When he released “Street Tuff” with Double Trouble (Michael Menson, Karl ‘Tuff Enuff’ Brown and Leigh Guest) in 1989, it was the first most people had heard of the Rebel MC. Truth is, he’d formed Double Trouble way back in the early 80s and Street Tuff was just the furthest reaching public display of his talent. Although frowned upon as a sell-out by the Hip Hop community, the cut has since been heralded as “the birth of UK Grime” by Dizzee Rascal amongst others. So, what has that got to do with Congo Natty? Well, everything. For those who don’t know (and I hope it’s just a handful), Rebel MC aka Michael West went on to record as Conquering Lion, Blackstar, Tribe Of Issachar, X Project, Ras Project and of course, Congo Natty. What is incredible is that since we saw him bounce on to the TOTP stage armed with fashion dreads, a backing track on DAT and his Double Trouble entourage playing dummy instruments, Micheal West has consistently released quality underground music with more than just money in mind.
Check ‘Black Meaning Good’(1991), a watershed release for the Rebel as his style evolved and his lightweight raps were replaced by conscious flows, Reggae, Techno and the emerging sound of Jungle. Guest appearances came from Barrington Levy, Dennis Brown and Tenor Fly….heavyweight business! Now the UK’s underground were on-side, and comparisons to the Ragga Twins (fellow Tottenham dwellers) and Shut Up & Dance were rife, the ‘Word Sound and Power’ (1992) collection cemented Rebel’s place in the Reggae tinged corner of the UK’s bubbling dance scene. Now a manifesting Rastafarian, West set up the Tribal Bass label in 1992 and it was this which gradually mutated to X-Project and finally into the Congo Natty imprint all old-school Junglists know and love.
So, almost 20 years on, and having recorded under an array of monikers, Congo Natty continues to roll out raw breaks, deadly deep subs and vocal performances from dancehall legends like Tenor Fly and Daddy Freddy to expectant audiences the world over. Now a fully fledged rasta living between the UK and Ethiopia, the conscious content and scathing attacks on our unbalanced sytems are stronger than ever. Even better, to add a fresh twist, the Congo Natty outfit now counts a full live band amongst its ranks. As somebody who recieved early musical tutilage from the Demon Boyz, London Posse, Shut Up and Dance and the Rebel MC (I think ‘Just Keep Rockin’ and ‘Street Tuff’ were among the first singles I ever bought alongside Public Enemy’s ‘Rebel Without a Pause’), I have to give my full respect to him for keeping it moving so strongly over almost two decades.
And the punchline, Heads High are in the zone with Congo Natty this Saturday 19th July. He’ll be accompanied by Connie Bell, Lady MC (Kool FM) and a full live band. Myself and Darren Judge will be rolling out selections spanning reggae, hip-hop and perhaps a few electronic, bass movements. It’s one to make time for….
Greetings people! A timely reminder that this Sunday 20th June will see the Vibe Bar play host to another epic meeting of musical minds as Cal Jader and Darren Judge represent Heads High as we create some new sounds in collaboration with the 12 Tone musicians. Our last session saw a departure from the norm as 12 Tone got all electronic marrying synths and effects with their usual sick rhythms and bubbling brass. It worked so well that this time they’re taking it there again….but perhaps with an MPC to boot. Runnings get underway from 6pm, entry is free and Vibe are screening the football too so no excuses. Click here to link us on Facebook and we’ll see you on Sunday….
I’m posting this pretty sheepishly as Darren Judge did one of thess podcasts for us a full 2 MONTHS ago. He left it to me to add the jingles and I moved house/studio and am still picking up the pieces. There are still no jingles for reasons i’d better not go into, but what there is, is two HEAVY mixes put together by the man currently garnering support from the likes of Solid Steel for his CLUBB ROCK project. #19 is everything you’d expect from a British born Jamaican. Tuff Hip Hop, raw breaks and some serious Kingston town leanings. #20 sees the Judge come over all smooth & soulful….in a ghetto style. Guess you can’t be raw all the time. He promises us there are more in the pipeline but for now, wrap your ears around these.
