Kwazulu-Natal born, non-gender conforming artist Sandiso Ngubane better known as M(x) Blouse shouldn’t be restricted in their expression of their artistic vision. Publications and pundits have already tried to place Ngubane into an arbitrary box as a queer hip-hop artist. This is a title that Ngubane has made evident they don’t agree with. “I don’t…
Eyedress, the recording moniker of Filipino musician Idris Vicuña, is making whacked out music perfect for a disturbing world. His albums Manila Ice and Sensitive G alluringly blend hazy dream pop and shimmering shoegaze with the antisocial attitude of gutter punk and gangsta rap. He sounds like he’s from an alternate timeline where in the…
Not many artists in the 2010s can claim that their first release was on a cassette tape, but as you’ll discover for yourself, Iglooghost isn’t like most artists. The esoteric producer’s career kicked off with the release of a limited edition cassette called Treetunnels back in 2014, and it wasn’t long after that that he…
With a crystalline soprano voice and an honest approach to writing, Alice Phoebe-Lou’s music has touched people from around the world. Her fiercely independent approach to music can be seen in her move from Cape Town to Europe at 16 to busk, an experience which saw her develop her sound, release her debut EP ‘Momentum’…
In a blog post by uDiscoverMusic, it is noted that the early days of hip-hop saw female rappers as an essential component to the genre’s biology, unapologetically detailing their interpretations and experiences of the world they lived in. They all had distinct variations in style, flow and lyrical content, but what each woman had in…
The first time I heard Ricky Tyler was when I played him on my radio show on DYR 105.1. I was looking for a song to play after Beyonce and Jay-Z’s Deja Vu and I spotted Ricky’s track of the same name. I thought it would be pretty funny to cue up two songs named…
“At an early age, I learned that what was said was not always what was meant, and this became my first lesson in the power of words. I also came to understand the influence of unspoken language.” Vocal Alchemy explores how choices are actioned through both expression and spoken language. Reflecting on the power of…
Both hailing from Vosloorus in the East Rand, it was their mutual love of poetry that brought Keabruh and Jay.B together. Now residing in Johannesburg, the two have been making music together since 2016. “The only way we could get to be heard was to put a beat to it. People resonate more with music than…
When I hear the name Deadly Bites, I imagine a lurid, D-grade exploitation movie from the 1970s or 1980s. It could be an Italian Zombie film, where the poorly made-up ghoul’s stumble around biting actors who utter badly written dialogue in roughly dubbed English. Alternately, it could be a revenge of nature tale where a…
The Other Records started as a small section in a clothing store a year ago and has since morphed into a physical space. Featuring a selection of music you’d be hard-pressed to find in other shops, The Other Records specialises in primarily electronic music from all spheres. The small space is colourful and filled with…
Listening to dJinns, an unassumingly dope two-piece musical project from Jozi, I genuinely struggle with the fact that they’re 18. There’s a maturity and nonchalant coolness to their work that even at my big age, I don’t think I could ever achieve. Francesco Mbele (Vocals and songwriting) and Jesse Elk (Producer and composer) seem to…
When I first opened the link to The Temple’s new EP Lusaka, I was blown away by the effervescence of their music. While the release harkened back to the optimistic beat of 1990’s Kwaito, it’s dense, swirling production is utterly contemporary, clearly in conversation with the hardness of Trap and Gqom. But unlike those intense,…
