The Very Good Agency

Zap Mama

Maya Angelou – ‘Phenomenal woman’

“….its in the reach of my arms
the span of my hips
the stride of my step
the curl of my lips
Im a woman,
Phenomenally
Phenomenal woman
thats……”

.

From the misspelling of the artist “brandy” [during one of my youtube scavenger hunts] I was fortunate enough to stumble on this gem of a “oh heeellll yeah!” or else known as “Bandy, Bandy” by Zap Mama ft Erykah Badu.

Zap Mama and Erykah Badu – Bandy Bandy

Marie Daulne, the founder and leader of Zap Mama, was born in Republic of Congo the fourth child of a Walloon (French-speaking Belgian) father and a Bantu mother. Daulne was only a week old, when her father was attacked and killed by Simba rebels, who were opposed to mixed-race relationships. Pygmies rescued her family from the rebels and she pays homage to those pygmies in the song ‘Gati’ from the album, ‘Supermoon’.

With an eclectic history of influences including Etta James, Bob Marley, Run DMC & Beastie Boys to {Dualne and her sister’s} mother’s Congoan songs and French radio, Zap Mama was born.  This polyphonic, harmonic music has a mixture of heavily infused African instruments, R&B, and Hip-hop with a strong emphasis on the traditional African harmonies.

Two decades later, seven albums, collaborations with Talib Kweli, The Roots, Common, Bahamadia & Jazzyfatnastees, and tracks featuring on blockbusters like ‘Mission Impossible’ & the recent art film, ‘What about me?‘, Zap Mama can be explained in just one word…… “dope”.

Not only does this woman’s beauty make you blush, and her wails get you high, Zap Mama is an evolution of the soul who never fails to get you movin’ like …..

“…like Bandy Bandy (the snake), wave your body…“

You can check out more from Zap Mama at:

www.zapmama.com

www.myspace.com/zapmama

www.zapmama.be

Tags: Collaborations, hip hop, Soul

Dres the Black Sheep – What is… and what was

If your looking for the new flavour of the month fresh on the charts, then this article and even website probably isn’t for you. There’s a lot of great artists who have come and gone over the years leaving their mark on the scene since hip hop began to offer an alternative view of what is, and what it can be. I think about posse’s like Native Tongues which consisted on artists like De La Soul, A Tribe Called Quest, Jungle Brothers, Queen Latifah, Mos Def,  and I know that there are people who are beginning to listen to conscious music every day who have an interest in where these new artists draw their inspiration to create from. I get to surfing the internet and I think about an artist who has re-appeared more recently, Dres from Black Sheep.

Black Sheep as well as doing they’re on thing on Polygram Records, were affiliated with Native Tongues right from the early days, and so it’s no surprise to hear Dres recent solo work still delivering that old school flavour of beats with a positive spin, and enoyable perspective on current issues facing the world. Instantly being made aware of the style and quality he posesses’, I want to say that I was listening to Dres and Black Sheep’s music since their first release ‘A Wolf in Sheep’s Clothing’ back in 1992. I want to say that I saw them performing as the first hip hop group to play ‘The Tonight Show with Jay Leno‘, but although I may have and since forgotten, I have only recently given them any real attention after hearing a track that Dres released in 2006 called ‘Novakane Groove’.

What is
Dres of Black Sheep – Novakane Groove

I know I heard him on Handsome Boy Modelling Schools ‘White People’ Album on the track ‘First… and Then’ with fine production skills of Dan the Automator and Prince Paul.

and what was

Black Sheep – This or that

You can check out more from Dres and Black Sheep at:

www.myspace.com/blacksheep

…bs

Tags: hip hop, Old School

Batucada Sound Machine Interview

We talked size with Batucada Sound Machine…

(Interview with James Hughes, percussionist and band founder)

A 12 piece band doesn’t happen by accident, how was BSM born?
Dude, we are now 12 piece, but were at 15 during the early days!
It all started when I returned from a stint in Cuba and Brazil studying percussion and I got a group of players together at a local club in town. We jammed once a fortnight and mixed brazilian and Cuban rhythms with drum & bass, hiphop grooves etc. The night started getting a reputation and soon a few horn players turned up, and MCs started coming along. Soon followed a bass player, guitarist and pretty soon we had a full band…playing improvised jams. We got booked for a couple of big local festivals and since then its been a mad ride…playing festivals around NZ, Aus and the UK, and resulting in the studio album with Neil Sparkes last year.

Does size matter? Is it important that there are so many of you?

We have developed our sound so that each person has their own role. From the rhythm section to the percussionists, to the traxedos (horn section) to the vocalists etc. Each person is key. Obviously there are logistical issues, but that’s all part of the fun.

Your music has been described as an ADHD Melting Pot of sound – is this deliberate?
Well, not sure who that person was, but we’ll take it as a complement! There are intentionally chaotic moments within some of the tracks, but by and large – its all carefully orchestrated…unless the band leader is having one of his ‘moments’.

How would you describe your music?
I would call it super-samba-afro-funk, with elements of hiphop and pacific soul added for taste….hmmm yeah I like it.

Your live set is said to be ‘explosive’. Was it difficult to translate this kind of energy into your album ‘Rhythm and Rhyme’?
The recording process was a great experience. We enlisted Neil Sparkes to produce (UK, Transglobal Underground) and he came out to NZ to record with us for 3 weeks. We had demo’d all the tunes for him which was great as we really worked on making the tunes album friendly and not the extended mixes we play live. In terms of energy, we captured the vibe really well during final recording, and then tried to enhance that as much as possible in the mixing stage (we were fortunate enough to mix at Avatar Studios in NY).  The engineer at Avatar was a genius and were stoked with the final result. We are discussing releases at the moment in Aus and the UK – so stay tuned!

