Nakayama
Creative Director and Co-Founder of Wip Caps
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Ring the alarm~ the champion sound is coming~ whoa, aye~ For those who have been anxiously waiting, the Champion Sound caps are on the way. I won’t talk about the release date yet, just keep checking back here or on our website.
This cap is really personal to me, and if you ask the other guys at Wip, they would tell you the same. We all knew that this was coming sooner or later. The concept came to me sooner thanks to some of the people in the local Dub Reggae movement. More about them later. As most of you know and if you’ve read the blog entry on Strictly Fitteds, Champion Sound is our salute to Jamaican music. Jamaican music namely, Reggae, Dub, Ska, Rocksteady, Dance Hall.
I can trace back my introduction to modern Dance Hall to sometime in late September of 1999, New York City. My sister and I were flying in from San Francisco via Detroit and were waiting to be picked-up by my brother’s college buds. It was about 7pm, we were waiting for about an hour in the cold when they finally came. My brother was stuck in class and so he asked Chris and Roy to pick us up. As we were driving back to the campus from Laguardia air port, I hear this tune on the radio. It was up-tempo, bass heavy and accompanied by what I could best describe as Jamaican rap. Chris tells me it’s Red Rat.
I’ve been hooked on Dance Hall ever since.
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I was also taken in by the history of Jamaican music and how they gave birth to Rap, Punk, Drum & Bass and lots of other genres and sub genres that really took off in the 80’s and 90’s. In a way, it taught me to be more eclectic and to be more appreciative of old classics.
Watch this documentary to get a better idea on Jamaican music’s rich heritage
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Fast forward to December 2008. Red-I Sound System kicks-off it’s Dubplate Reggae Sunday here in Manila. Linking up with these guys and other like minded people was instrumental in the creation of ‘Champion Sound’. The name is that because Jamaican music is the true O.G. ,the “champion of music genres”.
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Dubplate Reggae Sunday: DJ’s Don P & Red-i
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..Is how I would describe U92. I mean, check out the line-up. Half of them are from TV.
MTV Phil(Video) killed on Feb 15, 2010, U92(Radio) officially born on March 26, 2010.
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Sarah invited us to the U92 launch party but people I was rolling with literally slept on it for a couple of hours. After the nap, we finally showed-up around 10:30ish and the thing was pretty much over.
(Borrowed your photos Sarah, thanks!)
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We drank what was left of the booze and raided the studio.
Champion Sound ‘Rasta’ fitted makes a cameo, breaks a neck or two.
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Unlike us, David fell for the effective event marketing ploy.
“Yea that’s cool, we understand if Timbo and JT couldn’t make it to the party at the last minute coz they’re busy doing sound check”.
Unfazed, David, Tollo and a tired Amanda followed a tip from a reliable source and headed over to B-Side to kick it with Timbo doing his after party thing. lol
Another one from Sarah’s cam
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Was at B-Side last week to get a taste of Subflex before curfew. That’s right, your boy can’t stay out late on a school night.
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Subflex is brought to you by AMPON and waving the flag way up high is the homie NothingElse. Also of the Wip Caps Reppin Crew.
NothingElse is fully posable and has Glow in the dark action. Batteries not included.
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His joint, Kawawang Bata will haunt him for the rest of his life. But we won’t listen to that shit today.
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Haven’t seen Red and Astrid in a minute. Good to finally reconnect. Big-up to you guys for B-Side. We’ll kick it soon.
Astrid and Chesa
Rin Tin Tin
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We end this entry with a short clip of Cali..p..h…. excuse me, he is now known as Albatross & Loveski.
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Spent Saturday afternoon at this newly remodeled compound called The Collective, along Malugay st. Makati. Most of you probably know this place coz of B-Side.
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I got there kinda early so I kicked back and scoped around while waiting for the others to show up. Lucky for me Angela was nice enough to keep a stranger company.
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Angela is the proprietor of Sundae. She gave me the low down on her new community of eclectic bunch of shops and establishments. This came as a surprise to me but Sundae also carries some choice ladies Vans’ and Nike’s care of Secret Service.
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Anyway, I was there coz the homie Don P (32 Bar Productions and other half of DUB PLATE Manila) hit me up to film Roam Elsewhere bang out some dope OBEY art installs.
Don P aka PJ with his newly acquired OBEY prints courtesy of Roam
Combines like Voltron
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DJ Mulan got a piece too. His will go nicely into his beat lab. Wait for the video to see what it is. That’s him in Blue putting in some work.
This mine.. shibby!
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This was made possible by OBEY, Red-I Sound System, 32 Bar Productions, b-side and.. that’s it!
Check the flyer
Peep this video done-up by Sean http://www.facebook.com/video/video.php?v=364464531390&ref=mf
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Shot out to PJ, Red, Astrid for the hook-up. Shot out to Roam for the dope prints. Good people, Good times.
Everyone, keep it locked for the video. It’s being slow cooked at the Wip Creative Lab.
