K-oS defies Hip Hop Lables

[fugees-online]

k-os defies hip-hop labels
By BILL HARRIS - Toronto Sun

Rock musicians are allowed to be artists, but hip-hop musicians are not.

That’s the opinion of k-os. And it drives him crazy.

“To be as candid and as real as possible without being pretentious, as a black Canadian doing music, let’s list the words that get used — eclectic, different, melodious, alternative,” said the 34-year-old k-os, who will play three shows at the Mod Club — on Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday — in support of his new CD, Atlantis: Hymns For Disco.

“But they never use the term hip-hop, because to a lot of people hip-hop is a stereotype. And a very American stereotype.

“When David Bowie showed up dressed like a woman, or dressed like Ziggy Stardust, no one questioned if he was rock. Thom Yorke (of Radiohead) doing an album like The Eraser and using drum machines, no one questions if he’s still indie-rock. But when Andre 3000 or Lauryn Hill tries to do something slightly beyond hip-hop, all of a sudden there’s a new term. It’s not really hip-hop. Why is that?”

Not that k-os — who was born Kevin Brereton in Whitby in 1972 — necessarily is so enamoured of the term hip-hop that he wants it to follow him wherever he goes. But it greatly frustrates him that when he tries to incorporate and acknowledge all his musical influences — as he does on Atlantis: Hymns For Disco — hip-hop “purists,” as he calls them, get their backs up.

“It becomes sort of a marketing thing,” k-os said. “It’s funny, because KRS-One, who is a huge hip-hop icon and hero, he offered a great affirmation when he said, ‘Hip-hop is something you live, but rap is something you do.’ In other words, hip-hop is like punk rock — it’s a lifestyle.

“But you can be hip-hop and not rap. You can be hip-hop and drive a taxi. You can be hip-hop and run a clothing store. I kind of relate to that in the sense of, as soon as someone like myself starts doing something like playing musical instruments or having Sam Roberts on a track, everyone is like, ‘It’s not hip-hop.’ And you become this mascot for alternative living.

“Could it be that people want hip-hop to be like a soul-food restaurant? They’re like, ‘I’m going to get hip-hop, I’m going to get black culture from there.’ They’re shopping. And once it can’t fit into their shopping cart as a definitive thing, it becomes alternative. But they’re really open if Queen in the 1970s went and did a whole record on accordion, everybody would be like, ‘It’s genius.’ ”

Okay, maybe that’s going a tad far. But k-os states his case clearly and passionately.

His passion overtook him earlier this month after he had read a review of his new CD in Now magazine online. Taking offence to a line that called him “a crossover pop artist disguised as true-school b-boy,” k-os posted some inflammatory comments on his Myspace web page, accusing Now reviewer Jason Richards of being a “Sambo” and an “Uncle Tom” who was being “manipulated by his indie-rock nerd bosses.”

After a night’s sleep and some sound advice, k-os removed the posting. In a story that appeared in the Toronto Sun on Oct. 11, k-os claimed he had not reacted to the review per se, but to the fact that the reviewer was a personal aquaintance.

Relationships aside, k-os simply wants to be himself musically. And he said he’s getting better at not worrying about what other people think.

“After Sam Roberts finished his last record (Chemical City), I called him and was critical of it,” k-os said. “I said things like, ‘Where’s the Don’t Walk Away Eileen? Where’s the Brother Down?’’

“And he was like, ‘You know, Kevin, they can all be damned. This is my expression to myself.’ I don’t know how he feels about me repeating his words, but after talking to him I felt like such a wimp.

“There’s a saying that goes, ‘the truth has no disciples, but everyone should be a disciple of truth.’ And I find that to be a very interesting statement, because that’s how I see music.

“Everyone should be a follower of music, but no one should follow music.”

[fugees-online]

Q&A with k-os
T'cha Dunlevy, Montreal Gazette
Published: Friday, October 20, 2006

Complete transcript of the Gazette interview with Toronto rapper/musician k-os, whose third album Atlantis - Hymns for Disco was released recently, and who performs at La Tulipe on Thursday.

