|
|
 |
TZU.
"Melbourne's really good for hip-hop at the moment. There's a lot of albums coming out and [hip-hop label] Obese have really stepped up their game - everyone has stepped up their game in terms of promotion and production and quality. The bar is being raised."
MC Joelistics (known to his mum as Joel Ma) is feeling pretty good about the world at the moment. As one third of Melbourne crew TZU he's in the enviable position of being about to release one of the most anticipated hip-records in the country at a time when Australian hip-hop seems to be on the up and up.
"The raw talent of MCs and producers has always been pretty high, but now your mixers, engineers and the rest of the industry is starting to understand hip-hop and figuring our how to compete with sound quality and standards compared with overseas, like the UK. It's growing at an incredible rate. And the content of the raps is a lot better I think as well."
Speaking of content, TZU don't hold back when it comes to their political views. While much of 'Position Correction' is laid back in its beats and rhymes, the trio take the gloves off for its angry centrepiece The Horse You Rode In On.
"Politics in our music," he muses, "has always been one of the foundations of what we talk about, because we're generally politically active people in TZU anyway. Also, at the same time, we're not trying to beat anyone over the head with what we think, or saying 'think like us!' It's not so much a pro- or anti-party, like we've got no party lines, but definitely we're all aware that we live in one of the most conservative countries in the world in its most conservative era, under its most conservative Prime Minister," he explains. "And maybe that's felt a bit more because two of the members of TZU are not wholly Anglo, so we've had heaps of experience with racism ourselves. It's something that's in us. For me, I know that I was attracted to hip-hop because it would speak out against racism and it was a voice for minority peeps."
One line that resonated for me was "I'm proud to be Australian, whatever that means." "It's that lack of identity that Australia has, isn't it?" Ma agrees. "It's a funny one. For me, I turn on the TV and I see nothing of the Australia I know - except on the news, or SBS. It's pretty troubling. I do a lot of work in high schools around the western suburns of Melbourne and I do a class with 20 kids and two of them are Anglo - but then I go home and turn on 'Neighbours' and there's not one non-Anglo face," he spits. "So where does that whole 'I'm as Australian as Ampol' Australia come into contact with the first- and second-generation Australians that live in the inner-city and listen to hip-hop and don't know the first fucking verse of Advance Australia Fair, which is racist and hypocritical anyway?" he barks. ""For those who come across the seas, we've boundless plains to share" - fucking right, provided you have the money."
Intrigued, I ask Ma what his high school work involves. "I do a lot of workshops," he explains. "Hip-hop and theatre workshops. I just got given a grant by VicArts to curate a CD of up-and-coming MCs from the western suburbs - a lot of second generation and bilingual MCs as well. There's some really good stuff going on at the moment." And that's not all: "I'm also working on a play with Little G, a Koori MC over here, really fucking awesome MC."
'Position Correction' was produced by Peter Brennan, late of Good Buddha: "Pete's an old friend of mine from high school. I grew up in Sydney and I went to school with most of Good Buddha - we're friends from way back when. In fact, I just finished an album with Andrew from Good Buddha and Shannon from The Herd - that should be out at the end of the year. So yeah man, I'm keeping busy! And the TZU album's out in March and we're all pretty interested to see what happens with that."
First up, though, the band are doing a couple of shows in our little town. "We're so keen to get over to Adelaide," he enthuses. "Adelaide seems to be the hot spot for Australian hip-hop at the moment. I was listening to the [Hilltop] Hoods' album this morning - it's fucking awesome."
So: there's the TZU album, the tour, several projects with young people and various collaborations... when does this man sleep?
"It's not sleep that's hard to find," he laughs, ruefully. "It's finding time to hang out with my girlfriend!"
Andrew P Street
 |
TZU play at the Crown & Sceptre on Fri 5 March. and the Rhino Room on Sat 6 March. 'Position Correction' is out shortly on Slanted/Liberation.
|
|
|
The latest issue
available now!
|
