Native Tongues 12 October 2020
Written by Admin on October 13, 2020
This week we started off with some throwbacks!
‘Where Yat‘ and ‘Cookin Soul‘ from JBrown and the Mic Smith‘s classic EP ‘JB&TMS EP‘ which was released back in 2011. The Mic Smith is the voice and JBrown is the beats.
JBrown, a 175 IQ genius with the motivation of a sloth, is rumoured to have found an MPC 2000 (drum machine) in a dumpster and began making beats out of sampled flaming plant fibres. Upon hearing this first batch of soundscapes, NZ born activist beat poet, The Mic Smith, quit his day job of street-side political slander and set about writing the book of Genesis into post-modern rap format. Together these two record and perform a baffling mix of inbred blues music and over sampled hip hop foolishness.
Kolab – A Hip-Hop group hailing from Auckland started tearing up the airwaves around 2004. Conscious Hip Hop with a definite jazz influence via the likes of De La Soul, Common, A Tribe Called Quest and J Dilla. Their debut EP ‘Standards’ was released in 2011.
Band Members:
James ‘J Brown’ Brown (producer, turntables)
Scott ‘Scottie B’ Bibby (producer, vocals)
Tom ‘MC Speak Easy’ Everett (vocals)
Olly Harris (trumpet)
Shaun O’Kane (saxophone)
Mikey Rockwell
Dan Collins
Kolab, K+Lab – Killin Time (K+Lab’s Vibe Up) was a super dope collab which also dropped in 2011.
K+Lab is a dominant force in New Zealand glitch hop. His signature bass heavy hip hop fusion blends seamlessly with Kolab’s jazz-hop synthesis.
Speakeasy Sideshow is the solo project of MC Speakeasy (Kolab). He brings back his wicked rhymes and styles in his latest album ‘RumpleDrum’ and is having the album release party this Saturday 17 October in a show not to be missed. WIN a double pass plus bar tabs by entering our competitions on Facebook and Instagram. Enter HERE
Tracks featured on this weeks show ‘Blazed’ , ‘Haircut’ and ‘Golden Eye’.
Eliezer is a London born, Auckand raised rapper, singer, songwriter who produces and engineers all of his music with his best friend Jake. Eliezer met Jake, known as Ten.Oh when he was 14 through online gaming. He released his first song 2018. He has an extensive catalogue of tracks so I’ve picked out just a few of my favourites to feature this week: ‘Dream’, ‘Melancholy Ice Tea’ and ‘A Message‘. 
Dharmarat’s unexpected yet highly-anticipated album ‘BELIAL’ is out now. Originally Dharmarat had no plans to release any solo music in 2020 and had only planned to release an album with group Valleyside Boys. When New Zealand went into lockdown, this gave Dharmarat time to create, resulting in a lot of new music that he knew he needed to released now.
The album, like previous release ‘WLKNZ’, is personal as it touched on his mental health at that time whereas ‘BELIAL’ dives into his past:
“The whole project is about letting go of all the negative energy I still have inside, from my childhood to now. I tried to make a soundtrack to my childhood basically. I brush over some of the darkest moments of my life and let out the anxiety & PTSD the best way I could. The album is full of screaming, something I’ve never really done to this extent till now.”
After the releasing of his two tracks ‘CCC’ and ‘Hate da Game’ under his new alias of Kamahumble, the Melbourne based, Christchurch raised MC has dropped his debut EP, ‘Donuts’.
‘Donuts’ is his first release as a solo artist. Kamahumble brings in longtime friends and collaborators such as Highlace and Dharmarat to feature. The entire project is produced by KOME in-house producer Spyde.
As a member of the KOME collective, Kamahumble (then known as humbleboy) was making moves in Auckland’s underground scene through KOME high-energy, stage-mobbing sets. His ability to write hooks became an instrumental part of the groups success through Soundcloud, peers Church & AP took an eye to Kamahumble and would go onto work with him on ‘Penos’.
Featured this week are ‘CCC‘, ‘HATE THE GAME‘ and ‘A STEP BACK‘.
Church & AP have released the first side of their sophomore album ‘At Thy Feet’. Recently the duo took home 4 awards from the Pacific Music Awards (Best Hip-Hop Act, Best Group, NZ Radioplay award and Best Producer with Dera Meelan). Now as multi-award winners, the duo’s sophomore album may have high expectations but there’s no doubt they’re here to go above and beyond those expectations.
Just like ‘Teeth’, Church & AP keep their circle close as YKK in-house producer Dera Meelan covers all the production on ‘At Thy Feet’. Adding an additional 3 tracks to the first side of the album from the past fortnight of releases, Church & AP are once again bringing their unique sound to the forefront of the Aoteroa hip-hop scene.
Award winning producer Dera Meelan came in to Base this week and had a chat with Ian Beatmaster Wright. He’s highly regarded in Auckland’s rap scene for his experimental hip hop beats.
He has a forthcoming project (release date to be announced) but lucky for us, we got a taste of an exclusive unreleased track titled ‘Silver Spoon’. If this is anything to go by, we can’t wait for the project to be released.
Finishing the show, we end up full circle again closing off with an official remix from SkiiTour for JBrown and the Mic Smith’s track ‘Like This’.
Native Tongues is a one hour show of new music from local artists curated and hosted by Yannika. Big thanks to NZ On Air Music. Tune in live every Monday 3pm-4pm.
Launched in late 2011, Native Tongues is a 1 hour show dedicated to uncovering the freshest in underground music from Aotearoa. From bedroom producers who are just starting out through to artists with multiple releases on international labels, Native Tongues showcases the true sound of the underground.
Native Tongues highlights new music & new artists to the show each week, focusing more on emcees, beat makers, producers & electronic music.