Gazette: This album is a real leap for you, musically. What were you thinking while you were making it?

k-os: I was trying to have no rules. I was listening to music from that same standpoint. I have things on my computer playlist that play if I want a certain mood. But I have music on my iPod I never check out. I kept wondering, 'Why am I so quick to let people download songs for me when I only listen to certain things. It's almost like money in the bank - all these songs I don't listen to. There's a difference between the songs you think you need to hear every day to live life, and people actually investigating music. After my last album. I had songs like Crabbuckit and Man I Used to Be, which were the songs that got played on the radio that people just went to. I thought I'd take that energy and lead people to a different place. It's an interesting path, because you start to question stuff. Like, is music there to lead poeple to new stuff or should you just make hits? I don't know. It was sort of a crazy experience. The more I started to write different stuff, I realized that what was creeping in was my own nature of songwriting. which ended up making it catchy anyway. It took a while. After the third listen, I was like, 'Cool.' After the first listen, I was scared.

Gazette: What was your starting point?

k-os: Probably a song on the record called Sunday Morning. It was the first song I wrote. Then I thought, 'Okay, I can start making the album. I write songs all the time, for fun. The way I wrote that song, it's as if I was saying something I didn't even know I felt. That's when I start writing albums - when I start writing songs that express emotions that are hidden to myself.

Gazette: What was it expressing for you?

k-os: A certain amount of boredom with everything I was pursuing since I was a kid about music - going to parties, having a record everyone liked. being a popular person, girls. All these things seemed like something I had been chasing since I was 15 or 16 years old. This song sort of sounded sad about it. It has jubilant party vibe, but the way i'm singing it sounds like I'm kind of sad about my situation. I was like, 'Why am I sounding sad if this is everything I wanted it to be?' That's when I was like, 'Maybe I'm not as happy as I think. That's how music becomes an audio autobiography. There are things you learn about yourself that come across in the melody or tone. This girl, a friend of mine, Diane, says tone never lies - the tone of someone's voice, the look on their face, never lies about who they are. Even though I was happy about where the last record was, and called it Joyful Rebellion, I still felt unsatisfied, even after the success of that record. Now I'm really starting to feel more of a kind of joy. I'm able to acknowledge that the thing I was chasing all the time, success in music, isn't going to make me happy. What's going to make me happy is peace of mind. And that isnt going to come through music. That's going to come through spiritual evolution, knowing God, or anything I could quote inthis interview and make it sound metaphysical extrasensorial. Peace of mind is basically when you have peace when you can sit at any point, whether you're in your bedroom or on a plane or in a group of crowded people, and feel at peace and happy. That's what I'm actually seeking. I thought music would bring that to me, but music actually made that harder to get, at least successful music. Because with that comes a lot of ego. I don't know, it's just all those ideas, you know? Atlantis - the sinking city that sank because society got to such a great level of evolution that they start to take technology to the next level, and started to clone things and forget they were children of the universe and think they were so arrogant and smart that nature revolted against them. That's where I'm coming from. You get so confident, you start doing things that don't better yourself. You feel like you are but you're going against the laws of nature. That's why I chose the Atlantis theme.

Gazette: How do you manage to keep yourself grounded with everything going on around you?

k-os: I just acknowledge my heroes - Nas, Outkast, the Fugees. I'm always going back to those records. Thriller, Eric B. and Rakim. No matter how good I do, these are the things that still move me. Having heroes - not idols, heroes that created pieces of art that surpass things you've done. It puts things back in perspective about what's really going on.

