.”
2012: Releases Mourning in America and Dreaming in Color (with Jake One, who now works with Chance the Rapper). He is arrested for trespassing in Minneapolis, which leads to legislative action on foreclosures.
“We won so many battles [against foreclosures through the Occupy Homes movement] that the press had stopped covering. I figured, if I get arrested, that’ll put the story back in the local media again and it did. We ended up doing a Homeowners’ Bill of Rights [and] a Renters’ Bill of Rights.”
2017: Ali releases All the Beauty in this Whole Life.
“I wasn’t even sure if I wanted to keep releasing music. [There was a] pull towards exploring and deepening my own spiritual journey [that] led me to engaging with some of the great
spiritual teachers in the Muslim world. They not only gave me the encouragement to keep making music but they also gave me a lot of inspiration that’s behind the album.”
July 28, 2017: Set to perform at the Live on King Street series.
“This performance will be two days before my 40th birthday in the city where I was born. In the Islamic tradition, 40 is when you really become an adult — it’s symbolic of becoming a complete person.”
