Reggae

Protoje – KEXP Studio Session

So a little dream came true recently when Protoje announced his North American summer tour!  As I scanned through the list, there was, to my shock, a Toronto date!  I’m really excited about this, because as most of you already know, I am a huge fan of his.  While he has toured extensively in Europe and the United States, he has seldom set foot in Canada (which is even more odd given his management is actually based in Toronto!).  For complete North American tour dates, see the listing below:

protoje

Prior to his performance at Coachella this year, he stopped by a Seattle radio station (KEXP) and did a live session.  Finding this on YouTube was quite serendipitous, and has me even more hyped for the show now.  He starts the session with a wicked version of Criminal, which happens to be one of my favorite tracks on the “Ancient Future” album.  I saw Protoje perform this song when I was in NYC for the Ancient Future release party, but he manages to put a new rock twist on the version in this session which I really like.

The second song he performs is “Protection” which is the lead off track from his latest album.  I don’t think he sang this track last year in NYC, so it was nice to see a live version of it with his backup singers filling in for Mortimer.  He ended the session with “Stylin” and his smash hit, “Who Knows”.  Check it.

 

Another major development in his career has been his recent appearance on the British late night show “Later…with Jools Holland”.  While I had never heard of it before, as per the Wikipedia entry, it is considered an institution on that side of the pond.  The show has been broadcast on BBC2 since 1992 and has millions of fans around the world.  Needless to say, this provided Protoje with HUGE exposure and will certainly expand his fan base.  There is a video of the live performance on YouTube, but it is geo-blocked outside of the UK.  Luckily, using a proxy site aptly named UnblockYouTube, you can check out the performance using the link below:

Protoje performing Who Knows on “Later…With Jools Holland”

While Protoje was in the UK, he also found time to hit up the BBC 1Xtra Live Lounge to drop a sick cover of The Fugees classic “Ready or Not”.  He plays with the lyrics a bit in his version, and then ends it by dropping some verses from his own song “Protection” over the instrumental.  It’s really top notch, so definitely check it out.  Unfortunately, it’s also geo-blocked outside the UK, so use the link below as it won’t be searchable on YouTube in North America.

Protoje cover of “Ready or Not”

 

 

 

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