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I can’t really get into the nitty gritz but I’ve been in a funk for the last couple of months. Because of it, I temporarily swore-off doing any commissioned or personal graff work for the time being. Shit is tough but I wanna be all there when I do a piece. Anyway, it’s been over 4 months now since I stopped and just the other day I had an itch to mess around. I broke out what half empty rattle cans I had and just zoned out.
colors to work with: Black, White, Orange, Rose Pink, Sky Blue, Primer Grey and some School Bus Yellow
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Trying to work out a new process. No cut-backs. Dropping the accuracy and just free flowing and sketching away.
Like how my man Bob Ross used to say, “We don’t have mistakes here, we just have happy accidents.”
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Key component to zoning out is some tasty jams. I had on 80 minutes of 90’s Classics done-up by DJ Decypher. Free download right here.
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Felt good. Thinking of putting a proper piece together. We’ll see how it goes.
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It’s been a minute since I’ve been OUT out. Especially in Makati.
Anyway, last Friday night was Drip’s music video launch. They were launching 3 new videos and so I had to show some love by coming thru.
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I wish I had links to the actual video but the best I could do were these teasers. They should be up on the internets real soon. *edit – some video footage from Elea http://www.facebook.com/video/video.php?v=311690461899
Turning Grey
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The drawings were done by Johnny. This is the 3rd video he’s done for the group. That’s one supportive husband right there.
Blind
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Early in the event I bumped into an old friend from college. Turns out she’s in the video for Bloodletting keeping it eye candy. Catching-up was real good. But it’s been so long since we last saw each other, I just had to come correct like I always do. So Shawn, loved the magazine pictorial. RESPEKT! See you at the reunion.
Bloodletting
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The night was good until Elea the Kawawang Bata and Picoy the beat kid got smashed and disorderly. More about that next time.
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To cap things, here is one of my choice classics from Drip. Sweet Cheeks
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Murs and Slug are back again as FELT. Aesop Rock jumped on as the producer and the new record is called FELT 3 : A tribute to Rosie Perez.
So what’s with Rosie Perez? Jump to part 3 of the video to find out or get a clue from their 2 previous FELT collabs, Felt: A tribute to Christina Ricci and Felt 2: A tribute to Lisa Bonet.
Check out FELT’s interview on Ray Shemersy Tonight. Classic real talk.
Just hard hitting stuff.
Here are all 3 parts for your viewing plejooor
Just got done screening the Pun documentary.
I’ve always felt that there weren’t enough PUN videos and insights back then, but this film makes up for all that. One interesting excerpt was Xzibit talking about his BIG PUN tattoo on his arm. Just goes to show how big of an impact PUN had on many people and artists alike.
Cop the DVD when you get the chance.
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Rewind back to summer of ‘98, New York City. I spent the summer with relatives in Queens while also visiting my bro who was in college in the Bronx. Living in the Philippines back then was tough in terms of getting intel on new jams from the states(or any where else for that matter). Back in the 90’s there were no blogs, radio and MTV was wack as ever, just not enough handy resources. At school, you were The Shit! if you had all the new joints. I remember hitting-up my bro on ICQ or AIM to get the scoop on the regular.
Anyway, at the time it was all about Ruff Ryder’s anthem, Superthug, Horse & Carriage, Hard Knock Life and Still not a player. All of those tracks were hot! (unless you were from NYC then you probably weren’t feeling Horse & Carriage as much) Needless to say Still not a player was THE Jam of that summer. Serious heavy rotation. You heard it on the radio, downtown, uptown, at the corner Deli, at the park, wherever. NYC was the only town I saw cats sporting goggles like PUN did.
One of my choice PUN joints ever
You know how every now and then, a hot new 2Pac track would just pop out of now where? despite him being dead? Anyway, before Dave Chappelle left his show, he recorded a skit which was later aired as Chappell’s Show: Lost Episodes. The skit pokes fun at those “unreleased” 2Pac tracks.
If you haven’t seen it, here’s the clip.
HaHaHaaaaa!! thats classic stuff. Chappelle is King!
So you’ve seen the Chappelle clip and maybe even heard some of Pac’s posthumous work that’s been put out. 5 Albums to be exact. You would think that whoever is behind all new records would finally let the legend rest. Right? SIKE!
Boys and girls, Halloween will never be the same!
Cookin’ Soul and DJ Whoo Kid Present: Night of the Living Dead Part II
HOLY S**T! And if that’s not enough. There is a planned Album coming out in 2010.
Current_ has a 6 part music special that kicked off on October 14.
First installment was the mighty Mos Def. An hour long feature on Mos. Current_ follows the man around Japan as he does concerts, shopping in Shibuya and all that boring stuff. I was hoping to see him catch-up with DJ Honda but that didn’t happen.
It’s been a while since I’ve visited my father land. If I had the funds, I’d go in a heart beat. I’ve got friends egging me to come and move there which makes it even more confusing. Hopefully WIP CAPS would be my excuse to go back real soon.
Click on the Play icon and watch the feature right here
The new album is The Ecstatic. Needless to say it’s seriously a dope album. I already got my favorite joints picked out. Choice has to be Casa Bey.
Lyrically he is just untouchable, no doubt, but what really makes it heat to me is when he breaks into that funk with the horns at around 0:40. Dooope!
Keep it locked on Current_ for the next installments which includes Ben Harper, Common and Thievery Corporation.