Was it hard to create ‘one’ sound with such a wide range of talents and backgrounds? How do you avoid ‘too many cooks’?
It’s a process for us, and often song ideas are created by one person and then developed by the rest of the band. There is a core group of 3-4 of us who do most of the song creation – which makes for a consistent approach. Often a song may start as a rhythmical or bass driven groove, and then we’ll add horn and vocal melodies, breaks etc until things materialize into something we agree on. Often it will take a few times playing live for the final arrangement to stick.

As well as there being so many of you, you also enjoy collaborating with other artists – recently Che-Fu – what do outside artists bring to the band?
It was great working with Che on the song ‘Smoke’. He was super professional in the studio and had researched the subject matter of the song (which was loosely about Cuban Santeria etc). He had all the lyrics down and new exactly what BVs he wanted to do…all in all he was in for a couple of hours and done.

Batucada Sound Machine feat. Che-Fu
Smoke

We have also worked with Kevin Field (jazz pianist on Hechicera) and Lewis McCallum (saxophone guru on Vai Chegar) – both of whom really added great touches to the respective tracks.

You not only perform in English but other languages such as Portuguese. Would you describe yourselves as a ‘Kiwi’ band?
To be honest, were probably not a ‘Kiwi’ band…what is a ‘Kiwi’ band anyway? Define NZ music!? Can I ask questions?
We certainly are from NZ and love being NZers, but take our influences from other parts of the world as most bands do to differing degrees as well.

Where will you be performing over summer?
We have 4 gigs in Aus lined up:
Thurs Feb 12 in Melb @ The East Brunswick Club – w/ The Melodics
Fri Feb 13 in Sydney @ The Factory Theatre w/ Son Veneno
Sat Feb 14 in Canberra @ Carnival in the City
Sun Feb 15 in Perth @ The Becks Music Box, Perth Int Arts Festival

Then back to NZ for summer gigs etc and hopefully hitting the UK mid-year.

What does the future hold? Will you get bigger in 2009?
We wont be growing band numbers that’s for sure!
This year, we are looking to release the album in Aus and also tour the UK and Europe…things are coming together well, and we have interest from a number of festivals over there…
So yeah…gonna be huge!

You can check out more from Batucada Sound Machine at:
www.myspace.com/batucadasoundmachine
www.batucadasoundmachine.com

…BabyRuth

Tags: Collaborations, Funk, hip hop, Interviews, New Zealand Artists, Reggae

Batucada Sound Machine hit Australia

New Zealand’s 13 piece hip hop, funk, samba mash-up group Batucada Sound Machine are bringing their crazy Brazilian percussion based performance to Australia for a week long tour this February. As they explain, “Loosely translated, ‘batucada’ means percussive samba jam, which aptly summarises BSM’s musical roots. BSM began in 2003 when five passionate drummers met once a month in the dimly lit lounge bar of Galatos nightclub in Auckland to experiment fusing ‘batucada’ with more local beats and influences. Before long, a talented group of diverse musicians had joined in and the band had grown to 13 members”.

Batucada Sound Machine – Rivers of Rhyme

With the individual members of the band involved in various solo and group projects outside of BSM, you might recognise some of them from earlier works, most recognisably in upcoming MC Hazadus showing his own style of soul infused vocals after years of fame in Che-Fu and The Krates.

If your able to make one of these performances then your in for a sweet night, and from what i’ve heard and seen in their performances locally and in Europe, you might need to get your boogie shoes on for this one.

Batucada Sound Machine will play:

Feb 12 @ East Brunswick Club, Melbourne

Feb 13 @ The Factory Theatre, Sydney

Feb 14 @ Canival In The City, Canberra

Feb 15 @ Becks Music Box, Perth

Feb 28 @ Music Mountain Matakana, NZ

You can check out more of Batucada Sound Machine at:

www.batucadasoundmachine.com

www.myspace.com/batucadasoundmachine

and you can check out the interview we are doing with them over the next week

…bs

Tags: Funk, gigs, hip hop, New Zealand Artists

Braille – Cloud Nineteen

Whenever I am in Sydney I try to take a moment to pop into D2MG Hip Hop academy. I do it cause it’s cool to see local outfits who are really passionate about hip hop, and who are putting in time to give back to the community that has given so much to them while they were coming up. Last time I was there I heard about a book written by Jeff Chang called ‘Can’t Stop Won’t Stop – A History of the Hip-Hop Generation’. About 80 pages into this now, I have no problem recommending it to anybody who is interested in the roots and history of hip hop culture, and find myself bringing it out whenever I board that train, take that break, or hit that bed. So when I received a link to the ‘Cloud Nineteen Initiative’ that Braille Brizzy and S1 are working on in USA at the moment, it was truly awesome to see the new generation talking and walking the path that has been established right from the outset of the culture and ideology of real hip hop.

Musicians inevitably flirt with the relationship between doing what they feel is right and meaningful with their music, and doing what is financially beneficial and sustainable career wise if they want to promote their music in a way that will reach greater audiences. In a perfect world musicians can get out there doing what they dream of and all the rest will fall into place, with so many artists around nowadays however, and the masses not always following the conscious but rather fashionable and current trends, I admire the way these guys have put themselves out there regardless of the consequences to give back just simply cause… it feels right.

So if your feeling the vibe, and if you too beleive it’s important to give to the next generation then show some love to the ‘Cloud Nineteen Initiative’.

I know I will be

You can check out more on Cloud Nineteen at:

www.braillehiphop.com

…bs

Tags: hip hop