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DTMS x NTN/ NEGROPOP @ ICA

I first met the NTN family in 2014 at a party in an abandoned warehouse somewhere in South London. It was thrown by our good friend Misbah who runs the blog/ music platform Misdigest. Members of NTN include the likes of artist/ lyrical genius Jawnino, UK underground rap prince JP, lyrical antagonist ESSEM, vibe creator Teddy Bones & more.

What struck me about NTN was the energy they created. In this abandoned and desolate space I could feel an abundance of light beaming off every single member as they laughed, joked and bantered together. It reminded me of taking a lunch break at my school playground in Hackney, with endless high jinks and silly games to test a teachers patience.

A little later on set, everything changed. NTN was sonically electrifying, sticking to their originality with hints of Grime, Drill, Trap and leftfield electronic influences. There was no more laughing or joking, but an illustration of mob mentality. Every member attacked every riddim with the coldest bars or thought striking/ coded lyrics that took you out of your body. I instantly saw the authenticity and knew the potential for the clique to grow was unlimited.

The event in 2014 was definitely a foreshadow of events. Fast forward to 4040, I met the newly branded Negropop at the Institute of Contemporary Arts. NTN underwent a significant name change and were invited by Boiler Room and Nine Nights to open up for Skribz (67). 

The name change reflected expansion and growth at a untameable pace with new members such as, multi disciplinary artist PK BRKO, UK alt rap trailblazer Ryoko Virgil and Grime ambassador CHAMBER45. Despite the name change, the crew made sure they stayed true to themselves, even though this link up was in one of the most prestigious venues in the country.

I was blown away by their presence. Not much had changed and I could tell, because the gang was still backstage laughing, joking and running the same playground banter. However, this time I could feel they were sitting on music that was in its own league.

There was a buzz in the air and I could tell each artist had a bond between each other that nobody could break. Everyone backstage had something special to bring to the table and you could see it in the way each member presented themself. Every time I moved my camera and snapped a subject, it felt like I unlocked a new character in a fighting game.

It had been many years since I had seen these people together, but the feeling was familiar. There was a synergy happening and the first few minutes of the footage illustrates that.

Up until the time for their set, the feeling in the venue was vibrant. I followed the gang coursing in and out the venue about 15 deep. They were covered in some of the coldest fashion, individual style and accessories I had seen in a long time. Each member's individuality complemented their collective energy and each moment backstage felt like a pre-show ritual.

As soon as CHAMBER45 had his USB plugged in, I knew I was about to witness something special. Every member had their own unique vibration and each artist that jumped on mic had a different flavour to add to the melting pot. A song that stood out to me was “4040 Mode '', which led to special guests jumping out the shadows and joining in the mosh pit. Guests included Kibo, Bunny and Edgarthedyke. Watch the evidence below:

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DTMS x 160 FT DEEP

Shot by Tre’Bore.

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DTMS x CULT STUDIES 2018

Shot by Tre’Bore.

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DTMS x DUMMY MAGAZINE x THE GREAT ESCAPE 2016

https://www.dummymag.com/features/photo-report-dummy-earth-agency-at-the-great-escape/

Shot by Tre’Bore

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DTMS x SLUGABED x IGLOOGHOST x SAMUEL ORGAN x FRIENDS 2017

Shot by Tre’Bore

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DTMS x DENZEL CURRY x AJ TRACEY

Shot by Vinkele

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DTMS x PRINCESS NOKIA 2017

Shot by Vinkele

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FEELING GOOD w/ MALL GRAB & CO

This February just gone we managed to invade Patterns, one of Brighton’s most noted nightclubs by the seafront. Patterns has been a legendary venue, ever since taking the space from previous owners “Audio” a few years back. It is constantly visited by a range of young - middle age audiences seeking an easy going positive club vibe, with groundbreaking electronic music and euphoria.