HH PODCAST #19:
As We Enter//Nas & Damian Marley Yegelle Tezeta//Mulatu Astatke Struggla//Skitz ft Rodney P, Kardinal Offishal & Skibadee Born Inna System//Skitz ft Buggsy Kill Em With The Flow (Remix)//Skandal ft Klashnekoff & P Money Shutterbug//Big Boi EMC (What It Stands For)//EMC Twilite Speedball//Mos Def Orange Murderer//Clubb Rock Lit Up//Flying Lotus & Declaime Geek Down//J Dilla 914//Pete Rock ft Styles P & Sheek Louch My Aggin (Inst)//OhNo
This Friday 11th June, fans of real black music are going to feel nice. The OKRA project has teamed up with Adesose Wallace’s Ibile and Dalston’s Passing Clouds venue to bring the people a night of tone, taste and texture spanning Africa, the Caribbean and South America.
Representing Africa, 11-strong outfit Ibile hit the stage with a serious blend of Afrobeat, Highlife and raw West African drums. For better or worse, there has been an exponential rise in the number of Afrobeat/Afro-Funk/Highlife bands in the capital over the last few years but be warned, Ibile is the real deal. If you read the excerpt from our interview with him, you’ll know that Adesose Wallace is as authentic as they come. He’s played with Geraldo Pino, the James Brown of Afro-funk, and the inspiration for Fela Kuti to transform his Hi-Life Jazz sound into Afrobeat. Ade has also worked with Hugh Masekela, Miriam Makeba and a host of other African music legends and to this day, teaches West African rhythm and song to students countrywide – basically, he’s real.
Representing the Caribbean, OKRA presents Ras Happa and the Harambe Drummers throwing down a live set of pounding Jamaican roots drums and dance. Long before reggae music warmed its first amplifier and rumbled it’s first speaker cone, the island of Jamaica danced to the beat of Nyabinghi, Kumina and Revival drums. Rhythms and dances which are so powerful, they still emerge in the beats and sequenced movements of the freshest bashment dancehalls. Unfortunately, the dancehall didn’t assimilate the spirit of the culture with quite the same vigour…..that’s where we come in. To compliment proceedings Duke Etienne and Suga Kan’n keep it raw, roots and occasionally, savage with a DJ selection linking the past with the buzz of the afro-future.
Representing South America, Otto Nascarella takes a pause from the rootical, tropical funk of his Saravah Soul project to throw down a scorching selection infused with his Brazillian roots.
GB is something special. In a musical omniverse drowning in the throwaway output of countless copies of Ableton Live, his music speaks differently. Listen to his recent Xpander EP for his own GIFTEDandBLESSED imprint or his production on All City’s fifth installment of their Los Angeles 10″ series and you’ll know.
Our generation, to our detriment, has all but forgotten the true power of sound. GB has not. After studying the seemingly Salvia inspired sleeve of his latest release, I decided I had to make the link and dig deeper. This is what I found…
HH: So, I recently picked up the Xpander 12″ and was blown away by what it hid in it’s grooves. I looked you up and then realized that i’d been hearing your music for almost 10 years and just never made the connection! For those people who are in that position, who is GB?
GB: I write, produce and play music. GB is a moniker under which I’ve released much of my music. I’m an informal student of what I call “technoindigenous studies.”
HH: You’ve collaborated with Flora Purim, Airto Moreira, J*DaVeY, Steve Spacek, Baatin and a whole host of others. Listening back over your discography, your sound is diverse to say the least. Can you explain a little about your musical pedigree and the kind of sounds that have shaped your evolution?
GB: I enjoy music from around the world. I’m interested in exploring lots of musical territory. I enjoy drawing from many sources of inspiration, not to replicate a vibe someone’s already achieved by instead to see how I may be able to transmute, reconfigure, or add to that. At the moment, when working with others, I’m most interested in going places with them in which none of us have spent much time.
HH: Are you resident in LA? I once saw an interview with SaRa in which they talk about the energies and vibrations affecting the city and it’s inhabitants, creatively and otherwise. Is this a concept you can relate to?
