Azd

The Azd or Al Azd, are an Arabian tribe. They were a branch of the Kahlan tribe, which was one of the two branches of Qahtan the other being Himyar.

In the ancient times, they inhabited Ma'rib, the capital city of the Sabaean Kingdom in modern-day Yemen. Their lands were irrigated by the Ma'rib Dam, which is thought by some to have been one of the Ancient World Wonders because of its size. When the dam collapsed for the third time in the 1st century AD, a large number of the Azd tribe left Yemen and migrated in many directions.

Azd is also a widely used male name in Yemen.

Azd branches

In the 3rd century AD the Azd branched into four sub-branches, each led by one of the sons of Amr bin Muzaiqiya

Imran Bin Amr

Imran bin Amr and the bulk of the tribe went to Oman, where they established the Azdi presence in Eastern Arabia. Later they invaded Karman and Shiraz in Southern Persia, and these came to be known as "Azd Daba". Another branch headed west back to Yemen, and a group went further west all the way to Tihama on the Red Sea. This group was to become known as Azd Uman after Islam.

Ninja Tune

Ninja Tune is an independent record label based in London, England, UK. It has a satellite office in Los Angeles, California, US covering the whole of North America. It was founded by Matt Black and Jonathan More, better known as Coldcut and managed by Peter Quicke and others. Music Week has written that Ninja Tune is one of the most credible independent labels in the UK.

Inspired by a visit to Japan, Black & More primarily created Ninja Tune in 1990 as a means to escape the creative control of major labels, and to act as a vehicle to release music of a more underground nature, free from the restraints that were put on them via their brief stints with Arista and Big Life. The label has been called "visionary" and "reliably excellent". It has signed a diverse range of uncompromising artists, encourages interactive technology, embraces the audio-visual world, has created its own publishing company, Just Isn’t Music, and finds innovative uses of software.

The label’s first releases —the first five volumes of DJ Food's Jazz Brakes— were produced by Coldcut in the early 1990s, and celebrated by the music press and beat aficionados. They were composed of instrumental sample-based cuts that led the duo to help pioneer new instrumental hip hop beats genres (alongside the Mo'Wax label and Ninja Tune artists such as Funki Porcini, The Herbaliser and DJ Vadim) and, to this day, are recognized as being indispensable tools for DJs.