Just A Name Vol 1

A long time ago, in a land far far away (in my head) and an era when in my ignorance I'd never even heard of spoken word and knew very little about poetry or theater, I was rapping.
I still do it. I love it. It's a special feeling kicking a verse over a beat, but from late 2000 onwards for a long time, outside of my work life, it's pretty much all I did.
It's a topic I cover in the show I'm working on A Tale Fron The Besdit in which I moved to Brighton to further what I was already doing, at the time, predominantly MCing in small clubs under the name of Kase One before I began to move towards making Hip Hop and Grime.  
  During that period while I was down there, I wrote a lot of lyrics, which at the time, didn't seem to amount to anything. When I left Brighton in early 2006, the few music projects I was working on had all seem to drift by the wayside and I was left with a shoe box full of lyrics, and one day, whilst sorting through some stuff just before I moved up to London, I had the idea to put a CD together. So I saved up, bought a laptop, borrowed some equipment, went to Bristol  and got a crash course in Logic from my brother Gatekeeper and set about recording some of these words over tracks that I'd selected, or used to practice rapping over.

Mixtapes and CD's were pretty much common place for MC's and rappers even back then, but for me, it was a big achievement and I think I surprised a few people when they listened to it back then. It never really went anyway, at most, I probably gave away 100 copies which I burnt and hand drew the sleeves for, and hearing it back, it's very raw, both lyrically and in the recording of it, and despite most of it making me cringe I'm proud of it, it was a milestone for me. Most of the lyrics were the result of a stream-of-consciousness style of writing I used to do, because it was all I knew to do, I didn't know much else and never really worked with other MC's about from old friends Boogaloo Dee and later on, through the Bristol connection, Grilza, all of which helped me to develop

I've had 3 of the tracks up on Soundcloud for a while, but decoded to stick all up on line (bar 1 track which Soundcloud won't let me, which is fair enough, as I didn't get permission for most of the tracks) and here it is.

 .

Just A Name Vol 1 Tracklist

Small Town Perspective – RJD2 Ghostwriter (Deadringer)

I Drop A 16 - Metal Fingers – Spikenard (Special Herbs vol 4)

Figure It Out – Metal Fingers – Lemon Grass (Special herbs vol 4)

Story – Black Grass - Toys (Black Grass)

Thursday - Roll Deep - Fire Hydrant Instrumental (Poltergeist Relay EB001) 

Trials and Tribulations - Myst aka Gatekeeper

Remember Your Roots - Various Artists - Distorted Minds In The Mix (Knowledge Magazine Issue 46 / DJ Fresh – All That Jazz (Instrumental) / Q Project – Ask Not

Vision Overground

So I mentioned a couple of weeks ago the music my brother Gatekeeper is involved in creating. Well, I'm excited to say that there has been a project bubbling away now for a while which is now seeing the light of day!

Vision Overground consists of Gatekeeper on productions, with MC's Grilza, Ryder Shaifq and the vocal's of Sohpie G. Have a wee listen to a couple of clips they have put up recently on their Soundcloud page. I believe one of the tracks was recently featured on Mary Anne Hobb's XFM show.

Family Business! Gatekeeper & Grilza: Cuts From the Green Room. Free E.P

Bonjour!


Over a decade ago now, when I started on this journey, it pretty much began in my bedroom at home, after an idea was planted in my head by one of my brothers, who I shared not only a bedroom with (full of rave flyers, records and a set of 1210's) but also a common interest in Drum and Bass and most other forms of underground music. He suggested to me I could be an MC.


It's a story I've told many times since then, in various different forms, so whether it's tired or not, it means a lot to me. The part of the story which I havant spoke of, well, not publicly anyway, is of course my brother (I'm not going to tell it now though, I'd have to speak to him first, it's family business). The long and short of it this, he ended ended up in Bristol producing experimental Bass music (Dubstep and it's various mutations) under the name of Gatekeeper.


On the rare occasions we get to meet up, there's normally lots to talk about in terms of our mutual interests and the separate paths we've both taken. About 5 years ago, I think, he told me he'd began to work with a young rapper from Bath by the name of Grilza. Well, he still is, and the family has grown! Theve gone on to be a duo for a few years now and have some pretty sick releases like Ignite which featured Dread MC as well as being championed by Mary Anne Hobbs on the Bristol Rise Up Documentary and various other tracks played on her Radio 1 show.


They've just released a free EP, "Cuts From The Green Room" which you can download HERE. It's a collection of some of the tracks theve produced over the years now, and I know they were carefully selected (there were 1 or 2 I hadn't even heard!) 


At present, they are working on a project which I can't say too much about but believe me, I've been excited about this for a long time, I've had a little listen and there's bigness to come...watch this space!


As one is my brother by blood and the other by a notepad, a pen, football and pure jokes, I'm going to give them all the support I can. It's what you do with family, and like I said, it means a lot to me.