Elefant Traks 10th Anniversary Party DVD

On November 22nd last year renowned Sydney label Elefant Traks put on a one-off show at The Forum. Thankfully for those of us who couldn’t make it on the night, it has been documented in DVD form. It’s a veritable feast, featuring performances from: The Herd, Hermitude, Urthboy, Horrorshow, The Tongue, Unkle Ho, Astronomy Class as well as a couple of special guests: the delectable Gina Mitchell, Senator Jim, John Maddox and Bezerkatron formally of The Herd. It’s heartening to see a label thrive so naturally from humble beginnings to 50-deep releases.

First cab off the rank is Unkle Ho along with the trumpet and theremin talents of Senator Jim. The pair aptly kick off the night with the left-of-centre vibes Ho is known for. His alluring rhythms got the punters, who were scant at that point, jiving. Astronomy Class and The Tongue on hypeman duties are up next with a nice, albeit brief selection of tracks from their set. More tracks from Astronomy Class and Horrorshow would have been great but I guess the parametres of a DVD are what they are. Urthboy and Jane Tyrell’s onstage theatrics and unique costumes provided the type of zeal not seen often enough in Hip Hop shows. Elgusto held it down on the decks with class as always. Horrorshow’s set from their debut album The Grey Space was yet another enjoyable facet of this DVD and the spiel Solo gave about Elefant Traks showed great perspective and nous. Even as the babies of the label, they truly are a perfect fit. The Tongue continued the festivities with some tracks from his EP Bad Education as well as Shock And Awe. The inclusion of The Blues is wonderfully appropriate given the proposition of a battle from the punter in the word association segment. Hermitude’s portion of the night is another dance-friendly selection of songs, Cartridge Kings being a fantastic inclusion although Fallen Giants from Alleys To Valleys would have been a welcome addition especially taking into account the personel present on the night. Luke Dubs takes centre stage on Slychain, rocking the Korg and then invites Elgusto up front for some MPC, button-mashing goodness on Hermit Justice. The lighting really comes into it’s own in the Hermitude set, suitable hectic. Lastly, The Herd grace the stage with a wonderful array of tracks, some classic, some new, most inadvertently on the political bent The Herd is known for, all pure illness. The finale freestyle jam is the cherry, the sugar, the icing on the proverbial cake.

This live DVD probably could have done with some more special features but given the effort so clearly present in all the sets, the unique remixes and the overall quality of the camerawork, it’s forgivable. The Tongue is the obvious, suited candidate for hosting the 10th Anniversary DVD, trying to bring a little flavour to enthusiastic but unknowing punters as well as a good measure of cockiness to the police supervising the event. Perhaps a more even distrubtion of tracks would have been better as by the time The Herd’s set rolls around on the DVD, most of the members have already performed in previously on the night. That said, can’t really front on 130 minutes of highly enjoyable live music on your telly, a highly enjoyable watch. Here’s to another 10 years of releases from Elefant Traks.

Swarmy – Fed Up But Still Hungry

Swarmy from Overproof recently uploaded Fed Up But Still Hungry for your listening pleasure. Click here for free download. This is what the man himself had to say about the 13-track sampler:

“…Not all of these songs are as good as i would have liked, due to theft and loss of files we were faced with the decision whether to painstakingly recreate beats and songs from scratch or get them out there in rough form and move on. I’m movin on…”

Don’t sleep, this is especially dope for a free release. The tracks are also streaming on his facebook and myspace if you’re too lazy to download.

Horrorshow – Behind The Scenes

Sydney boys Horrorshow have upped this video on youtube giving a brief insight into the recording of their second album Inside Story. Released on October 2nd through Elefant Traks, the 13-track offering features fellow One Dayers Nick Lupi and Jimmy Nice of Spit Syndicate. Jane Tyrell also pops up for a duet with Solo. Three tracks from the new album are now on their myspace, Thoughtcrime, Inside Story and Neighbourhood Hit. At the moment, Horrorshow would have to be one of the classier outfits locally. Can’t really front on two albums in 18 months, national tours with Muph & Plutonic and now Urthboy, festival sets at Groovin The Moo and Big Day Out. Signed pre-orders are available here.

Requiem – Grassroots Anarchy

Requiem is an underground MC from Melbourne with a distinctly socio-political bent. Humble nihilism constitutes the basis of his recent LP Grassroots Anarchy. It’s a darkly-tinged manifesto with some able beatsmiths on production duties including: Ciecmate, Doc Felix, Pabstrakt and Wizard. Everything from the music and words to cover artwork conveys an urgency to communicate a message. Grassroots Anarchy is brimming with anthems for the pariah.