GB: Yes I am currently a resident of L.A., so I suppose I relate to that in the sense that living here I’m subjected to the earth energies and social energies that are dominant. L.A. is the communication center of the world, something like Earth’s throat chakra. It adds up that there’s so much sound being transmitted out of L.A. But on the flip side, for my taste, all of my favorite music comes from throughout the world, from both likely and unlikely places.
HH: You record under a few other aliases too. Could you tell me a little more about them?
GB: I’ve released music as Julian Abelar, Frankie Reyes and the Reflektor. Keep in mind that GB is more of a “character” than anything. There is a sound that has come to be associated with GB. Julian Abelar, though related in vibration to GB, is a very different thing, more focused and intentional. Julian Abelar is an ode to the nagual Carlos Castaneda and his shamanic initiation with the nagual don Juan Matus as documented in his series of books. The name Julian Abelar is a name that comes from their lineage of sorcerers. So again, that project was intentional, and releasing it as Julian Abelar gave me the space to let it be what is was. Had I released it as GB, it might have been considered a disappointment to some who were expecting what they got out of Soundtrack for Sunrise. The Reflektor is a similar thing. And Frankie Reyes is a derivative of my actual name, emphasizing and paying homage to my Puerto Rican ancestry. If you spend time with the music, you’ll get a sense of the subtle variations.
HH: You seem to have a particular affection for analogue electronic equipment. What inspired you to evolve in that direction?
GB: I am most interested in a hybrid sound. My earlier releases were mainly sequenced digitally via computer software with a combination of samples and live instruments (I’ve never used software synths). I’ve played analog synths on most of my releases, but in recent years I’ve spent lots of time learning about the connectivity of these machines and how to use them in a configuration that allows the machines to speak to one another and keep in time with each other, like a band. And of course, this allows me to operate the entire band by myself in real time. Plus the sonic quality of analog synthesis is special. You can hear it immediately. There are many studies you can find out there on the compromises with digital vs analog. But that’s not to say that you can’t do interesting things with digital sound that you can’t do with analog. It’s only a matter of taste and understanding. But having said that, electronic music in general has a definite limit for me.
HH: Talking of inspiration, looking at the artwork on your most recent Xpander release and reading some of the copy on your site, there is a definite spiritual thread running though your art. Is this intentional, and if so, how do you relate art to spirit?
GB: Art for me is an attempt to make matters of spirit tangible. I use art to translate inspiration from spirit into a three-dimensional density-based experience. Art affects its audience, one way or another. My aim is to affect my audience positively, to inspire others to be inspired.
HH: To quote directly from your site you are‘an active advocate and practitioner of therapeutic sound healing techniques’. Could you expand on this please? What role do you think music has in the human healing process?
GB: Sound health is a very real thing. You can input sensory data into any of the senses and have a healing effect, and just the same you can have a detrimental effect. Without being conscious of it (for most people, anyway), you’re either helping or hurting your body by what you give it. So in my Healing Tones: Inverted Listening release, I emphasized specific colors and frequencies using analog synthesis again with the intention of activating the body’s innate self-healing capabilities. I’ve used these principles in several yoga studios here in L.A. as well as university lecture halls and alternative healing spaces.
HH: The most recent offering i’ve heard from you is the Raices Africanas sound collage under the Frankie Reyes moniker. It features a lot of traditional african drum music. What are your thoughts on the traditional music of the African diaspora and what relation have these rhythms got to your electronic output? Do raw organic drum music and programmed electronic music share any common ground?
GB: African music is inextricably a part of who I am. My rhythms, be they human-generated or machine-generated, are very African in essence. The drum is the most primal universal mode of communication and vehicle for achieving higher mind states. I don’t think we’ll ever stray too far from the drum because it basically equates to our life force itself. And in our technological age, in this transitional moment in human history, electronics are in many ways as organic as hand drums.
HH: What projects are you working on at the moment? Anything we should look out for in the near future?