Our visit was for exactly the same reasons as everyone else and we couldn’t have timed our visit more perfectly. Mall Grab and Co’s “Non Stop Feeling Tour” was the occasion and it did exactly what it said on the tin. Mall Grab is a London based Australian producer, putting fun back in House music by doing everything in Lo-Fi.

Within a genre where artists and audiences are constantly taking themselves way too seriously, Mall Grab is breaking the pretentious bubble by staying true to himself and having much fun as he can.

His music is a reflection of this, using grainy internet video rips, throwback samples, euphoric house chords and chunky house drums within his productions. It’s a very simple formula, however it is very difficult to not to be opened up to Mall Grab’s floaty and heavenly world created by his tracks.

He often presents his music in a nostalgic way, with one of his most popular Youtube videos being chopped up VHS footage of LDN OG’s cutting shapes. The video is called “I’ve Always Liked Grime” and Mall Grab gets away with ripping probably one of the U.K’s most famous Eski beats using nothing but tongue in cheek behaviour.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8v7Agx74gsU

On entry to the club we instantly started sweating our souls out of our bodies. It was very clear that people had already been hooked into the “Non Stop Feeling”. The vibe was real and the energy in the room was righteous. As soon as we caught a tingle of that 4/4 beat, we couldn’t escape.

Without the aid of club candy we instantly felt the atmosphere of feeling nothing but collective love and gratitude. We then began lurking around revellers, capturing as much as we could.

We ended up with lots of snaps of the audience loosing themselves in the sea of feel good House provided by Mall Grab and co. The DJs definitely created a platform for every member of the audience to be a star of the night.

As the night progressed everything began to blur, with a constant supply of alcohol flowing down our faces and euphoric house taking us to another dimension. By about 4am the night began to come to a close.

The drinks flowing had slowed & all the undercover joints being passed in the smoking area had died down.

We thoroughly enjoyed our time with Mall Grab and Co. Our only criticism is that we need longer than a 4am close. However, we still highly recommend a night with Mall Grab.

Dear Mall Grab, please come back to Brighton with your homies and don’t stop spinning till we feel good face down on the floor.

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DTMS x ACCLAIM MAGAZINE x THE GREAT ESCAPE

http://acclaimmag.com/music/event-recap-the-great-escape-2017/

Shot by Louis Osorio & Tre’Bore.

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DTMS X CULT STUDIES 2017 

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DTMS x SMHO WAL

For our first ever DTMS interview I managed to meet up with a newly formed experimental Record Label based in Essex called “Smho Wal”. The label is run by the very creative duo: Dusty Ohms & Supasaiyan aka G.Lux. Dusty and Supasaiyan are both beatmakers, who focus on pushing the boundaries of electronic music. They mainly focus on Hip-Hop in an electronic sense, but for a while have found themselves mixing everything that influences them from Trap, Drum ’n’ Bass and Glicth to get to this big melting pot of sounds, that eventually come together to make up who they are.

Dusty Ohms is a beat maker and DJ based in Essex who is pretty much a Veteran of beatmaking and DJing in the area. He has been uploading wonky Hip-Hop compositions consistently for the last 3 years. He has also delved into other genre’s, such as Footwork and Drum and Bass working with other labels, such as Experimental 160bpm pioneers “Medallion Sounds”.

It doesn’t matter what genre he fucks with. The sound he produces is always huge and glitched out in the best way ever. Dusty also runs a radio show alongside the crew “Fly High Society” with their Mixcloud branch off that is “Fly High Radio”. “Fly High Radio” has featured some of his favourite artists and homies, such as Macabre Unit, Crypticz, label partner Supasaiyan & more.

The radio show is definitely worth a listen because of Dusty’s diverse genre selections. Some of his shows are solely 160 dedicated for the ravers and those prone to gun fingers. However, other weeks, his choices in rhythmically loose and sample based tracks, make it perfect for a lazy Sunday afternoon.