Counter Culture is both a sharp castigation of fronters staking claims to appreciating contexts of a culture before their time and an earnest account of Requiem’s own introduction to Hip Hop music. Given such a bold proclamation of the state of affairs, you would expect a similar brazen quality to the beat but not so. Instead, a simplistic, warbling guitar loop is layered over a simplistic drum pattern. Slum Gutters is an imagery-heavy account of a despondent, dystopic metropolis obviously inspired to a certain extent by Melbourne but generalised in the hook. A couple of Taxi Driver samples assist in creating the filthy cityscape. Slum Gutters is the best of Requiem’s flow, he excels over another basic drum loop. The beat is appropriately reflective, completed by a lilting piano sample in the hook. Slum Gutters and The Violence Of Love are a pair of highlights on Grassroots Anarchy. Requiem invokes the spirit of El Salvadoran archbishop Oscar Romero, assassinated in 1980. Pabstrakt laces together some evocative string sections and gentle latin guitar over another basic timescale. Vocalist Tahireh Thampi injects some class and flavour into the hook. ‘Justice cannot be killed’ is the popular refrain. Although it’s slightly oxymoronic to cast a figure of religion in such a thoroughly revolutionary light.

Grassroots Anarchy is a release exhibiting much potential but also areas due for improvement. One such facet is Requiem’s flow which is lacking somewhat. Overall, the beats could probably do with a bit more punch to compliment the thematic bombardment of Req’s lyrics. A refreshing touch of presentation was the liner notes in the booklet, something seldom seen in modern releases. Grassroots Anarchy is by no means an outstanding recording though Requiem is an artist competently plying his craft, developing a style that will be intriguing and undoubtedly entertaining in years to come.

Urthboy

Urthboy is an artist of longevity, an artist thoroughly on point in everything he does. The Elefant Traks head honcho has recently released his third LP Spitshine. It compounds the critical acclaim garnered by his previous two LPs, 2007’s The Signal and his 2004 debut Distant Sense Of Random Menace. The same talent behind the boards handles production on Spitshine: Count Bounce and Elgusto. Solo, Jane Tyrell, Lior and Mark Pearl and Nat Dunn all contribute to the already rich vein of songwriting present throughout. On the rap tip, Nay and Mantra hold their own brilliantly. Spitshine is an audacious, synth-stained offering from the talented maestro.

Things seem to be going swimmingly at Elefant Traks with seeds both old and new flourishing. Is it easier to produce music of your own in such a conducive environment?
Yeah I like to have good people around me. I like to have people that are making music that is solid. It’s kinda competitive because it means that you’re seeing your peers making good music that you’re impressed by, so you want to compete with them. But it’s not competitive in a negative way. It’s more about finding ways to inspire those around you and I like to be surrounded by people who inspire me because it makes me want to work harder. I mean, The Tongue has to get his shit together and work on some music and I’m quite happy to be putting that out there in the public sphere. He’s a talented writer and I like having him around even though he’s sort of been quiet for a minute. He has the potential to do some really cool shit, he’s done some and he’ll do a hell of a lot more. Same goes with Horrorshow, it’s dope having those guys around because they have grown up with Australian Hip Hop, I kinda did but the majority of what I grew up with was American with a sprinkling of groups like Def Wish Cast, Brethren and Quro. Horrorshow have come through, I guess maybe realising the possibilities that were a bit more vague back in the day. The result is they come out firing.

As you grow older and release more albums, do you think tracks with the sentiment of Ready To Go become more paramount?
I think that’s a personal thing. You see it over and over again when artists get really comfortable and just keep regurgitating similar material. That’s not necessarily a bad thing because a lot of the time those artists are hounded by fans to keep recreating the same stuff. I often find it keep cornering you into a comfort zone and so whether I succeed or fail, I think it’s really important to explore ways of avoiding that comfort zone because there’s something really great and untarnished about naiveté and being a new, young artist feeling like anything is possible. It’s exciting man, it’s sorta why people make music, whether you’re staunch or soft or whatever, you get a buzz from creating shit and putting together words. That sometimes gets a bit lost when you do it so much that you just have a clear understanding of what you need to do to write a song. You can just fall into going through the motions and that’s fine because that shows you’re familiar and you’ve got experience and that’s cool. But the flipside is that you just end up being a bit too safe sometimes. So I guess Ready To Go is kind of a call to arms in that sense, it’s an acknowledgement of finding some inspiring shit to keep really hungry.

