CHOPPING FRUIT AND VEG IN MELTON MOWBRAY

So I spent a week in July out in Melton Mowbray at the house of Leicestershire artist Debbie Bird collaborating on a project for Sainsbury's. There is a new store opening up in Melton and they've commissioned a piece of artwork that is going to be 4 metres wide and 2 metres tall for the side of the building. I received good news yesterday that the Melton Borough Council have approved the artwork and it is going to be going into commission.  

All week long me and Debbie were working on a concept that we came up with, and that concept is for the artwork to be an entire landscape focused around a park that is in the middle of Melton, with all local monuments and sights in this scene around the park. The park is to be busy with people with loads going on, and everything in the entire scene is to be made from fresh fruit and veg.

We were chopping and slicing veg all week, laying out characters on perspex sheets and photographing them from a light box, so they were illuminated. Sadly, the project isn't finished yet, but here are some photos that sum up how I spend my week out in Melton, working in Debbie Bird's studio for Sainsbury's!

MAINLY TWATS IN TOWN

YOOOOO WOSKENON YOU KNOW WHAT IT IS ITS WICKEDLAND TIME, LETS SLAG OFF SOME STRANGERS!

I was in Peri with Jimlad the other day when this guy got a ticket for waiting on the double yellows outside. Even though he was in his car just waiting for his order this guy started writing him up a ticket. Everyone in the shop started going mad booing the traffic warden, asking him how he sleeps at night and swearing at him. It was brilliant, he must have felt like such a slug.

He still wrote out the ticket.

These guys were at the bottom of new walk with a picnic table and a megaphone moaning about something. If i'm going to take advice about the way I live my life, it's not going to be from people like this.

I really, really enjoyed Sunday. This could be a very good season for Liverpool. I've been waiting for Ferguson to retire for years.

Quick chill with the Pip Don the other night. It's weird, we left out to go for food from mine but then ended up just chilling, neither of us were hungry. We legitimately went for a walk. An evening stroll. Is that batty? Two mates just going for a walk in the evening?

I had the mixtape launch the other night. It went well, it was a right laugh. I performed a few tunes from it that when I wrote with a stage show in mind for the first time and I really enjoyed performing them. Is this the best face Mo has ever pulled?

I had when Tesco miss their delivery. This is a pure first world problem but it pisses me off. I only ever get these meals when I'm pure in a rush on lunch at work and this fully fucked up the base. Not impressed Tesco, You're meant to be taking over the world, what is this shit?

Look at this narna. Looking like Elmo the fucking elephant with saddlebacks in fucking sandals. SANDALS! after all that safety gear and she risks stubbing those toes. Mental. I'd rather be completely cleaned up by a car than look like this.

Well that's it! Short but sweet this week it's not a long ting. If it's nice tomorrow I might wear white shorts, and aint nobody who reads this here blog gonna stop me. That's what it is.

SHOEBOX MONEY 2 - TRACK BY TRACK

YOOOOOOOO So I squeezed off my new mixtape yesterday, 16 brand new tracks under the umbrella 'Shoebox Money 2.' Here is a track by track run down of what's going on with it. Open a can of fanta fruit twist and drink it as you listen to it and read this.

The whole idea for the mixtape was just to have fun with it. Within the confines of my last two releases (Nicely Waved and Silver Tongued with Kama and Teeps) the direction was very clear before the project started. I had an idea where it was going to end up. With this I wanted to use beats I had been meaning to use for a while, from an genre and bring it all together with the only thing in common being my voice.

TRACK 1 - NIGHTCALL

As soon as I watched Drive with Ryan Gosling I thought yeah I'm gonna use that. The start of the song provided a really nice intro so naturally it kicks things off. Don't watch that it follows exactly the same format as the next song. Don't worry about that.


TRACK 2 - TRICK ME

Obviiiiooooously Kelis's tune from a few years back. I've always liked this and have been meaning to touch it for years. I love the tempo of it. I recorded a little video for this (posted a couple of posts ago on here) so I suppose that makes this the lead single!


TRACK 3 - G-R-I-M-E [PROD. BY KURLY HYPA]

I really like the chorus on this tune. I've always liked minimalist grime, and I was happy when I made this beat. I wanna make a 4x4 remix of it and get a bag of different guys from Leicester on it like a relay tune.


