NPR’s Tiny Desk Concerts, the stripped-down, live-in-the-middle-of-an-office-cubicle performance series probably most remembered for breaking the Internet when T-Pain dropped by sans AutoTune, held a big contest to give an undiscovered act a spotlight at the Tiny Desk. The winner was Fantastic Negrito, a roots musician from Oakland.
What’s good with that name, though?
“To me it’s a celebration of blackness,” he says. ” ‘Fantastic’ is self-explanatory, you know? And the ‘Negrito’ is a way to open up blackness to everyone — you know, make it playful, international. It’s extremely positive in my view; it’s my affair with this music. And it’s like gold! I feel like it’s something that everyone should know about.”
Gotta love musicians, man.