Maundz, the outspoken rascal of Melbourne’s rap-scene; has a heart of gold, a potty mouth, and an acid tongue. His second LP Zero, is the first release of 2012 from irrefutable hip hop collective Crate Cartel. Zero is a fast approaching sun on the horizon after what has been a long winter for Maundz fans.
Featuring collaborative efforts from New York’s number one man of the moment Action Bronson, ARIA award winning Drapht, Golden Era’s Vents and Sesta, Melbourne kings Brad Strut and Bias B, and of course Crate Cartel. Revered by the likes of Hilltop Hoods and Drapht as the “next big thing”, Maundz has become highly respected by his underground and commercially established cohorts alike.
The lead single Take It Back featuring the legendary Bias B is full of nostalgic imagery and vintage beats and cuts, the track revisits cultural icons of the 80’s and 90’s. Its accompanying cameo-rich music video gained an extensive amount of exposure within weeks of its release.
Take It Back is characterized by its early 90’s inspired production –courtesy of Wik, catchy call and response chorus (prevalent of the era), and of course the nostalgic references. Throughout the tongue-in-cheek homage collage Maundz and Bias B divulge their own era-reflective stories. Take It Back proves that no matter when you grew up, the cultural impressions of your youth shape you.
“Bias B, Wik and I wanted to make a track that would take people on a little time-machine trip back to the good old days. We get on a bridging the gap type of feel with this one.” – Maundz
Maundz – Zero is available through Crate Cartel on 25th May 2012.
First things first – it’s pronounced muh-DOO-soo, & it’s spelled M-D-U-S-U , lets just call the MC/producer from Hobart Duse or MD. Duse has recently released a ‘name your price’ EP titled the 88 1/2 EP. The Tape Death Collective member catches up with aahh to talk about the new EP.
What brought about the newEP? Basically, I’d spent the past year working like a madman on beats, rhymes, session muso work & post-production for a heap of cats (no arrogance, but I can almost guarantee that if you like hip hop from Australia, you’ve heard my work this year). I also joined the Tape Death production crew (all day, erryday!) & dropped a few instrumental & remix albums, but it’s been quite a while since I’d done anything as a rapper with my name on the cover. I pretty much woke up one day & thought “fuck it, let’s see how quickly I can write, record, mix & release an EP”, so I went through my archives of beats & raps, picked a bunch that still sounded fresh, & wrote the rest of it during a 48 hour bender on the contraband.
Tell us about some of the tracks and features found on the EP? A couple of the tracks (‘Four Hunnid’ & ‘Scarborough St’) were verses that I’d already uploaded to FB before, so it was just a case of re-recording the vox & tweaking the beats (‘Scarborough St’ has a new beat, as the OG track was just me spitting over the ‘Funky Drummer’ loop). The Class A & BVA features used verses of theirs that I’ve had for a minute now. The raps are still fire today, but the OG beats for those tracks sounded a little dated, so I whipped up a pair of new head-nodders for the vox, then hit them both up to see if they felt the v2.0 tracks. Luckily, they were both gracious enough to let me proceed with them, as I love both of those tracks now. As for the Rigby, Wiz Kid & Dunn D features, they’re my people down here in the HBT (Rigby’s my lil’ sis), so it was pretty much inevitable that we were gonna work on some ish together. Because we’ve all done so many shows with each other, we can get straight to the point in the lab, & get awesome tings done in a short space of time.
As soon as I wrote the beat for ‘Spread The News Around’, I knew that I wanted Dunn & Rigby on there with me. It only took 2 hours for Dunn to write & record his vocal (dude is a machine when it comes to hammering out quality verses), & about half an hour (if that) for Rigby to lay down the harmonies. Same deal with Wiz Kid – dude is a dope song-writer as well as a singer, so the only reason it takes us any time in the lab is that we’re trying out a million different ways the song could go. Originally, I was gonna get him in to co-write a hook for ‘Basin St Blues’, but I decided to keep the outro blank while I was editing the clip for it. A homie heard the ‘Doobie Brothers’ beat & commented that singing would suit it, so I wrote a quick hook & Anton KILLED it.