TRACK 4 - TOO NICE

When Leicester HQ first opened they invited me down to nose around, take some pictures and do a blog write up for them. As part of the deal I got to use the studio space to record something for a couple of hours and I had wrote this song and had it sat around. This was the first song I made for this tape. Big up Chaser who worked the desk for the session, he has been a big help towards this mixtape, a real good guy. You can read the Leicester HQ write up here.


TRACK 5 - 2000 AND REIDSPACE [SKIT]

When I recorded the launch party promo freestyle the other week round Darryls he was fucking around, testing the mic whilst I went for a piss and recorded this. I told him I had to put it on the mixtape hahaha

TRACK 6 - PAY ATTENTION

Just a oneaway over an old Alchemist banger. I've had these bars written for time, but they didn't really fit in with Nicely Waved so I sat on them. I filmed a live version of this for JDM.TVs 'Everybody's Watching' series the other week.


TRACK 7 - BACK WIDDA BANG FT. KIWI, ONYX, KAMAKAZE

Out of all the new grime guys in Leicester I really liked what Kiwi and Onyx (formally known as Youngz) were doing. Real grime for grime heads. I knew I wanted to get them on a grime track for the mixtape. As soon as Darryl played me this tune I knew this was the one for them. I got Kama to come in and take the baton for the last leg. I wanna do a video for this tune.



TRACK 8 - POLAROID PICTURES

I wrote this pure hungover on a beach in Turkey when I went with Dan and Tom in June. I love this beat (Angel Haze - New York) and wanted to record a oneaway for it. There are so many songs on here I can realistically see myself making videos for, this is another one.


TRACK 9 - SNAPCHAT FREESTYLE

This is just a freestyle over a beat produced by Spooky. Something for the grime heads, I like this kind of shit. I spat this over this beat for my JDZ freestyle that got took down after too many negative comments. I don't give a fuck what any other human alive on earth says, this is solid grime, man. One of those real 'if only I was black' moments. What? I'm not bitter.



TRACK 10 - DOING MY THING FT. TWISTED PENNYS [PROD. KURLY HYPA]

I first heard the song I sampled for this in Aarons car when we were driving to see Kyle sometime last year. I knew I was gonna sample it and make something out of it and I'm so glad I got around to doing it. I really like the structure of this song, the breakdown, Teeps 'how to do a 16 bar feature on a rap song' verse in all it's perfection and the chorus brings it home. I think at the moment this is my favourite song on the tape.


TRACK 11 - YUNG STYLE [PROD. BOY KID CLOUD]

Obviooooously had to work with Reidophile on something for it. I wanted this to sound kind of like a clip from a set, like very live and free. I think we did it on one take to get that effect. It's the perfect kind of beat to skip all over, such a nice song to play with the flow on.



TRACK 12 - WAVEY LIGHTSKINNED GIRLS [PROD. KURLY HYPA]

This is the first beat I made when I was just pissing around when I bought my MPD off Darryl earlier this year. I pitched that Jay-Z sample down and had that over a couple of pads and played it out live.



TRACK 13 - DON'T CHAT TO MAN

I pure lied at the start of this post when I said 16 'brand new' tracks. This is a liiiitle bit old. I recorded this when Au Seve was all people were listening to and stuck it up on Youtube. Thinking about it, this might well be older than Too Nice, making this the first tune I did towards the tape. Either way, check out me going to church with the chorus vocals hahaha AFRICA!


TRACK 14 - GWOPAZ BIRTHDAY MEDTWANG [SKIT]

Fuuuck meeee. I'm having a nightmare. Even though a skit, but still technically a track this is definitely the oldest thing on the tape. Gwopaz, pissed out of his head on his birthday weekend last year left me a voice note on my phone breaking down exactly what a medtwang is.



TRACK 15 - CATCH YOU SLIPPING [PROD. KURLY HYPA]

This is another song I wrote a little while ago. When I went to Portugal with Dan last year. It was originally wrote for another beat at the same tempo, but I made this beat relatively recently and thought it would go well with these lyrics. Some real gas man trap, I was trying to make something similar to H-U-S-T-L-E-R-S anthem from the first Shoebox Money.


TRACK 16 - TAKING BAD ADVICE FT. SKITZA

This was kind of inspired by Kanye's early work in terms of how the chorus is built and the different sections in the song. I wanted to be really honest with the subject matter. I really like this tune, Skitza has a really nice singing voice. Because of the way it fades out and whatever I saw it as a natural outro for the body of work.




Well that's it, a track by track run through of the whole mixtape. I hope you guys enjoy listening to it as much as I enjoyed making it!