Supasaiyan aka G.Lux is the second half of the duo. He is Essex’ finest young artist with an SP404 addiction. Under G.Lux he draws some of the most amazing characters. Influenced by London’s graffiti scene and 90’s hip-hop, he is definitely one of London’s most humble & talented artists.

When it comes to music he is a very talented beat maker, focussing on dusty sample based tracks with huge drums that snap at you, making sure you always paying attention while you drift through nostalgic radio waves.

The label first drew my attention with their new LP “Trap Door”, which is an amazing 12" that catches your eye with a lovely double sided piece of him & Dusty on the moon, drawn by G.Lux himself. Once you get the 12" out of the lovely sleeve it is covered in, and place it on the turntable, you are instantly drifted away to a land where, loose, yet heavy drums & floaty vintage samples are the currency.

The LP is riddled with cheeky vocal samples that guide you on your journey. As you progress through the LP it gets progressively heavier. The duo begin to play with heavy 8bit synths and then continue to progress with a wavy track that features talented UK based rapper “Onoe Caponoe” who hop, skips and jumps over the track effortlessly. As you get to the end of the LP it progresses genre wise, into a heavy smoked out Trap influenced piece, which is a nice contrast to the calm that we heard before the storm.

After a heavy weekend of partying, I journeyed all the way up to Upminster to meet the pair, with what was probably one of my worst hangovers of 2016. As I landed I was greeted by both Dusty & G.Lux.

After a trip to the off license they wasted no time in welcoming me into their beautifully spacious apartment, that shouted creativity at me as soon as I walked in.

We sat down, grabbed our rolling utensils, smoked one, and pressed record on my i-phone.

So you guys, tell me a little about this release?

G. LUX: Well it’s taken two and a half years to make.

DUSTY OHMS: Yeah we started it in 2012.

G.LUX: Yeah it wasn’t like set a date and that was it, stick to it. We just started making beats and was like alright should we make an EP? We kept going and made loads of beats and just kept whittling it down.

DUSTY OHMS: Yeah then we had the concept of doing one side more sample based, but used similar samples within the interlude to tie in to the other side, which is more electronic.

G.LUX: Yeah it’s two different styles really. My style is more Hip-Hop and Dusty’s is more electronic.

DUSTY OHMS: It’s what we want to push with our limited 7”. We only got 11 of them done.

Looking at your new releases vinyl cover, it looks sick. Do you guys plan to expand after this release?

DUSTY OHMS: Yeah for sure. We plan to keep it like this. We plan to get mail (what are this?) artists we know to artwork for us. For example gaz. There’s never going to be any text. That is like the art. Your 12” is going to be your 12”. I also think we are doing a cassette next or a 7″. Haven’t really planned it really.

Who would you say influences you guys?

DUSTY OHMS: One of the main ones for me is Samiyam.

G.LUX: Definitely.

DUSTY OHMS: When I hear his tunes I just think I wanna make music like this.

G.LUX: For me it’s Madlib. That’s my like main influence. If I could sound like anyone, it would be him.

DUSTY OHMS: And Knxledge.

G.LUX: Like when I listening to Knxledge I still don’t understand what he does. I just wonder how he makes it good every time? It always sounds like his.

Ok let’s sway away from Hip-Hop for the moment. Who else are you guys digging at the moment?

DUSTY OHMS: My roots were in drum and bass and then I got into Hip-Hop. I started doing the whole Grime/ Dub thing before I started doing this. I like Hip-Hop, but sometimes it doesn’t do it for me. I like the stuff that 22A are doing. Another label I like is Astral Black. They have a lot of Hip-Hop stuff like Jaisu, but they also have bits for the dance floor.

G.LUX: The boundaries between all the genres are blurred. Feels like a big mass of electronic music.

Views on bullshit happening in Society now? I’m talking major bullshit. For example, Trump. Also do you think the political system taking a sharp turn to the far right is pushing you in an artistic way?