What can we expect from yourself in the next few months? I’ve got some more ish dropping soon – an album with my crew ‘Mic Dons’, a couple more producer/remix projects, & then my solo LP Ex-Samples will FINALLY see the light of day this year. Cheers for listening, MD.
Crate Cartel presents The Take It Back Mixtape, which marks the lead up to Maundz’s upcoming album Zero set for release on May 25th. Take a step back in time and listen to all the classic Maundz tracks including live radio show goodness, rare tracks, and the collaborative efforts from some of the scenes finest.
Take It Back has 22 monster tracks including the recently released track Take It Back feat. Bias B. The mixtape also features Fluent Form, Geko, Rave, Aetcix, Dialectrix, Fatty Phew Deece, Rigby, Force and Awbs. Take It Back also features production from Wik, Geko, Discource, Plutonic Lab, Alter Ego and Doc Savage.
Tracklist: 01. Blue Collar Scholar 02. Wild Wild West feat. Deece 03. Comin To Getcha feat. Fluent Form, Dialectrix & Rigby 04. Pink Shirts (Alter Ego Remix) 05. Melbourne (Live On 102.7 RRR Top Billin’) 06. Cake 07. Human Heads feat. Aetcix, Raven, Geko & Fatty Phew 08. Blue Murder feat. Geko 09. Locomotive feat. Fluent Form & Fatty Phew 10. Set Sounds 11. Cypher (Live On 102.7 RRR Top Billin’) 12. Drama 13. Anti Pop feat. Awbs 14. 50 Thumbs Up 15. Agent 99 (Doc Savage Remix) 16. CC Camora feat. Goatmob 17. Take It Back feat. Bias B 18. Duck Down feat. G Force & Deece 19. Spring Rolls 20. Rap Life feat. Bias B 21. Lazy Sunday feat. Fatty Phew & Deece 22. No Concern
The Maundz – Take It Back Mixtape was released through ozhiphop.com as a free download. You can grab it here.
The video for the single Pieces of a Puzzle from Dialectrix - Audio Projectile album. Film clip directed and created by Versus.
The unique synergy created between artists was a defining character in the creativity and success of hip hop during the 1990s. Hip hop crews were bound together by their ideas in the moment and this interaction, at times tense, marked an incredible era in the genre’s history. Dialectrix, along with Mercury Prize winner Plutonic Lab and prolific Sydney DJ 2buck have taken this historical approach to produce Audio Projectile, the second album from one of Australia’s most talented wordsmiths. The album is the work of collaboration in the truest sense. Aiming to capture the vivid sounds of the classics, Audio Projectile is their enjoyment of the past, distilled with their own unique take on the present and future.
The album’s lead single, Pieces of a Puzzle, delves deep into mid-70s West Coast brass rock, recreating the stellar sounds textured with the memorable production work and Dialectrix’s unmistakable flow. The song’s up tempo vibes piece together an air of optimism, a salute to the great notion of a plan coming together. In Inner Heart Beat, the dynamic of this collaboration comes to an apex; an experimental and autobiographical take onDialectrix’s musical life. Plutonic Lab’s assortment of aural textures is never more evident than in this track; boasting a wide array of sonic layers including kitchen utensils.
Having set the tone in previous releases with his unmatched vocal skills, Dialectrix turns his lyrical inflection to a different sound, working consciously to adopt a new style to reflect that distinct 90s vibe. Evident in Life Goes On, the audible pauses and stretching of syllables reflects better than ever this infusion of new in an old sound. Paying homage to the atmosphere of those times, songs like What’s Important and Holding the Lantern allow the listener to shut off their visual senses to travel back an era.
Fly On the Wall is a landmark track in the Dialectrix cannon. A bona fide throwback song, Dialectrix raps from the perspective of a fly- observing and judging humanity from an insignificant point of view. The song is in direct parallel to the working man’s plight and the feeling of helplessness that comes with being able to see everything, but being powerless to change it.
