This weekend Pennsylvania was short one Connoisseur and Maryland welcomed home it’s golden boy on the wheels of the giant hound. Okay, if you’ve gotten over my ridiculous exaggeration of my return home for the weekend, allow me to get into the details. I went home to retain sanity as this college life gets overwhelming from time to time, attended an epic concert, a birthday shindig, and most importantly reunited the duo. Your favorite tag team collaborated on the future of this here site/brand and if  the future was any brighter we would be walking around with no sight. It’s a blessing and privilege to work with someone whose passion and creative vigor is a great as Sam’s. The stronger this collaborative effort gets, the better the experience and presentation of our ideology, so stay tuned.

I’m not sure how many of you know, but both Wale and I are proud Africans that come from really culture oriented homes. Despite all of the condescending remarks that Africans have to put up with (as is many other persons of foreign decent) we embrace our heritage. This past sunday, my aunt flew from London to have her wedding here in the U.S. I swore I met like fifty aunts in the span of forty seconds but it’s all love.  And please don’t let me go on about the food! It was a famished college kids dream to have jollof  rice, cous cous, fried plaintains, puff puff, casava leaf, pepper soup, etc… You name it, it was there!

A big misconception of Africans is that we’re lacking in mannerisms and are primitive. #FALSE! Our continent is one of many traditions and cultures. Even the aesthetic in our clothing, in my own opinion, surpasses those of other cultures (then again I’m a bit biased). As you can see from the little glimpses in the pictures, my family takes pride in wearing traditional garments (head wraps, scarves, costumes, and so forth). We’re a colorful group of people with personalities to match! Next time, we’ll invite ya’ll to Sierra Leonian or Nigerian outing and you tell us what you think.

-Peace & Light

Greeting Connoisseurs and other readers alike!

I’ve been away in my murky lab trying to design some goods and get some sketching in as of late. With deadlines approaching, I’m feeling pretty confident about the future. Wale and I, both, have been making steady efforts towards finalizing and making last minute adjustments to the Fall/Winter ’09 line. I know you’ll enjoy it as much as we do and can’t wait for you guys to be apart of it. I hope to see you on the other side!

-Peace & Light

There comes a point in all our journeys where we become temporarily fed up with the present, where we lack the same drive and determination we had when the journey began, and only a physical, tangible reminder of the progress made and the displacement of your actions can bring you back to fight another day.

I’m sorry if that is hard to digest since it may seem pretty vague and broad to some, the past week I lost my zeal and let the universe dictate my path, school has been so hectic that I started to feel overwhelmed and at the mercy of my lectures. When I finally got time to think, time to reflect, all it took to re-spark my drive were a motivational post by my brother Joshua Kissi at Street Etiquette, and the item in the picture above, a button. A simple button made of paper and metal held so much symbolism for me, it symbolized the progress of this idea I and Sam have concocted, it symbolized a plateau higher than the one we were at when we decided to share this brand and life ideology with the world, a Connoisseur is anyone that has zeal and passion for something in life that drives them to be the best version of themselves and become experts and enthusiasts of that particular thing. That may not be the definition Mr. Webster has but that is what the word means to us, and we thank you for following and partaking in it with us.

(fyi if you want some buttons shoot me an email)

Wale. A

The Roots – Lazy Afternoon

So Paramore Dropped a brand new album entitled Brand new eyes, while it was going to be hard to top the singalong anthem filled RIOT! the band delivered what I will hail their best album to date! yes people, better than Riot! better than All we know is falling . This album surpassed every previous compilation by the group for two reasons, it was not a measly attempt to recreate and, more importantly, it had the best lyrics of the three. The depth and meaning that are coupled with the usual infectious melodies is a treat to listen to. This album doesn’t rhyme as much as the previous two, I love this aspect of it because it means the artists did not sacrifice the insight and message in the music for a catchy singalong song. Our favorite Canadian Exports (excluding K-os of course) did it again! actually, they did it better!

