Here’s Part Two of Efnik’s Interview with The Hot Grits, where we discuss James Brown, the origins of Hip Hop, and the band’s different cultural influences- India, Africa…

Can you tell us about your childhood? Where did you spend it?

N: I spent my…I was born in this little country called Qatar which shoots off the coast of Saudi Arabia it’s a little peninsula? Uhm but I’m from India I’m from New Delhi but I was born and sort of raised in between there and Delhi before coming here….Marlon?

M: And…I’m not kidding you here but I lived, I was born in a little middle eastern country called Bahrain which is off Saudi Arabia and I went to boarding school in India as well and there and back for a few years, and then came here when I was 14. So, Gulf war babies!

M: Well not really but.

B: 14!

M: Yeah.

B: Wow. I um I was born in Pohangina which is outside of Palmerston North. And then (laughs), and then when I was 4, I went and lived in India. We’re all Indians aren’t we…For like a year and a half? And then went back to Palmerston North, and then, when I was 7 went and lived in London for a year with my mom. And then, back to Palmerston North and up to Auckland..

Coz our magazine is about Transculturism and you know like..

B: What is Trans…culturism?

It’s a new term which I just found out, but uhm, you know, ok. Like say a person, is influenced by different cultures, like naturally, like they don’t think about it, they just are, and they kind of churn that out, you know, through their work or their art or their music? And you guys are,

B: Oh cool!

Like through and through, Transculturists.

B: Yeah yeah..

The thing of it is that you know people who do it…

N: Are not really conscious of it.

Yeah, they’re not really conscious of it.

N: Yeah, I remember trying to…we given…when I went to drama school we were given this, uh, this project to write a monologue. And there was kind of this pressure on me to write something Indian? And I tried to…sucked! Just sucked! And so I just kind of threw it away and just wrote this monologue about being a young girl who was desperately in love which also sucked but it was a little bit more kind of um, kind of true to me and I’ve kind of just figured out that whatever culture I had in me would be there anyway because I look the way I look, I talk the way I talk and, you know, that’s the product of it. I hate that when people kind of expect you to come out and…build an Indian story on what it’s like to be an immigrant!

M: I mean I can’t speak anything but English so people expect me to speak Hindi or whatever, so I was kinda like, sorry, you know… I know swear words, but I’m not gonna tell you but you know…

(Laughter)

M: It’s just…yeah just go with the flow and be a kiwi.

N: It’s quite a hard thing to explain to people…

That’s true.

N: …exactly what it is.

As a band, Fela Kuti and you know, James Brown and The Meters were like your biggest influences. Individually who are your big, strong, influences, musically?

M: Whoo. I don’t know! It’s weird, how to explain…

Or just, you know, favorite musicians or…

N: I’m really obsessed with “The Doors.” The Doors…

M: I mean I grew up on Grunge and Jazz and Rock. Uhm, and yeah, whatever is really nice to the ear, I mean, music is music you know? Just really good stuff.

Music is music.

N: I kinda lean towards like, I like the Doors and sort of artists of that time….Jimmi Hendrix, because they were, again, like, they were saying something about where they lived at the time that they lived and they were kind of on the fringes of that society that was, that was, alive in America where, all of the poetry was starting to protest and find metaphors and ways to protest and I think that, was possibly after Fela, maybe? And you know he was kind of a part of that, and went, instead of staying in America, and doing what the rest of them did, decided to go back to Africa and kind of, deal with it, there. I’m quite drawn to that sort of era of protest and song and poetry?

B: For me, yeah, James Brown and Fela, but also, uhm, I grew up listening to a lot of really Punk music like The Dead Kennedys and The Ramones and The Sex Pistols and Minor Threat and stuff like that, so, I still really, I still think about that all the time? LIke when I’m, something about the attitude of it or just about…and by attitude I don’t mean the “Fuck you!” attitude. It’s just like, it’s sort of the way they corrode themselves into that music.