Spitshine also seems to contain more songwriting devoted to non-rap vocal stylings. Is this a facet you enjoy?
Yeah for sure. My primary music that I create is Hip Hop and that’s what I love. I’m still spun out by how much there is still to learn about it. It feels like it’s inside everything I do, like there’s a Hip Hop angle or approach. But I get curious about how you can incorporate that mentality into a more traditional and conventional songwriting structure-sung music and working with singers. Because I don’t think you need to turn your stuff into drivel in order to work with singers. I think there’s heaps of great ways to convey your message. I was listening to that Line To Line track by Bias B this morning. He’s talking about shit that is supposed to connect with writers and that’s what the whole song is about and that’s a lot of the new record and that’s mad because he’s talking to a whole sub culture of people out there that the majority of society doesn’t have a clue about. It’s really important but at the same time he’s just trying to connect with a group of people whether it be writers or you’re a singer writing about love or loss, you’re still trying to communicate something to a group of people. Sometimes there’s a great challenge working with singers in getting your point across, I find it really interesting.

Where does the inspiration for your onstage costume tomfoolery come from?
There was a time in Hip Hop music when it was the way you performed and entertained you know. That shit is what created the artform that we are involved in. I realise that there’s a certain gimmick about dressing up and that’s why it’s only every now and again that we do dress up. You can’t trade on a novelty, it just wears thin. I like to keep it as an element of a show that says ‘we’re not taking ourselves too seriously’ you know, that we’re not so precious about our fucking image that we can’t go out and kinda take the piss but more importantly, it’s about entertainment. We’re entertainers, you go out there and freestyle on a stage, just trying to land your punchlines or whatever and that’s all cool if you’ve got a bunch of heads in the crowd that are all just following every word. But in the broader music scene, we’re up on stage to fucking entertain and to put together an engaging live show. You don’t have to wear a costume to do that but that’s just another little weapon in your arsenal. I don’t really care, I just think it’s fun to do every now and again.

“…I often find it keep cornering you into a comfort zone and so whether I succeed or fail, I think it’s really important to explore ways of avoiding that comfort zone because there’s something really great and untarnished about naiveté and being a new, young artist feeling like anything is possible…”

You’re hitting the road September though to November for the nationwide Spitshine tour. Are there any further live theatrics in development?
Yeah, we’ve really tried to work hard on our live show. In previous years when I was coming up, you’d just go to a show or play a gig and it would be more about the social aspect. You’d have a bunch of beers, you’d see your mates, you’d get onstage, rap some songs and it was just about the buzz of performing. For many years it was like that because it’s difficult as an artist to think ‘well this is going to take me somewhere, I better really be as professional as I can’ because in years past, it was very difficult to imagine it growing like it has. Nowadays I’m firmly of the belief that you have gotta make use of every opportunity and that means gone are the days when you get up onstage and just rap your shit. You gotta come with something different, put some time into your show. For us, that means we’ve been putting together visuals for the whole gig and actually creating them, not just getting random shapes and things and putting them behind us. Jane and a good friend Bernie who did a lot of the editing of the making of videos have taken care of that. We do it where possible as well, a lot of the time we’re doing regional shows where we don’t have big venues so it’s a bit hard to do full lighting shows and whatnot. Remixing songs for the show and working out how we’ll be delivering these songs onstage is important. We’re not that two or three blokes shouting the chorus kinda thing. I might sound like I’m not speaking about that favourably but I love that shit, it’s mad energy, like Funkoars. You love that vibe man because everyone is just fucking electric, everyone is venting. I mean it’s not punk music but it’s just about cutting absolutely loose at gigs and that’s good. You need to have bands like that but that’s not us, we operate on a different level so we gotta shape our show to have a different angle.

How did the collaboration with Lior eventuate?
That was simple, he rocked up to a festival, he was playing after me. He jumped into our tent and said he was a big fan of The Signal. I just said ‘cool…wicked.’ I’ve been a big fan of his for a long time, I think some of his melodies are just outrageous.

Is it humbling to have an artist of that ilk commenting on your work favourably?
Yeah for sure, I guess it just shows that we’re all on the same boat. As a Hip Hop artist you tend to marginalise yourself, you think you’re on the fringes. And that’s not some ludicrous conspiracy theory or paranoia, we are on the fringes. It’s constantly rammed down our throats that we are on the fringes, especially in Australia. Even if people accept it, even if Hilltop Hoods go number one twice in a week, we’re still treated as an anomaly. So strike me down for adopting that outsider mentality but that’s just the way it goes and anyone who has been around Hip Hop for more than five years and remembers it 10, 15 years ago, let alone 25 years ago, can relate to that.