Gazette: How did you go about choosing your collaborators on this record?

k-os: It was pretty natural. The thing with me and Sam (Roberts) is pretty natural. We just trade music, trade instrumentals, he would do something and I would do something. It was similar to before. Someone like Buck 65 is a new addition, but we've been pursuing each other for a while. Since I did half this record in Halifax. He ended up being there during the Junos. He came in and did that verse in his first take or something. He just came with a piece of paper and did it. I was late and by the time I showed up, he had done the verse. All of it was very natural. Broken Social Scene were at the Junos, too. Kevin came by the day after and did a bunch of vocals. I kept some. Nothing was an effort. Everything was what it was.

Gazette: What drew you to Halifax?

k-os: When I tour there, everytime I go there, ^Î feel like, I love this place - the water, people are into music. You go to cafés, and there's great music playing. People love music there. It's good to be in an environment with music-lovers. Even when you go into a store and you're not hearing your music, you don't mind - you get to a point when you're making records where you become a record people play. In Halifax, every time I went to a bar or restaurant, the music was cool. It was good to be around people who love music. It reminds you why you're doing this, why you're a fan.

Gazette: Why did you choose to bring Sam Roberts back again?

k-os: Many reasons. I'm inspired by his work. Part of me wants to prove it's a real relationship. He's a soul brother. There's not much conversation. It's like, 'You love songwriting, I love songwriting, let's do it.' It's hard to explain. It feels very familiar. Even when you listen to the song and our voices, there's a blend there. It's hard to deny. It seems like there's a real similarity, musically and tone-wise, our voices fit. It's hard to find somebody like that, who doesn't do the same genre of music as you but when you do stuff together, it sounds really natural.

Gazette: Does he bring you out of your element?

k-os: Of course. When I got back his vocals, I was like okay, I had to redo my vocals. He sounded so at home and peaceful. There's an underlying competition, but it's not negative, it's upping the ante making the song better because someone is being themselves. It's like in hip-hop. You can have four or five MCs on a track that are all diff - Cee-lo, Chuck D, Eminem and Ol' Dirty Bastard, all on one track. And if they're all themselves, it will all blend. That's the magic of hip-hop. I always thought I'd be scared to do a song with Q-Tip or Nas, but not if you're yourself. Then you won't be competing with the next guy. When Sam comes in on Valhalla, it's kind of like a hip-hop song. The music stops and you hear his voice, you know it's him from the melody, the harmony. You've heard it before, but he's guesting on a track that's not his, and he's made it his own.

Gazette: How have you been redefining yourself as a singer and an MC?

k-os: I've been looking at things like songwriting, not whether it's reggae, rap or pop. I've been looking at songwriting - Joni Mitchell, McCartney, Neil Young, Bob Dylan, specifically - looking at the craft of songwriting, and applying that to a hip-hop thing. Growing up, making and listening to hip-hop, I don't think I looked at it as songwriting. I looked at it as a jam - three minutes of slaughter. De La Soul turned a lot of hip-hop into songwriting. They had very interesting arrangemts and choruses, musical things. Tribe (Called Quest) and De La did a lot for hip-hop songwriting. So did the Fugees. I'm taking a cue from that.

Gazette: You don't' rap as much on this record, but when you do, it seems very charged.

k-os: I react off of boredom. No one in hip-hop was inspiring me. You can't be a hip-hopper if there's not people around inspiring you. Whether you're on the playground and everyone's doing rap, and you can't wait for the other guy to finish so you can slaughter (him), or just listening to hop. Hip-hop is all about building off of what the next guy's doing. I can only listen to Eric B. and Biz Markie for so long and come up with old-school songs like B-Boy Stance - songs that sound retro. I don't want to do another record of retro. What is that? Just looking to old hip-hop and regurgitating? So I just chilled, I didn't do anything. That's the hardest thing. On certain songs, when there's a rap available, like on Cat Diesel or Black Ice, I put a rap in. I didn't approach the record like I had to rap. I came off the idea of what KRS-One says, that hip-hop is an attitude. It's the way you live. Rap is something you do. Just because you don't rap doesn't mean you aren't hiphop. Lauryn (Hill) was as hip-hop on Miseducation as she was on Fugee-la. She just chose to express that hip-hop attitude in a different way. If hip-hop was only rapping, then you couldn't have a hip-hop manager. Graffiti artists dont rap. Rap is just one part of hip-hop. If people say this is not a hip-hop album, they should say this is not a rap album. My big crusade on this album is to find the difference between rap and hip-hop. Hip-hop is an attitude, it's how you approach your life, how you wear your clothes. It might even be about who you vote for. Rap is just an expression of hip-hop.

