Blog - The Movement Fam, Independent Hip Hop Record Label - Toronto + Montréal
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Rock
Due to the fantastic response from Cee's music video for 'Comin' Home', from 'The Indie Experiment Volume 1' project, The Movement Fam decided to completely remix and remaster the entire series and rerelease the three mixtapes with a new, bigger sound, thanks to Notion's amazing engineering work.
'Comin' Home' was shot in locations around Toronto in the summer of 2012 with Dave Dunville and J Mitchel Reed. The track is lifted from Cee's 'The Indie Experiment Volume 1' mixtape, as his ode to both his homes (Melbourne and Toronto) over City & Colour's haunting gem of a tune.
Cee speaks on his feelings after selling everything he owned to move to Canada to pursue his dreams with his music. Much love to Josh Telfer, Clem Ryan, Notion and of course Tiffany Alexis for all their help with the filming of the video, and huge props to editor Andrew Howart for putting it all together.
Yes, bitches! Volume 2 out this. For those who ain't know, this is the second volume of a three volume series of mixtapes where I try to do something that I haven’t heard anyone else do; rap over indie rock/electro/dubstep/alternative/folk/indie songs, while leaving the original tune intact and integrating my rhymes with the theme of the tracks. It’s also my first ever solo mixtape release, so I hope y’all dig it.
Of course, even though the blog has been out of action, the hustle hasn't quit. June was the last month of my monthly cuts leaking from 'The Indie Experiment' series, so get ready for some fresh shit come July.
My project is called 'The Indie Experiment'. Over the last couple of years, I picked up the guitar again (I've been playing on and off since I was 9) and discovered rock/indie/electro/alternative music, and it had a huge affect on me. I decided that I wanted to undertake my first ever solo project by adding my vocals to some of my favourite indie tunes, but instead of chopping the songs up like most rappers tend to do, I left the original song intact and placed my vocals around those of the artist, creating a whole new dichotomy for the song.
The good homies You And Your Music, who we've performed with a number of times before we dipped from Oz, have worked for 9 months putting together a fantastic video for the remix version of their single 'Keep On Spinning', which details the daily struggles of the bicycle courier. It's picked up some steam amongst the two-wheeler crowd, and in anticipation for the launch next month, the boys dropped a teaser for the video. Peep game. Also, you can catch the boys live with The Fam's own Bekah at the St Kilda Festival in a couple weeks!
June has already shaped up to be a big month for The Fam. My bad on slippin' on this but Notion, DJ Gentleman (making his TMF debut) and myself rocked a sick set at The Silver Dollar Room here in TO, and thanks to y'all, we pulled the biggest crowd of the night. It was stacks of fun, and hopefully we'll rock there again. And next Friday June 24th, we have a huge set as we're opening for the Track Avenue event at the legendary El Mocambo, with My Son The Hurricane and What She Said, along with March Fourth. It'll be a full line up - Notion, Cee, Bekah, DJ Gentleman and Pat Cole on the drums. Fucking vibed.
Hit me up for pre-sale tickets, otherwise we'll see y'all there! Flyers for both shows (along with FB event links) are after the jump...
Track Avenue @ El Mocambo Feat. What She Said & My Son The Hurricane, The Movement Fam & March Fourth
Silver Dollar Presents The Movement Fam LIVE
British India have gotta be one of my favourite Aussie bands. So glad I caught em before I left, even though I got caught up in the slam pit and some pock-faced barely legal kid jumped on my camera. Bastards need to do a show out here. Anyway, here's the latest clip the fellas dropped for the title track to their latest (and best) album, 'Avalanche'. Word.
So much music lately, it's time I shared it with y'all. Some of it new, some of it older, but all of it is new to me. The homegirl out here put me onto Karen Elson, who happens to be Jack White's wife though she's dope as hell in her own right. Her debut album, 'The Ghost Who Walks', is a wicked blend of bluesy rock and soul. This joint, 'The Truth Is In The Dirt', happens to be my favourite song off the album and I was happy to find out that it's a single too. Peep game.