N: And that directness as well, the simplicity of the music is really hard to hit especially the more you get educated in music. The more you know, it’s harder to strip it back in sort of like to just what you really want to say.

As with any artform.

N: Yeah. Like, how Fela decided to sing it in broken English even though he knew English really well, because it was a more kind of direct way of saying something?…Screaming. Really loudly. Is also quite direct (laughs)

B: I mean I still..I also really really love old school early 80’s hip hop? I mean just the music I grew up…

London Posse?

B: I don’t…London Posse..

What’s that?

B: London Posse you say?

From the UK.

B: I’ve never heard of London Posse.

80’s.

B: Really?

Check it out man.

B: Awesome.

They kind of pioneered UK hip hop and they started like rapping in their own accents…

B: yeah right.

N: Oh right.

…at the time when everyone’s you know, like, doing the American accent?

B: Cool, uhm.

And now everyone copies them.

B: The earliest I go back in to my liking of UK hip hop was probably Rebel MC, but, yeah same–I mean that same thing. I really liked old school hip hop because of the simplicity of the raps, and the beats, and I really like old school cuts and scratches just (mimics scratching noise) that’s fine, I just love that noise.

Cool. And people are more like innovative back then like, in terms of hip hop now it’s just, about bitches and hoes…

B: Yeah.

N: (Laughs)

B: Yeah. I mean i was…we were uhm…we were listening to Grandmaster Flash in your laptop last night while we were all making puppets and our friend, like a girl was laughing, “HUh? Who’s this?” Like hadn’t heard much of coz it…to, nowaday’s ears to just hear a guy, “What-you-hear–is not a test–’Im rappin…to the beat!”

N: (Laughs)

B:…Quite sounds kinda corny and funny? But, I love it!

N: Same. It’s real…powerful…the wit

M: Origins of rap.

Irreverent.

B: But really cool music is. I mean like, the message, I mean, lots of those songs are about, “Hey. Cmon. Take a look at what’s going on–it’s Rap! doo doo, tgsh.” Not about, fucking, bitches and hoes, yawn.

What are your other passions besides music. I mean obviously Nisha is into acting…

N: I started out just in theatre, creating my own theatre and being in other independent theatre productions. Uhm. Other passions? I like knitting!

M: Ah knitting, yes. She’s a good knitter. She knitted this big massive scarf on tour it was amazing.

N: It’s got a few stains from the tour bus as well I found out.

How about you Marlon?

M: Uuuuh, I like to dj every now and then when I get the chance.

B: Drum and Bass dj, very good drum and bass dj.

M: Which is weird coz it’s… it was kinda like just finding friends who got into the same thing and you know you just do what they do and I liked it and enjoyed it you know? And uh, and the other members of the band are like to drink. Lots. It’s fun. Party. Socialise, talk about stuff.

N: It’s a real passion.

M: It’s a passion, yeah.

B: I like, kind of like, theatre as well

Really?

B: Yeah writing plays and sort of devising and making them with other actors. And, yeah, writing…djing…umm and I like cryptwalking, heaps at the moment.

Cryptwalking! (laughs)

B: Cryptwalking. Have you seen those guys do like, that, like, Okay have you seen that Soulja Boy music video?

Yeah yeah.

B: You know how they kinda do that footwork shuffly kinda…That’s cryptwalking.

I know about…seawalking…

B: Yeah that’s that.  Seawalk is cryptwalk. I’m not very good at it at all but I’m just kinda addicted to watching footage of it and like any little people I meet I try to get them to teach me some of their moves. But I’m still like super novice. I used to do a lot of breakdancing when I was a kid, in the 80s. It’s my lil’ get back in touch with, my youth.

Like hardcore breakdancing.

B: Kind of well not hardcore but I mean every weekend we’d go and have like battles in the square, on lino that I still own. I was the littlest one so I was the one that they kind of, flipped around and spun and shit.

End Part Two. One more to go!