Gazette: Musically, where does that attitude bring you?

k-os: It made me be okay with using other influences, leaving rap out of a song like The Rain. Even though there's no rap, it sounds like the same emotion Ghostface Killah emotes. It's still that same raw, soulful emotion that Ghostface or Genius might have, with piano or strings. But instead of rapping, someone's singing. It doesn't mean that just because I'm singing, I'm not hip-hop. I don't think the audience knows that. Like Glenn Campbell, Wichita Lineman. That song became hip-hop to me. He's talking about being a truck driver, needing a vacation. He's a guy struggling with environment. Barry White, Al Green - he came out with his shirt off in the 60s, in tight pants, singing Lets Stay Together. He was a soul man. Hip-hop started to be an attitude. Then I saw the connection between Andre 3000 and Prince, how Prince was super hip-hop. "This is what it sounds like when doves cry." And Michael Jackson - on Wannabe Startin' Soemthin', he's rapping. It's more an attitude. I started to see hip-hop in different types of music. Billy Idol, on Eyes Without a Face. "Reading murder books, tryin' to stay hip, I'm lookin' for you." That whole section is hip-hop. It's all punk rock. And like the Clash, big time... How they would be shouting on a track, like an angry mob. That's hip-hop.

Gazette: Yet a lot of your singing is melodic and pretty.

k-os: Like Gregory Isaacs in reggae, or Bob Marley, Sanchez, Cocoa Tea. Those were all guys in Jamaica living a street reality but when they sang, it was the smoothest melodies. Why does hip-hop always have to be raw and rugged? Maybe because sometimes it got to a point where it was a bunch of people from the suburbs who wanted to be hip-hop and use it as a reason to be raw and rugged. That's one aspect of hip-hop - Onyx, Method Man. But Pete Rock was also hip-hop, Smooth B. Slick Rick also hip-hop. Those guys weren't raw. They were super smooth.

Gazette: I was going to ask you about Slick Rick. You seem to borrow his rap style sometimes on this record

k-os: Most of the raps on this record were inspired by Slick Rick. My little brother was like, "That sounds like Andre 3000." I was like, "You don't even know, dude. It's Slick Rick." He was the first guy to have an English accent and a sophisticated flow. I totally took off Slick Rick. He's a rapper that reached a lot of people, yet he had sophistication. He was very clear in his diction. You could hear every word he said. That's important in hip-hop, if you're expressing yourself. I love Slick Rick. His diction was amazing.

Gazette: Was there anything that you were afraid of when you were making this album, any point when you were making a track and thought, this is going too far?

k-os: Most of the time. On songs like Highway 7 and The Rain. I was going to leave those songs off the record, the pure ballad, singing songs. Then I was like, once again, it's punk rock if I leave them on, punk rock meaning doing what you feel, doing it yoursellf as opposed to, "Oh, will this fit into hip-hop?" F--k if it fits in with hip-hop. I dont care. It's just what I feel.

Gazette: Do you feel like you've reached a different point now, artistically, that you can make an album like this?

k-os: Joyful rebellion is very much about a guy who wanted to be doing all things he is doiing now, but was scared of what people would say. Now, it's like, I'm Free. That's what my little brother said when he heard this record. He was like, "This is your freedom record. When I hear you, I feel like you're just doing what you want to do."

