Music part of a mission for Jidenna
On his debut album, “The Chief,” Jidenna is out to prove that origin stories aren’t just for superheroes.
The 32-year-old hiphop artist, known locally for his role with the Oakland social club Fear & Fancy when he attended Stanford University, first gained notice with his 2015 single “Classic Man.” That track, a triumphant statement about redefining masculinity, helped Jidenna find a home at Janelle Monáe’s Wondaland Records, which in February put out the dapper performer’s first full-length record.
“She paved the way for a lot of us,” Jidenna says of the impact Monáe has made on young artists like himself. “She was a pivotal leader in both fashion and music, and I’d say in just originality. She is one of a kind.”
Like Monáe, Jidenna has found that one’s personal aesthetic can be harnessed as a reflection of their art. Often seen performing in a three-piece suit, he may not subscribe to the adage that clothes make the man, but in his case, they certainly help tell the story. Jidenna says his signature duds were conceived in homage to his late father, Oliver Mobisson, and have now become part of his origin story after he dropped “Classic Man” two years ago.
“I found an anthem that was needed in the world, and an image that went with that. It just so happened to be that it completely matched who I was at the moment,” he says. “Sometimes people force it — they find some trend or wave to ride — but what we stand for at Wondaland is finding that magic in ourselves. We ride our own waves, and if people want to ride with us, then right on.”
Local fans had an opportunity to ride with Jidenna at last year’s Outside Lands Music and Arts Festival and again this summer at Colossal Clusterfest. On Wednesday, Aug. 23, they’ll get another chance when he returns to headline Slim’s, this time for his Long Live the Chief tour in support of his new album.
On “The Chief’s” opening track, “A Bull’s Tale,” Jidenna recounts a harrowing episode during his childhood in Nigeria, in which he and family members were robbed, beaten and kidnapped. He says that song and the rest of the record serve partly as a way to reclaim ownership over that past.
“That was definitely a large part of it. I think the reason why we tell stories is to try and make sense of the struggle of life,” he says.
Jidenna’s story has covered many miles, from his birth in Wisconsin to his childhood in Nigeria to a return to the U.S. for adolescent
years in Massachusetts. But it was while completing a bachelor of arts degree at Stanford that he became active in the Oakland community as a co-founder of Fear & Fancy.
Started in 2006, the organization initially was conceived as an event crew, “because we were in the bay, and Silicon Valley was booming, and we saw the early effects of Facebook before the world had it. It was at our school, and seeing how people reacted — that changed us. It made us aware that we needed to consciously create a culture that had those human values as technology kept soaring.”
So the group started throwing parties, arranging potluck dinners and hosting masquerade balls. Then there was Bless the Block, an event held in honor of the community’s fallen members, which featured the burning of incense, candlelight vigils and the visible presence of a neighborhood united against violence.
Part of the mission of Fear & Fancy is to foster local community, he says, and it’s an ideal he hopes will spread far beyond the Bay Area.
“As we move into this new era, what people are worth will be based on the creative parts of the human being, the parts that can’t be automated in a machine. So (at Fear & Fancy) we like to focus on the things that are uniquely human,” he says.
Jidenna’s desire to reshape culture through his music and actions continues to serve as a guiding principle of his still-young career. When Monáe called upon her Wondaland Records crew to participate in the Women’s March in January, Jidenna was by her side. Although he prefers not to be categorized as an activist, he’s more than willing to take a visible role in support of his beliefs.
“The first thing that we have to do when we’re looking at the values that any group of people is fighting for is to examine our own lives,” he says. “For me, for my own business and career, I needed to examine myself as a leader, and especially as a male, and see what changes I could make so that I wasn’t committing some of the same atrocities as the next man or the next institution that doesn’t look after women’s rights.”
Furthering his commitment to give back, Jidenna and his sister, Nneka Mobisson, established a scholarship in September at Nigeria’s Enugu State University of Science and Technology in honor of their father, who had taught at the school.
“It’s the first step of many,” he says. “Out of all the steps that are in our head as a family, that are in my head as a person, that are in our think tank as the Fear & Fancy tribe and the Wondaland tribe, that’s like a centimeter. I don’t mean to diminish its importance — it’s important — but we have a larger yardstick that we’re looking at.”