Aight, so we're a bit delayed on this one. But y'all can forgive us. We'd never been to anything like this before, and the shit is hard work. Seriously. Networking. Trying to talk to that producer/MC/DJ/industry dude without looking or sounding like a groupie or a new jack. Yelling over loud music all night. Up early and paying attention to panels all day. It's a full time job doing this shit. But we ain't complaining; both of these conferences were some of the most amazing experiences we've had thus far with music, and in 2011, we finna be rockin' shows there, beleeeeedat. We kicked off Atlanta by scoring tickets to the Drake show at the Fox Theatre. Bonus. Notion and I walked into a room full of people rapping every word to a Soulja Boy song. Oh-kay. Five minutes after we got in there, Drake started so it was perfect timing. Apparently Tyga opened, so we prolly didn't miss much. The crowd, mostly women and their generally less-than-enthusiastic partners, stood up pretty much the whole time and there was a lot of screaming. Drizzy did most of the joints I wanted to hear bar 'Say What's Real'. 'Forever' was dope; he even brought Young Jeezy and The-Dream out for their respective collaborations (I have no idea what they are), and the pyrotechnics for 'Fireworks' were awesome. Great show.
So A3C (it stands for All 3 Coasts, for those who ain't know. I didn't til recently) kicked off on Thursday at the Masquerade complex in East Atlanta. The venue was dope as it had about 5 stages with either performances, demonstrations or panels on at any given time, so there was never a moment of boredom. We finally got to meet a gang of folks we'd built with over the years but never met in person (as well as a bunch of folks we respect and have admired for years), including North Carolina producer S.T.T.R.E.S.S. (below with The Fam), Kevin Nottingham, Dasha, Hassahn, Emilio Rojas, Hezekiah, Donwill and Von Pea of Tanya Morgan, Che Grand, Big Dho, Chaundon, J The S, DJ Evil Dee, DJ Z of DJ Booth.net, Crooked I, El Da Sensei, Illmaculate, Laws, The Bodega Brovas, Khrysis and a gang more.
Day 1 was the 9th Wonder interview by Dres The Beatnik, and included guests and collaborators Buckshot and Murs. It was an awesome insight into 9th's work ethic, inspirations and methods. The rest of the night included performances from Jamla artists like Skyzoo, The Away Team, Rapsody, Big Reemo, Murs and Jean Grae. And of course, DJ Evil Dee was on the mix (c'mon kick it!).
Day 2 was full of more shows and informative panels. The two main showcases we caught were Kevin Nottingham's and DJ Booth's. Kev's included dope sets from HiPNOTT Records artists like Jermside, Nobody Famous and the Hall of Justus cats headlined and tore it down (Rapper Big Pooh, Chaundon, Jozeemo and Joe Scudda). DJ Booth's showcase had sets from cats like J The S, Emilio Rojas, Cyhi The Prince, Laws, Exile and Crooked I. We ventured inside to catch Illmaculate's set, followed by Seattle native J. Pinder, both of whom murked it.
Nosh even caught Mr Douthit to get a quick photo and pass on a copy of his tribute mixtape to the man himself. And we also managed to chill with Crooked I for a while and explain our move to Canada from Australia to pursue our music, which he said he really respected and that we'll be successful with that sort of determination, belief and passion. That really meant a lot coming from him. Great dude.
Day 3 was just as hectic. More panels in the early afternoon and the weather was gorgeous. Atlanta turned it on for us, we were drinking beers in the sun; it felt like home. More networking and more shows, including Torae, Sha Stimuli, Lessondary Crew (Jermiside, Von Pea, Donwill and Che Grand), Reks and Statik Selektah, the big homies The Bodega Brovas (Traviii 7th, Keynote and Headkrack), Hezekiah and horn section 'Me So Horny' (who KILLED it), The Artifacts, Emilio Rojas, Camp Lo and Rhymefest. All up, it was an amazing festival and we'll be there next year for sure.
After a quick couple days in Toronto to do some laundry and re-pack, we were on the bus to New York City to catch CMJ (College Music Journal). Yet another amazing experience; though a little different than A3C in the sense that it was general music business across all genres rather than strictly Hip Hop. We chilled for a couple days to check out the city as it was VP's first time, but Notion and I caught the David Icke lecture on the Sunday before booking it to the Mayer Hawthorne show downtown at the Bowery Ballroom, missing half his set. We got to hang with the homie Cyclops too, which was dope.
CMJ started on the Tuesday, and it was full on. The panels went from 11am to 4.45pm every day, with only 15 minutes break between each one, where we had to fit in any quick chats to panelists and toilet breaks before heading to the next panel and trying to get there early to ensure a seat. It was like being back at Uni. But the information we gathered was absolutely incredible, and the people we met will definitely be either long term friends or business associates.