With the production’s striking palette, DJ 2buck’s masterful cuts are unmistakable, providing extended narrative like cut chorus’ akin to the likes of DJ Premier and Revolution high lighted on One More Time andFly On The Wall. Audio Projectile is an exercise in true musical collaboration, a seemingly lost art in contemporary hip hop. Written and recorded over a short and intense 6 months, the energy bred from the live collaboration is both authentic and electric. Let this friction light the spark.
Track listing: 01. One More Time 02. Pieces of a Puzzle 03. Dead Set 04. Fly On The Wall 05. Audio Projectile 06. Life Goes On (feat. Hau) 07. Inner Heart Beat (feat. Joe New) 08. Whut! 09. What’s Important 10. Comin’ To Getcha (feat. Fluent Form, Maundz & Rigby) 11. Holding The Lantern 12. This Is Like, Mental 13. Zahir (feat. Tommy Illfigga & Joe New) 14. I’ve Been Told
The unique synergy created between artists was a defining character in the creativity and success of hip hop during the 1990s. Hip hop crews were bound together by their ideas in the moment and this interaction, at times tense, marked an incredible era in the genre’s history. Dialectrix, along with Mercury Prize winner Plutonic Lab and prolific Sydney DJ 2buck have taken this historical approach to produce Audio Projectile, the second album from one of Australia’s most talented wordsmiths. The album is the work of collaboration in the truest sense. Aiming to capture the vivid sounds of the classics, Audio Projectile is their enjoyment of the past, distilled with their own unique take on the present and future.
The album’s lead single, Pieces of a Puzzle, delves deep into mid-70s West Coast brass rock, recreating the stellar sounds textured with the memorable production work and Dialectrix’s unmistakable flow. The song’s up tempo vibes piece together an air of optimism, a salute to the great notion of a plan coming together. In Inner Heart Beat, the dynamic of this collaboration comes to an apex; an experimental and autobiographical take on Dialectrix’s musical life. Plutonic Lab’s assortment of aural textures is never more evident than in this track; boasting a wide array of sonic layers including kitchen utensils.
Having set the tone in previous releases with his unmatched vocal skills, Dialectrix turns his lyrical inflection to a different sound, working consciously to adopt a new style to reflect that distinct 90s vibe. Evident in Life Goes On, the audible pauses and stretching of syllables reflects better than ever this infusion of new in an old sound. Paying homage to the atmosphere of those times, songs like What’s Important and Holding the Lantern allow the listener to shut off their visual senses to travel back an era.
Fly On the Wall is a landmark track in the Dialectrix cannon. A bona fide throwback song, Dialectrix raps from the perspective of a fly- observing and judging humanity from an insignificant point of view. The song is in direct parallel to the working man’s plight and the feeling of helplessness that comes with being able to see everything, but being powerless to change it.
With the production’s striking palette, DJ 2buck’s masterful cuts are unmistakable, providing extended narrative like cut chorus’ akin to the likes of DJ Premier and Revolution high lighted on One More Time and Fly On The Wall. Audio Projectile is an exercise in true musical collaboration, a seemingly lost art in contemporary hip hop. Written and recorded over a short and intense 6 months, the energy bred from the live collaboration is both authentic and electric. Let this friction light the spark.
Track listing:
01. One More Time
02. Pieces of a Puzzle
03. Dead Set
04. Fly On The Wall
05. Audio Projectile
06. Life Goes On (feat. Hau)
07. Inner Heart Beat (feat. Joe New)
08. Whut!
09. What’s Important
10. Comin’ To Getcha (feat. Fluent Form, Maundz & Rigby)
11. Holding The Lantern
12. This Is Like, Mental
13. Zahir (feat. Tommy Illfigga & Joe New)
14. I’ve Been Told
Hailing from Hobart – Australia’s southern-most capital city, mdusu (pronounced muh-DOO-soo) is one of Tasmania’s premier hip hop artists. Since his first live performance as an emcee in 2003, the MC/producer has built himself a reputation Australia-wide for quality recordings and raucous live shows, a feat which is all the more remarkable considering the isolation of his home town. In just a few short years, he has performed alongside acts such as De La Soul, Jurassic 5, Jungle Brothers, Z-Trip, Swollen Members,The Herd, Drapht, Funkoars, Muph & Plutonic etc. and can even lay claim to having shared a stage with Wolfmother (before the Grammy). Mdusu has also performed at every major music festival in Tasmania’s history (the Basin Concert, Gone South, the Southern Roots & Blues Festival, Soundscape & the Falls Festival), and has been a performer on over 10 albums as either a solo artist or band member since 1998.
