Genesis Owusu on his latest album, ‘Redstar Wu & the Worldwide Scourge’

Have you ever gotten up in the morning and reached for your phone right away? You start scrolling, and in your mind, you might be thinking: “I’m just gonna check in on the news and see what my friends are up to.” But when you finally put that phone down, you feel more overwhelmed, confused and isolated than you did before.

Australian artist Genesis Owusu set out to fight those feelings with his new album, Redstar Wu & the Worldwide Scourge.

Today, Owusu, who blends genres like hip-hop, punk and funk, talks about responding to global unrest and that feeling that we just aren’t getting the whole truth by writing songs that are direct and outspoken.

This episode of World Cafe was produced and edited by Miguel Perez. Our senior producer is Kimberly Junod and our engineer is Chris Williams. Our programming and booking coordinator is Chelsea Johnson and our line producer is Will Loftus.