The self-described “eternal voice of Haiti”, Vox Sambou (born Robints Paul) is a Montreal-based emcee and international hip-hop activist whose Creole raps and dancehall chants speak to the thorny political reality that continues to plague his countrymen. After 16 years of spitting rhymes in booming baritone from Haiti to Havana to Toronto’s Harbourfront alone or alongside Montreal’s Nomadic Massive, Paul is now set to bless us with his debut solo album.
The title of the LP is Lakay, the Haitian Creole word for home, which in Paul’s case is Litero a neighborhood on the outskirts of the city of Limbe 220 km north of Port au Prince. Also known as ‘ti Guinea, the small region is the source of the deep-rooted Caribbean rhythms that punctuated the lives of Paul’s great-great grandparents and kept his own head bobbin’ before he had ever heard of a thing called hip-hop. As he grew older, Paul also embraced Dancehall and early Reggaetone, but his true heroes were the socially conscious local musicians he saw live. Motivated by the rebellious roots music of Eddie Francois and the legendary band Bookman Eksperyans as well as Kompa groups such as Tropicana, Paul moved to Port au Prince where hip-hop was quickly becoming the subversive soundtrack of choice for the next generation of young Haitians.
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