The first night we caught the New Zealand showcase at Le Poisson Rouge, where we saw awesome bands like Street Chant, Ruby Frost and Kids of 88, saw Blonde Summer over at Kenny's Castaway (where Bruce Springsteen apparently did his first ever gig), and then back to LPR for the Duck Down vs Blacksmith Showcase. It was Duck Down's 15 Year Anniversary so they went all out. The 16 year old in me lost my fucking shit when every Duck Down artist (with the exception of Louieville Sluggah pretty much) rocked the stage, performing classics like 'Le Fleh, Le Flah, Eshkoshka', 'Operation Lockdown', 'I Gotcha Opin' and more. Incredible. The newly signed Black Rob even came through to perform 'Whoa'. No words.
The Blacksmith kids killed it too. Jean Grae and Mela Machinko, Pharoahe Monch and Strong Arm Steady did an awesome job. We bailed after SAS so I'm not sure who else rocked, but it was an incredible night.
The rest of the week consisted of panels until Friday and shows every night. The soul showcase with Eric Roberson was amazing, the international showcase at 92Y Tribeca was really interesting, we even caught Aussies Paul Dempsey (from Something For Kate) and Angus & Julia Stone doing their thing. Israeli electro artist Onili was awesome, as was closing night with Foreign Exchange (who had Darien Brockington and Zo rocking with them all night, and they even brought out Rapper Big Pooh and Jesse Boykins III). Shouts to the big homie outta Jersey, Mike Philson, who we connected with. So after two weeks of shows every night and early mornings at panels, we're absolutely shambles. Now it's time to re-up, consolidate the networks and use the new info we learned. Until next year...
I'm a huge fan of old Angus and Julia, so I was stoked to hear they'd dropped another video from their latest, immaculate album 'Down The Way' in 'Hold On'. This is a cool ass clip. Looks awesome in HD. Can't wait to see these guys in Melbourne before we jet.
P-Money is definitely on that next right now. Dude always seems to come different (pause) on his own shit, and his latest single, 'Falling Down', doesn't stray from that path. Featuring vocalist Milan Borich, who's an old rocker from NZ, the clip is fairly epic and P's acting is awesome. Peep game.
Y'all should know by now that Mr. Mayer is possibly one of my favourite artists of all time. Yeah, the dude needs to shut his mouth from time to time, but on a musical level, his brand of acoustic pop/rock is fucking flawless. Managed to catch the dude live on his recent Australian tour and he was even better than the last time I saw him.
Anyway, I'll just get off his dick for second to tell y'all about the new video for his third single off 'Battle Studies', 'Half Of My Heart'. This joint features Miss Taylor Swift on two lines just shy of the 3 minute mark, not earning even earning her a visit to the video set. And rightfully so, silly broad she is. Cool video, not my fave song off the album ('Assassin' and 'Perfectly Lonely' are goddamn masterpieces), but should bode well. Carry on.
So being we're a Hip Hop/Soul group, most would assume that's where our taste in music lies. You'd be fairly wrong to say that. Throughout the Fam, our tastes essentially touch damn near every genre of music, bar none. We're an eclectic bunch. :)
So lately, I've sort of unintentionally broadened my musical horizons more than I usually would. I've been reading Marilyn Manson's autobiography (mainly because it was co-written with Neil Strauss, my favourite author right now), and he has inspired me to check out his music. So I copped his whole catalogue and seriously, I'm digging all of it so far. I can't wait to do Manson covers when we set The Movement Fam band up properly.
And at the St Kilda Festival, we caught an acoustic duo who played 'Wonderwall', and even though I was off my face singing along, that stuck in my mind. So I copped Oasis's whole back catalogue too, and goddamn, 'What's The Story, Morning Glory?' is an AMAZING album.
Our drummer, Fading Hour's Chris Ferre, got me onto Tool (no homo), which I'm checking out as we speak. Can't wait.
So if anyone has any suggestions in the rock/hard rock/metal/alternative category that you suggest I should check out, throw us a comment. I always assumed this stuff was really soul-less and just screaming bullshit, but I was wrong. I've always dug Nirvana and Metallica since I played guitar as a kid, but I never really followed it up. Seems I'm discovering my inner white boy. :)