The cursing on Spitshine is far less prevalent than your average Hip Hop release but seemingly well-considered. Is the impact of such language features something you give a fair amount of thought to when writing?
That’s cool because I’ve sworn more on this record than any other I reckon. I think that I’m pretty loose every now and again, I’m not the Geto Boys though. But at the same time I think people who talk all the time, talk shit, carry on, never know when to stop and every now and again they’ll make a valid point but it’ll probably get lost because they talk so much so people switch off then you get those other people who only talk every now and again but because they don’t talk that often, people listen. I think the same with swearing, sometimes you can throw a word into a spot where you weren’t expecting and it can give you a little jolt. I find that works more in singing when you’re writing a beautiful song and you throw something in that is a bit coarse. It’s like with Impossible Story, at then end of it, it was really important to finish that line even though really we were trying to write something evocative and a little bit reflective so that’s not necessarily the kind of song you load up with swearing but the last line of the verse is ‘…fuck it all, fuck it all, fuck it all for 12 months…’ Sometimes I get young fathers saying why do you swear so much on your records? I can’t play it to the kids.’ That kinda sucks but what are you gonna do? I grew up on the Geto Boys, Paris and NWA. That’s a lot more part of Hip Hop than swearing is to say…pop music.

The song titles on Spitshine seem to have a particularly poetic leaning-Above The Canopy, Impossible Story, Them Shackles, Til They Snatch The Last Page-is this a conscious endeavour, something you take pride in?
Yeah I reckon. I love instrumental artists that come up with good names for their songs because it can really bring people in, it’s a short-term thing. But if you name a song well, it’s a beautiful thing.

Is 2000 & Whatever a reflection of striving to make timeless music?
Yeah for sure, I didn’t want to go with 2009 & Whatever, I didn’t want to have it dated. It’s cool having something that’s dated like when you’re listening to say…some Wu-Tang shit and they drop a reference to ‘93 or 93 To Infinity itself. I wanted people to think ‘2000 and what…? What year was it? when they hear the song.

www.myspace.com/urthboy

Thundamentals – Sleeping On Your Style

Thundamentals are a four piece crew from the Blue Mountains and Sydney. Having shown much promise for a while now, Jeswon, Tuka, DJ Morgs and Tommy Fiasko have released their debut LP Sleeping On Your Style through Obese Records. It’s a wonderfully balanced recording. Everything from the guests to the lyrical ideals is well-considered and easy on the ear. Charismatic MC’s Jeswon and Tuka express social and political ideas with superb subtlety, messages neither strident or soft. Sleeping On Your Style is a very handsome development, skillfully following on from where their self-titled EP left off.

The LP begins in a highly inauspicious manner, a gently plucked guitar, simple vocals and effected accordion roam in the fleeting intro before Jeswon launches into the opening verse. Holistically, the title track continues in the same vein as the hook, continuing with a certain nuance that makes the entirety of the album thoroughly enjoyable. There’s no rogue element drawing attention, everything operates with cohesion. Move It Up is one of many highlights throughout Sleeping On Your Style. From the funky bassline to the rolling, soulful drums to the deft touches of xylophone to the effective chorus, it all moves along without fault. It’s easy to see why it was chosen as a lead single. The boys also recently completed a video for the track. Another pleasing aspect the Thunda production steez is how the vocal samples sit a little further back in the mix, even in the breakdown towards the end. We Won’t Mind and Bad Men are a pair of heavily contrasting tracks. The former features Jehst and the two MC’s pursue a reefer and beer fueled take on the lighter side of life over a fairly chilled, nondescript beat. Another classy guitar and bass combination weaves in and out the various horns on display. Bad Man has more of a swing about it as the femme relays negative, assumedly autobiographic, impressions in the primary sample. Jeswon and Tuka describe various, mostly unscrupulous, means of subsisting in a harshly capitalistic world.

Thundamentals strike me as a crew inherently indifferent to the inevitably superficial predispositions of the genre, something reflected in such things as their neat guest selection. Not an endless procession of names intended to propel the record’s notoriety, Jehst and Dialectrix get the job done very well. Sleeping On Your Style is an album of highlights, Serial Illa, My Favourite Song, El Mundo, Broke Pocket Philosophy all warrant repeated listens. The LP is also an exhibition in stylistic variety-from soul to electro to reggae-the Thunda boys pull it off with genuinely unaffected swagger and flair. Definitely one of the best for 2009.

Herb

Herb is a talented, charismatic MC originally from the Blue Mountains, now residing in Sydney’s Inner West. His brand of Hip Hop is intently sincere and funk-inclined yet simultaneously derives influences from fields as left as electronica. His perspective and lyrics are refreshingly earnest. Followers of this blog will note that not often, if at all, have I made mention of an artist for the sake of it. However, this is measure of how enjoyable the MC’s tunes are. You can check a couple on his myspace or alternatively triple j unearthed. Also, word around the campfire is Herb has an 5-track EP on the boil, titled The Morning Sun. Recorded by Fame at The Bank, mastered by Herb’s accomplice Ivan Lisyak and mastered by Adam at Sonamax Studios, it’s set for release in the not-to-distant future with distro from Unda K9. Fiends For The Top is particularly ill, effectively capturing the egomania prevalent in MCing. The song also featuring on this video from American BMX company Fit Bike Co. Don’t sleep.