I will be putting forth more live electronic offerings, as well as more earthy human music. I am still a student of music in the end, so as I continue to learn and expand, the breadth of my output will continue to do the same.
What is Gifted and Blessed? What are it’s aims and objectives?
Gifted and Blessed is the outlet for my music. Nothing more than that.
World Cup fever is mounting steadily and despite not being a huge football fan, even I am beginning to succumb to the allure of what is to come. To those of you who are fans, have you ever wondered how so many African players come to be in our home leagues and teams? To be honest, I hadn’t, but after running into director Baff Akoto, at our most recent Heads High session, my curiosity is acutely awake.
I first met Baff through a mutual friend at one of many warehouse parties I was involved with way back when. I always knew he was creative, but was always to polite to admit that I didn’t quite know in which way. Reasoning with him in Brick Lane, it transpired that after a long and arduous process, his debut film ‘Football Fables’ was set to be released this week. The blurb reads something like this:
African football has more global stars than at any other time in history. Every youngster across the continent dreams of playing for glamorous European clubs to become the next E’to or Essien.
The award winning documentary “Football Fables” tracks Francis, a young Ghanaian hopeful as he comes to the UK for Premier League football trials whilst attempting to navigate the tricky terrain of agents & scouts back in Africa
“Football Fables” provides unprecedented insight into the workings of African football migration. This internationally acclaimed documentary’s unparalleled access sheds light on the middle men who earn a living making sure that it’s their cream rising to the top. A “system” which (although far from perfect and in spite of itself) manages to produce some of the best players in the world!
Truth time, I haven’t seen the full feature yet, but between the trailer and the write-up, I know its one I will have to make time for.
Us London dwellers are going to be spoilt for choice. There are 8 seperate screenings to choose from over the next two weeks in the capital….i.e. no excuse. Click here to make the jump to the Football Fables site where you can digest all the information about screenings and plenty more besides, and click here to join the 1000+ strong facebook group.
Phonica are taking it there! Fresh from our collaboration with the One-Handed family last week (many thanks to all who graced the space), we’ve landed a last-minute instore with Stones Throw’s Aloe Blacc who’s hit the UK to spread some love.
Although the confirmation was last-minute, I’ve managed to out-slack everyone by leaving it till four hours before the event to drop this post. Hopefully, the RSS junkies amongst you will get it in time & i’ll see you down there….
Proceedings begin @ 6pm. Phonica Records 51 Poland Street Soho W1F 7LZ. More details here.
For those who don’t know, here’s Aloe doing what he does:
Some people know they can find me at Phonica, others not. That aside, everybody knows that Phonica Records is one of London’s premier outlets for those 12″ pieces of plastic that some of us still choose to play music from. Our selection is wide and our taste refined, even if I do say so myself.
Until know, fans of Disco and House/Techno were the only ones receiving the monthly blessing of Phonica’s club excursions which take place at the Big Chill Bar, and T-Bar respectively. Thankfully, my esteemed colleagues Free-Care and A.Child (Nick and Aaron to their friends) are spearheading a new venture to cater for those of us who are more moved by that electronic bass music shiznit. Rather than try and claim all the glory for themselves, they’ve decided to use the sessions as a platform for some of our most loved labels/musical camps to showcase their freshest work. The twist is, that each event also includes a further guest whose work compliments the rest of the night’s offerings. Nice.
So, this Thursday 27th May, make the pilgrimage to Plastic People for the event’s maiden voyage. One Handed Music are in the house and are celebrating the launch of the Paul White and the Purple Brain project. They’ll also be presenting we the people with exciting noises from Bullion, Tranquill and Alex Chase. Veteran analogue B-Boy Danny Breaks completes the bill with our very own Free-Care and A.Child laying the foundations. It looks like a good one. I’m excited….