As an emcee, mdusu earned his stripes through the freestyle & battle scenes, winning countless emcee battles across Tasmania, and performing solidly in battles across Melbourne. His lyrical skill has gained him respect amongst the leaders of the Australian hip hop scene, and has led to collaborations with many artists from around the world. mdusu is also an accomplished producer, having laced beats for almost every emcee in Tasmania during his 10 plus-years as a beatmaker. A skilled multi-instrumentalist, mdusu has spent more than half his life playing various instruments in live ensembles, and has toured Australia & around the Pacific Islands as far as Hawaii, playing many different styles of music.
In 2007, he produced two tracks for The Tongue’s debut, “Shock & Awe”, and supplied a verse to super-producer Chasm for his 2008 smash debut LP, “Beyond the Beat Tape”. The following year saw him drop verses on Dialectrix’s debut smash “Cycles of Survival”, and Astronomy Class’ second album “Pursuit of Happiness”, which was nominated for the “Best Urban/Hip Hop” Album of the 2009 ARIA awards. mdusu also produced a track for Obese Records’ signing Skryptcha on the DJ Flagrant-mixed mixtape “Who’s Got Next”.
In May 2008, mdusu and Tasmanian DJ Dameza released their groundbreaking sophomore LP, Can we get a soul clap? On May 10th (distributed by Obese Records). The album was picked up by Triple J, and helped mdusu&dameza become one ofTriple J’s Next Crop artists for 2008, an honour which is only bestowed upon 30 artists of all genres across Australia. The album was also made the Triple J Hip Hop Show “Album of the Week” (June 9th-15th).
In February 2009, mdusu embarked on his biggest challenge to date, to raise money for victims of the Victorian Bushfire: A 12-hour non-stop Freestyle Marathon. Not only did he manage this incredible and never-before tried feat, he raised over $1300 in the process, and set an unofficial world record (longest continuous freestyle rap) in the process.
After relocating to the Gold Coast for family reasons in July 2009, mdusu released his solo debut, “The Excess Baggage Mixtape” (available below) – which has over 500 downloads in just two weeks, and is currently putting together his debut solo producer album, which features some Australia’s best emcee’s, singers & DJs.
My new album is going to be the first solo effort I’ve ever done – all my previous stuff has been group stuff, so I’m excited as to take the leap of faith by myself, and see what happens. I’ve been working on it for about a year and a half now, and I’m just up to the stage of getting verses back from people and mixing the whole thing. Not sure if I’m going to approach any labels about it yet, but ideally I’ll be able to work out a licensing deal for release. Guests include: Muph, Solo, Louis Logic, Dialectrix, Jeswon of Thundamentals, Ozi Batla, Skryptcha, BVA, Scott Burns, Roshambo, The Tongue, Patto, Haunts of Choose Mics, Homebrew (NZ), Thorts, Class A, Syntax, Prime, Purpose, & Rigby, so it’s a real collaborative effort. It’s gonna be called Ex-Samples, and I’ll be handling all the production, so it’s a pretty massive undertaking.
Discography:
2010 – The Excess Baggage Mixtape – all verses and arrangement
2009 – Astronomy Class – Pursuit Of Happiness – Verse on “War Of The Worlds”
2009 – Who Got Next Mixtape – Production on Skryptcha “For You”
2008 – Dialectrix – Cycles of Survival – Verse on “The Takeover”
2008 – mdusu&dameza – can we get a soul clap? – Verses & all production
2008 – Chasm – Beyond The Beat Tape – Verse on “Cop a Lesson”
2008 – Unleash The Nugget – The Illustrated Guide to… EP – Drums & percussion
2007 – The Tongue – Shock & Awe – Production on “That Word” & “The Blues”
2007 – Heads of State – Making The Best Of What We’ve Got – Verses & all production
2006 – mdusu&dameza – sounds from our town – verses & all production
