""This album is what was on my mind when I was abstaining and moving through life," he said. "That's what I'm trying to leave with people.""
""People always said I had a gift, like there was something I was supposed to do," he said."
""I used to have a lot of anger problems," he said. "Poetry helped me, and eventually it turned into rap.""
Oakland rappers uphold a tradition of hip-hop that centers community accountability, political remembrance, and solidarity instead of individual fame. Grassroots voices persist despite streaming algorithms and corporate influence that often marginalize those narratives. East Oakland rapper Nimsins embodies this lineage with Black August 2, an album named for the observance honoring imprisoned freedom fighters and political prisoners linked to the Black liberation struggle. The project was created during a month-long social media fast and daily sunrise-to-sunset fasts, a period devoted to disciplined writing and reflection. Nimsins's life experiences, creative evolution from poetry to rap, and local ties inform the album's purpose.
Read at East Bay Express | Oakland, Berkeley & Alameda
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