I first met Dan Bean via a mutual friend with whom he shared the Iality HiFi soundsystem. As you can probably guess from its name, Iality was a predomoinantly Reggae affair, and so I assumed incorrectly that Dan was just another white-boy with a penchant for the sound of Jamaica. When I bumped into him in Fabric’s Room 3, which was being commandeered by the Detroit Beatdown DJs (Norm Talley, Delano Smith and Mike Clark), questions began to form in my mind about his musical affiliations. Over time, pre-conceptions were replaced with truth. The truth is that Dan’s taste (both musically and otherwise) is impeccable and diverse. Add to that his numerous trips to Detroit to hang out with Techno’s A-List and dig for long deleted vinyl prizes and you can probably see where we’re heading.
While I was round at his for an excellent meal and shameless audio geek-out a few weeks back, his floor to ceiling vinyl collection spanning everything from synthed-out Sunny Ade to Madlib’s DJ Rels broken-beat project prompted me to ask him to do a podcast for Heads High. It just so happens, that Dan is part of the Bleep 43 organisation who take great pride in inviting House/Techno’s finest to our fair city for marathon sets of real music. Derrick May is coming to Bleep very soon and that provides the inspiration for this very special audio excursion. I’ll let Dan explain:
“While preparing for the arrival of Derrick May to play a six hour set for us on the 21st May, I couldn’t help pausing to think about his work. It’s fair to say that he hasn’t exactly been prolific in terms of releases. On the other hand almost everything he’s released has been game changing in some way or other. This is partly to do with the innovative drum programming that Detroit is quite rightly renowned for, especially on the Roland TR-909. You might even say that the sounds from that peculiar little box define techno but that’s only half the story.
Listening to Derrick’s tracks, it seems clear that it’s the power of the melody that somehow connects most deeply. The instruments for this must have seemed like an uninspiring selection of cheap keyboards at the time, the only tools available to broke musicians. However in true ‘dubwise’ fashion they were put to use in ways that their designers probably never anticipated. The result was a sound or feeling that has since become ubiquitous worldwide, sadly almost to the point where it’s become totally devalued.
Rather than compiling a series of Rhythim Is Rhythim tracks in a mix, it seemed like a better idea to review at least some of the history of synthesiser music. It’s by no means a comprehensive review (please don’t write in…) but I’ve tried to pick out a reasonably varied selection including some tracks that might have influenced Derrick and his colleagues. For instance, ‘Shine A Light’ was a favourite of The Electrifyin Mojo, a revolutionary Detroit radio DJ who melded an almost ludicrous range of boundary busting records on his show and must take at least some credit for the Detroit sound.
I’ve also looked back to some early attempts to harness the power of synthesis by pioneers such as Raymond Scott and the unfortunately named Dick Hyman, not to mention sterling efforts from persistent innovators such as Ike Turner and Eddie Harris. Add to that Germany’s own take in the form of Popol Vuh alongside their inheritors Stereolab and with some luck I may have illuminated some less frequented corners of the synthesiser universe. To round the picture out I’ve also included tracks from European masters such as Giorgio Moroder (Beat The Clock) and Jean-Claude Petit and some apparently accidental house music from Roy Ayers, as well as a contribution from Detroit’s prodigal son (and devout synthophile) Omar S.”
Bleep43 with Derrick May is taking place on Friday 21st May at the wonderful Corsica Studios in Elephant and Castle. It’s £15 on the door (£9 NUS) or £12 in advance. Derrick will be playing for six hours from 1am. Hope you can join us. More info here.
John Carpenter//Main Theme from Escape From New York Jean-Claude Petit//Stones Of Law Omar S//Hot Ones Echo Through The Ghetto Rhythim Is Rhythim//Beyond The Dance Sparks//Beat The Clock (Alternative Mix) Jimmy Ross//Fall Into A Trance The Graingers//Shine A Light Roy Ayers//Chicago Cloud One//Atmosphere Strut Cat Stevens//Was Dog A Doughnut Fern Kinney//Groove Me Ike Turner//Thinking Black Dick Hyman//Give It Up Turn It Loose Raymond Scott//The Happy Whistler Stereolab//Refractions In The Plastic Pulse Popol Vuh//Aguirre I Yusef Lateef//Technological Homosapiens Eddie Harris//Carnival
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