NEW PODCAST : 028 - A LIVING, WALKING DISGUISE

Heyyyooooo We have everyone back this week discussing celebrities noncing, where Frank and Brad have been hiding, Kim Jong Un being a bastard, exploding throats, a shit zoo in China and a mission to mars. All this week!
 

700TH POST! NEW VIDEO - TRICK ME

Here is my brand new video for the first song from my new mixtape. The song is a version of 'Trick Me' by Kelis. Check it out, I'll be performing this on Tuesday!

WEEKEND DANCES AND TURKISH ROMANCES

IT'S FRIDAY AND I'VE HAD A VERY HARD WEEK AT WORK! I AM VERY EXCITED FOR THE WEEKEND EVEN THOUGH I AM NOT DOING A LOT.

Last weekend was special though. It was Darryl's night 'Show Me Love' at Sophbeck. It was sick as ever, we got slozzed at Darryl's before heading down.

Obviiiioooooously couple mandem were about.

Biddles! This guy. I feel like he is a person I have so much in common with, we share very similar interests. Every time I see him we have a lot to talk about and catch up on.

obbvvviooooously shorts gang in the DJ booth. Real men wear shorts. I can't wait to be one of those old fat blokes who wears shorts no matter what the weather is doing.

Isn't this a heartbreaking sight? That shutter should never be down should it? They should just employ people to work around the clock. I shouldn't be pissed, stumbling home from town, get to Bede Island and have a realisation of maryland only to be greeted with this.

Hail up Brendan Rogers though yana. This came on the TV and made me laugh. He has such a funny interesting personality. For anybody that doesn't know he is a football manager who has David Brents personality. Here is a link to some of the amazing things he has said.

This queue for Fatcats was literally 4 wide and deeeep with nothing but Indian blokes. What a weird, segregated customer base. I honestly counted 2 girls in the whole queue.

Saturday night we went to the Wellgosh birthday party. Newham Generals, Logan Sama and P Money were all on the bill. I love nights like this. It was at Streetlife, some place I've never been to but it was fucking sick, and perfect for a grime night. Mayhem and SafOne came through on Logans set and absolutely tore the room down. Logan did his usual kind of club set of grime bangers and everyone was going nuts. Full on mosh pits and whatever in the crowd. That's what grime is all about, energy. It was an amazing night.

This was happening the other night in that Lithuanian place on Narborough. Fucking santa claus was sat their saying some shit and everybody was engrossed.

I hit up that other Turkish spot, The Sultan with Olly and Max, it was really nice, but I don't think it was quite as good as Istanbul, the one I wrote about a few months back.

Kebabs left, right and fucking centre. Real life Nico Bellic was gonna beat Olly's face in. Look at the fear in his eyes.

Then Olly just told him to seckle innit.

I shot a new video for the first song from my new mixtape the other day. All things going well it should be dropping tomorrow. It's for a version of 'Trick Me' by Kelis.

Indian Jesus just putting in work for the ends, you can't fuck with a man who casually stands in the middle of a main road in a white suit. What've you ever done with your life?

Well that's a round up of what's been happening. I've got a fun weekend this weekend, I'll hopefully get some good wickedlanding then of course i've got my mixtape launch on tuesday, so I'll be posting about that. GUNSHOTS IN YOUR HEADTOP HAVE A SHOWER WEEKEND DUN DUN DUUUUUNNNNN

NEW PODCAST - 027 - CUM-PANY

Just me and Max holding down the fort this week. Discussing Miley Cyrus and her antics of late, GCSE results, mindless TV, Wentworth Miller coming out and females on social media. All this week!

CHUMBLR 021

It's been a while since I did one of these kinds of posts. Either way, here are some lovely things I've seen of late.

Doesn't this look like a really good single/EP cover?

mirrored rims like a fucking boss

An absolutely looooovely logo

I can't stop listening to this at the minute. I'm listening to a lot of old stuff at the minute, namely Brand New, Blink 182 and AFI. This is getting a regular spin.

I liked this, it made me laugh and I don't know why.

What a lovely illustration. I love the translucent instruments.

I usually really dislike young people with conscious social comment about an urban community. I think it's a really easy way to get noticed by boring white people at the BBC and what not. As soon as I saw this guy I kind of wanted to watch it to dislike it, but when he does is really, really good. This piece is very good, I love some of him rhyming patterns. Give it a watch.

A christmas card from Volkswagen

The colour here and the funny necks of the blokes are so good. Reminds me of neckface.

That's all I've got for you! Enjoy your bank holiday weekend.