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stylepark-job: hip hop holiday
seit einem jahr fast sind wir dabei, dj vadim und co. zu uns nach niederbayern zu bringen - jetzt hat es ENDLICH geklappt! dieser vielbeschäftigte dj produziert am laufenden band, ist beinahe jedes wochenende in ganz europa unterwegs und stellt nebenbei noch ein irres live-projekt auf die füsse: ONE:SELF.
und genau dieses spannende live-projekt macht am freitag, 01.07. halt im bogaloo. es war gar nicht so einfach, denn one:self spielen in london, lille, sansibar, paris, berlin, wien, bratislava, ..., und eben in pfarrkirchen niederbayern. lustig :)
wer einen vorgeschmack haben will, dem sei erstmal die ninja-tune- und one:self-homepages ans herz gelegt. ausserdem kann man sie hier schonmal das aktuelle video ansehen... nice and smooth but kickin'...
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von links nach rechts: blu rum 13, yarah bravo, dj vadim
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(bio pt. 2) "I know his music, I know how he writes, and I know what kind of stuff he writes about," Yarah says of her rhyming compatriot. "It's really easy to be in this group," the Washington DC-resident Blurum chuckles, "despite the geography." For his part, Vadim is convinced Oneself couldn't have happened had he not made the move in 2003 from leafy suburbia to the inner city, and built the studio where the Oneself album, Children of Possibility, was recorded.
"I've been much more inspired since moving to East Ham," he explains. "It's such a cultural hot-pot that it makes sense that I'd put it into the music somehow. There's sitars and the whole Indian thing, but also there's African sounds, flamenco guitar, Shakuhachi flute - it's a real blend of all the sounds and the people of the area we live in." The effect is startling; a blend of the sort of carefree, trend-defying production Vadim has made his name with, yet lent a new immediacy and clarity - perhaps because this may be the first time he has known precisely who will be supplying the vocals his music envelops. Blurum believes this is Vadim to a tee, but that "the chaos is a little more controlled".Echoing Vadim's own hope that listeners will hear the record first and foremost as "a hip hop album, but also a very musical album", Yarah believes Oneself transcend hip hop's parochial preoccupations and emphasise its global reach.
"A lot of people want to represent an area or a place," she explains. "But from us, you don't really get that, because we're from so many different backgrounds that we kind of represent everything." "We chose the album title," Vadim concludes, "because we wanted to talk about how children are so open to different things: they're not racist, they don't have prejudices, they're always trying to discover new things. And we wanted to go back, musically, to a space where we can discover things and create music. We're having fun, really; it's enjoyable. It's got a message, but that message isn't rammed down your throat. It's hip hop, but it's more than that." Seriously.
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ONESELF
(NINJA TUNES, UK)
BIO
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If you think a story that starts off with an American, a Russian and a Swedish-born Chilean/Brazilian ought to end up with a terrible punch line, then you've not heard the one about the multi-national hip hop trio Onself. Their tale might seem unlikely, but their music is definitely no joke.
The group - DJ Vadim and MCs Blurum13, a New York native who's spent time in Canada, and Yarah Bravo, whose mother came from Chile, father from Brazil, and was born and raised in Sweden - came together on the road, as Vadim, the celebrated London-raised, St Petersburg-born production visionary, was touring under the experimental banner of The Russian Percussion. "In 2003 we did two humungous North American tours," he explains.
"The first half was Yarah, me and DJ First Rate, and on one of the shows we were in Montreal, and Blurum opened up for us with his band Groundwerx. When we came back for the second leg of the US tour in the autumn, another 50 shows, Yarah couldn't do it so Blurum became the front man of the collective."
Realising both vocalists had complimentary but contrasting styles, Vadim, Yarah and Blurum began discussing a dedicated collaboration. Although his solo albums have tended to feature numerous vocalists, Vadim had yearned to work in depth with a core group of no more than
two MCs, preferably a pair whose deliveries and sensibilities would both mesh and spark. Through their natural evolution on the road, Onself became that group, and as the chemistry between voices, concepts and beats intensified, lyrical ideas began to take shape, giving the record an unplanned but hardly unexpected thematic consistency. "As writers, as lyricists, we trust each other," Blurum says of Yarah. (continued.)
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