Cudder! probably my most anticipated release from the Freshman crew of XXL. It was my most anticipated honestly because It was the project I feared for the most, I didn’t think Kid Cudi and Kanye West were a good pairing and thought the album would be a Mini mix of 808’s and Graduation. With that being said, I am glad to say Kid Cudi’s Man on the moon: The End of Day put all my worries to oblivion. Cudi delivered with this one, in a universe where “Main Stream” artists (yes sorry hipsters, Cudi is mainstream now) have as much depth as a kiddy pool, this album gives a completely refreshing and in depth concept that sounds good. Granted some tracks you wanna throw away (enter galactic, cough cough) and others just don’t quite fit ( make her say, cough cough) the album in entirety is pretty good. (cudi also has some underdeveloped lyrics, but maybe I’m over thinking it, oh well)

(hater block on, flame suite check) Okay I’ll proceed now. Jigga man’s Beatles topping 11th album, The Blueprint 3 Had some of the best features I’ve heard in rap for a while, it even had some of the best instrumentals  I’ve heard in a while, HOWEVER!!! It had the worst Jay-z I’ve heard in a while. Sorry folks, in my own opinion Jigga man was okay at best, maybe I’m too critical of your rap god but I expect better Jay. I felt like this man was about to rap most of the album instead of actually doing. Say what you want people Jay z’s perfect imitation of Brett Favre in musical form let me down. (I have the instrumental version though, that jont cranks lol)

Let me know if you agree, disagree, or simply want to express your opinion in the comment section brethren, till next time.

Wale A.

I know I’m not the only college student suffering droggy-eye-syndrome, right?  All this excessive studying, constant projects, and cooky professors got my mind in a frenzy! I know you college kids out there, like myself (shoutouts to UMD!), are starting to feel the ills of the lecture halls and the ongoing traffic in the libraries. Oh gracious sleep, where art thou?

If caffeinated drinks consume your mornings, afternoons, and nights, this is for you.  An ode to the hardworking students with a trap-or-die mentality in the classrooms. But know this, we will make it out alive!

-Peace & Light

My first Encounter with this seemingly mythical machine left me speechless, The Citroen Karin was designed by Trevor Fiore in 1980 and I personally haven’t seen anything else that perfectly stimulates my senses as far as concept cars go.

For all you DeLorean lovers out there, it is safe to say this baby trumps the time flying locomotive, considering she came first (and looks way better). Imagine driving down the street in this thing? great right? well imagine as much as you want because that’s all you can do since the Citroen Karin is not drivable. With her trapezoidal chassis and three seater layout, with the driver seated in the center directly in front of the passengers, the Citreon Karin is the epitome of concept design to me.I’m going to shut up now and allow you to digest greatness.

The above title is an oxymoron in my book but it has become the state of our culture since 2006, some would even argue it happened sooner. You know exactly what I’m talking about everyone being an individual and expressing themselves in exactly the same way, same clothing, same music, same hobbies. I’m not saying its not okay or possible for a collective group of people to be into the same thing at the same time, I’m just saying the reasons/ motives for such interest are a little fishy and I personally question how genuine and pure these interests are.

Style to me is a brew of organic and purely unique expressions combined with your appreciated influences from other people’s style. The problem to me is I see a lot of influenced folks with no hints of organic and unique expressions. I might be wrong here since I don’t know most of these individuals personally, but from my experience all I see are Uniforms, and Uniforms kill Creativity. How are the creative endeavors of  mike the hipster gonna differ from mikey the hipster??  Granted nothing is new under the sun but that organic expression is what I feel is very rare today.

We are all born individuals, made up of unique chromosomes, with unique upbringings, lets stop sacrificing this uniqueness for a uniform simply to fit into special culture or to achieve a false social status.

Till next time.

Wale A.

This past weekend I got a little break from work so I figured I’d attend a shindig or two, all was mellow and all was good. At one particular party I was one of 3 black males in the venue and after countless victories on the pong table and pointless arguements about music, something happened, one of the caucasian males uttered the infamous “N word” while rapping a jigga song, then a pretty intoxicated caucasian female followed suite.

I always hate these moments because I’m caught in between responding or holding my tongue. See I don’t encourage the use of the word by any race but I can’t shun any either. I use it sometimes when around certain peers and I know the jay z loving white folk in my presence are probably not racist, so how do I react? Do I just sit and watch or speak up? I feel an obligation to speak up but I won’t lie the obligation to keep a smooth and tension free environment pokes me as well.

It seems every black person I know, including myself is classically conditioned to cringe and have their hearts racing when someone that doesn’t quite look like them utters this word. The word was uttered a couple more times through the course of the night, at one point I was asked by one of the white girls if I was offended and that they would stop if I was; before I could respond the two other black males in the room said, “naw not at all”.

Truthfully I don’t know what I would have said, I didn’t know how I should respond, should I embrace this facade of racial utopia where the word has lost all its meaning and MLK’s dreams have been fully realized? or should take responsibility in discouraging the use of the word because I know racial issues in this nation are still tense and it is not okay to use the word.

I know you have opinions on this so feel free to share people, I would really love to hear your thoughts and the views of all races on this one.

Until next time.

Wale A.