Gazette: Is that it? Do you feel like you're at it now, you've reached it?

k-os: Not reached it, but I'm at the beginning of the path of not being afraid to be who I really am.
© Montreal Gazette 2006

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K-os runs gamut of genres on new album 'Atlantis'

Updated Fri. Oct. 13 2006 7:35 AM ET

Canadian Press

TORONTO -- Public scrutiny and grand expectations have made Canada's hip-hop guru k-os a little uneasy.

But with his expansive third album "Atlantis: Hymns for Disco" on the verge of worldwide release Tuesday, a degree of paranoia might be expected. While musing on the state of hip hop, k-os said Thursday he can't help but second-guess his finest work, an impressive collection of genre mash-ups that defies definition.

"I'm trying to embrace it," k-os says of the album, a melodic ride that meanders through soul, R&B, rock and, yes, touches on disco.

"I think (as someone) trying to be a perfectionist, as soon as you're finished something you critique it, so I try to hold onto the feeling I had when I first listened to the songs."

Early indications are that the acclaimed Ontario rapper, who also goes by the name Kheaven Brereton, has nothing to worry about. The album is garnering a steady stream of glowing reviews and Virgin Music is unleashing k-os's first-ever global release - betting that his unique stylings will find U.S. and European fans.

While k-os describes his previous album, the Juno-award-winning "Joyful Rebellion," as a rant against the state of hip hop, this time around he says he just didn't care what was out there and decided to make an album that spoke to his myriad of influences. Alternating between Canada's two coasts, he escaped to Halifax and holed up in the woods of Sooke, B.C., on Vancouver Island to hash out melodies and beats.

"I really wanted the music to be something different and be challenged to do my vocals based on the music being a bit weird or outside of the realm of what I did last time," he says over a late breakfast of beer and an omelette.

"If you really, really listen you can hear the feel and the sound of the ocean and different things on different songs."

What resulted was a free-flowing album accompanied by confessional liner notes - insecurity over his lyrics and fear of rejection seem to be a common theme, with the soulful track "Rain" putting his anguish to song. K-os says many uncertainties sprang partly from what seem to be strict notions of what constitutes rap and hip-hop music.

"You as an artist start feeling, if I don't fit into this, placed on the shelf, if I don't look like these other Barbie dolls, people will think I'm weird or different and may not like me," says k-os, whose diverse palette may be traced to a childhood in the suburbs of Toronto, raised by Jehovah's Witness parents from Trinidad.

"I feel sometimes with hip-hop music people aren't allowed to be individuals and share that genre of music through different ways."

Frustration seemed to get the best of k-os recently when he lashed out at one Toronto reviewer for a lukewarm review of the new disc. Insisting he has no problem with unfavourable reviews, k-os says he posted an angry rant on his MySpace web page because the review was more personal than professional. He took the rant down after receiving unsolicited advice from a fan and says he has since made peace with the reviewer.

K-os says he benefits from high-profile mentors like Public Enemy's Chuck D and Fugee siren Lauryn Hill, occasionally e-mailing the trailblazing pair when consumed by self-doubt.

"It's kind of like a Batman thing - I don't call him unless I really want to ask him something," he says of his relationship with Chuck D.

In making "Atlantis," k-os enlists plenty of homegrown pals to fill out the rich sound - Sebastien Grainger, of the defunct rock band Death From Above 1979, rounds out the galloping rhythms on "Sunday Morning," while Kevin Drew of Broken Social Scene and college favourite Sam Roberts bring up the rear in "Valhalla." Halifax's renegade rapper Buck 65 guests on the closer, "Ballad of Noah."

And despite all the doubt, K-os admits he's a happy guy - even coyly admitting to a crush on a certain girl - and feels his hard work has finally achieved a measure of success.

"I was so struggling and fighting to get my music out for so long that sometimes I have to realize, wait a second, I'm on my third record, people sort of like this stuff, I'm having fun, what is there to complain about?" he says.

"I think I've fought enough to get to the point where I have a platform to speak, have fun to perform and be an artist for my living, and that's a good thing. There's nothing wrong with that as long as I stay true to myself and tell the truth."