Akala Biography
Akala is a Kentish Town, London-based British rapper, journalist, author, activist, and poet who won the MOBO Award for Best Hip Hop Act in 2006, and he has been named to the Powerlist, the UK’s annual list of the 100 most influential Black British people, most recently in 2021.
Akala Age
He is 73 years old as of 2023. He was born on 3 June 1950 in Ogbomosho, Nigeria. He celebrates his birthday on 3 June.
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Akala Family
Daley was born to a Scottish mother and a Jamaican father who had split up before his birth. He and his mother spent their childhood in Kentish Town, north of London. He has recalled the day he became aware of his mother’s whiteness and felt ashamed of her race. Although his mother had taught him about black history and introduced him to radical black thinkers, those relationships would always have had a racial component. Ms. Dynamite, a rapper, is Daley’s older sister. His stepfather was a phase director at the Hackney Domain theater, and he frequently visited it before his teenagers.
Akala Education
His mother enrolled him in a pan-African Saturday school. Daley was placed in a special needs group for students with learning difficulties and English as a second language at the age of six at his state primary school. He went to Acland Burghley School for optional training. Daley was 12 when he witnessed a friend being attacked with a meat cleaver to the skull, and he carried a knife for a while. He took math one year earlier and completed ten GCSEs. Daley dropped out of college as an adolescent and concentrated on football, signing with West Ham United and AFC Wimbledon as a schoolboy. He supports Arsenal. Despite the fact that Daley did not go to college, he has admitted that he often envies those who do.
In recognition of his contributions to education, Daley holds two honorary degrees. He was awarded an honorary doctorate of art from Oxford Brookes University on June 23, 2018. On 31 July 2018, he additionally got a privileged degree from Brighton College.
Akala Booth
Daley performed “Fire in the Booth” on Charlie Sloth’s Radio 1Xtra show on July 18, 2011, and he returned in May 2012 to perform “Part 2” after the show was well received. “Fire in the Booth” was included on Daley’s two-part mixtape Knowledge Is Power, which was released in May 2012 and included a promotional tour in the fall of 2012.
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Akala Shakespeare
It’s Not a Rumor, his debut album, was released in 2006. His breakthrough album included the single “Shakespeare,” which was a reference to his self-described title “The Black Shakespeare” and made the playlist at BBC Radio 1. The MOBO Award for Best Hip Hop Act went to him for his work. A Little Darker, a mixtape released under the name “Illa State” in 2006 also featured Akala and his sister, Ms. Dynamite, as well as cameos from numerous other artists.
Daley performed a minute-long rap that included 27 different Shakespeare play titles in less than 30 minutes during a live session on BBC Radio 1Xtra. He later recorded these lyrics in the studio and turned them into the single “Comedy Tragedy History.” Daley was challenged to come up with a rap that contained as many titles of Shakespeare plays as he could manage.
The Hip-hop Shakespeare Company, or “THSC,” is a music theatre production company that was established in 2009 by Akala. Its mission is to investigate the social, cultural, and linguistic parallels that exist between the works of William Shakespeare and those of contemporary hip-hop artists.
Akala Book
Daley released the book Natives: Race and Class in Empire’s Ruins. The book is both a commentary on race and class and a biography. The book’s overall ideological framework is a socialist-oriented, pragmatic Pan-Africanism that says it wants to free all people from oppression and exploitation. Daley also draws attention to what he believes to be common challenges that African communities worldwide face as a result of what he refers to as global imperialism.
Daley says that the randomness and chaotic injustice of race, class, and privilege is to blame for his escape from poverty rather than personal exceptionality. According to Daley, Britain is not a meritocracy in which barriers of race and class can be easily overcome with hard work and perseverance. He says that his success is the absurd and unanticipated result of an unequal system that lets a few people rise to power while leaving many, no matter how brilliant they are, behind.
In the book, he says several times that some of his friends could have been academics or scientists if “structural racism” and “class oppression” hadn’t stopped them. Vision is a graphic novel and comic book by Akala. The comic written by Akala himself examines his interests and references. It is a journey into magical realism that is semi-autobiographical. It starts with him smashing a television with a teapot. From there, it takes us through altered states of consciousness, reincarnation, hallucinations, and themes of indigenous spirituality and ancestral memory.
Akala Career
British rapper Acala Daley started releasing music from his own independent label, Illa State Records, in 2003. In 2004, he put out his first mixtape, The War Mixtape, and in 2006, he put out his first album, It’s Not a Rumor. The MOBO Award for Best Hip Hop Act was given to him for his work, and he released a mixtape titled “A Little Darker” under the name “Illa State.” Freedom Lasso, his second album, came out in 2007 and included the song “Comedy Tragedy History.” He released the mixtape Vol. in 2008,
1, with Akala and his sister, Ms. Dynamite, as well as numerous other artists making cameo appearances. Daley wrote and performed a minute-long rap on BBC Radio 1Xtra that contained 27 different titles from Shakespeare plays in less than half an hour. DoubleThink, Daley’s third studio album, was released in 2010 and is heavily influenced by George Orwell’s Nineteen Eighty-Four. He headlined a live performance in November 2010 at the British Library to launch the “Evolving English” exhibition. Other performers included British rapper Lowkey, comedian Doc Brown, and poet Zena Edwards of Great Britain. He released a two-part mixtape titled Knowledge Is Power in May 2012, which included “Fire in the Booth.”
He said in March 2013 that his fourth album would be out in May 2013, moving the release of his upcoming EP, The Ruin of Empires, to later in 2013. On May 27, 2013, he released his fourth album, The Thieves Banquet, which included the songs “Malcolm Said It,” “Maangamizi,” and “Lose Myself” (feat. Osho, Josh). Daley was the first hip hop artist to headline his own concert in Vietnam in 2007. Daley has supported Christina Aguilera, MIA, Richard Ashcroft, Audiobullys, DJ Shadow, The Gotan Project, and Scratch Perverts at a number of festivals, including V Festival, Wireless, Glastonbury, Reading and Leeds Festivals, Parklife, Secret Garden Party, and Isle of Wight. He has also performed at South by Southwest and gone on the “Distant Relatives” tour with Nas and Damian Marley in the UK.
He began his own headline tour of the UK in November 2010, with 20 shows in total. He attended the “One Love:” In April 2011, Iron Braydz from London, Lowkey, Logic, and other up-and-coming UK artists performed at the “No Borders Hip Hop” event in Birmingham, England. He performed in India in August 2012 at the Outlook Festival and NH7 Weekender music festivals in Pune.
Akala Lecture
Daley has led workshops on songwriting at the School of Oriental and African Studies as well as guest lectures at East 15 Acting School, the University of Essex, Manchester Metropolitan University, Sydney University, Sheffield Hallam University, Cardiff University, and the International Slavery Museum. Additionally, he has addressed the Oxford Union. He has likewise been engaged with missions to “decolonise” the educational plan including giving a discussion at the College of Leicester.
Akala Songs
- Welcome to England
- War
- Roll Wid Us
- Bullshit
- The Edge
- Dat Boy Akala
- Shakespeare
- Doin’ Nuffin / Hold Your Head Up
- Bit By Bit
- Freedom Lasso
- Where I’m From
- Comedy Tragedy History
- XXL
- Yours and My Children
- Find No Enemy
- Lose Myself
- Mr. Fire in the Booth
- Giants