G.LUX: I feel like the world is just going mad. I think anything can happen now, I can’t believe it. I remember going to bed and thinking this whole trump thing is so funny. I thought it wasn’t gonna happen. Then I remember waking up and just thinking “I can’t fucking believe it”. It’s like Alan Sugar becoming prime minister. I mean it’s funny, but it’s scary at the same time. All the bullshit is mainly pushing my art.

Tell me more about your art & how what is going on influences that?

G.LUX: I like to make music and then do art thinking about what I was thinking about, making that piece of music. Just linking the two. I’ve always drawn. It’s something that I’ve always done. It’s hard to balance music and the bullshit though.

DUSTY OHMS: Yeah it’s hard to balance everything. I always manage to make music though. At lunchtime I take my stuff to work and just make beats.

G.LUX: Yeah I take a SP-404 to work. I just take it out during my lunch break.

We then moved onto the studio where the boys gave me a tour of their cosy spare studio room, where they showed me all the gear that they had been collecting.

DUSTY OHMS: Cool little room innit. Like we have got some stuff we haven’t even used yet. Normally we just pick up cheap bits and bobs and utilise them. Sometimes you get really nasty sounds from all the used stuff, but sometimes using the nasty sound is something I quite like. It’s the same with the MPC. When we first got it G.lux was in here playing with it for ages.

G.LUX: My set up is a little smaller than this. SP, MicroKorg, Mac and Monitors, that’s it.

DUSTY OHMS: We’re gonna do a beat tape though. We’re not really gonna master it properly. Just saturate the shit out of it using a compression unit going for a brash sound.

I think it’s mainly about getting ideas out. Sometimes you can just over cook everything. That’s the thing with music, drawing a line on finishing a track is the hardest bit.

G.LUX: It’s never done, it’s just when you choose to stop. Sometimes I’ve just got to go back and add a bit more, because sometimes you gain more knowledge on what you want to do. It’s good when you’re a bit stuck for ideas.

DUSTY OHMS: Yeah sometimes you get inspired to make something new from what you were already making and then you realise you have to go out, but really wanna finish the tune.

We made our way back to the front room and rolled another Joint. At this point I began to feel really queasy from the hangover, but pressed on.

Do you guys like Essex?

DUSTY OHMS: Yeah I used to live in Romford, which is down the road.

G.LUX: For me it’s all over essex, but I went to school in Romford. All the areas are like post-industrial towns that don’t really have much going on. There’s not really any reason to come here.

G.LUX: It’s not even far, but every time I go to London people are like “oh you’ve come all the way from Essex?!” and I’m like “It’s not that far”. It’s honestly just because they have no reason to come here.

DUSTY OHMS: I do love living out this way. I like to dip in London and dip out again. We call it entering the matrix. We went to The Lurkers London launch. We went and got a few drinks, grabbed a book, chatted and were back in Essex before we knew it. Just chilling. It’s convenient, bit expensive, but I just work loads.

G.LUX: I dunno how he does it. He goes out all night then goes straight to work.

DUSTY OHMS: Yeah you gotta be mindful though. Sometimes you can find yourself over doing it and getting anxieties. You get stressed, but most of the times when it is out of my hands I just think “is there anything I can do about it?” and if there isn’t then it’s just pointless in me being stressed. Music helps though.

If I’m ever feeling a bit shit I just turn to music. I’m so thankful that I can turn to something creative I like doing. I have some pals and they aren’t really interested in anything. They find themselves with no passion for anything, except getting pissed.

G.LUX: Yeah round here alcoholism is mad. You just see people passed out at bus stops. Went to the Chinese the other day and walked passed a bus stop and there was a woman passed out fucked. Everyone was going up to her, seeing if she was alright and we came out of the Chinese shop to see a paramedic shaking his head as rolled up chips fell out her bag.

DUSTY OHMS: People are just wasting paramedics time. Romford is a place where everyone goes to get drunk…

You never get stoned and do things like that though. Dunno how they think we’re gonna smoke a spliff and like rob people. Don’t get me wrong though it can twist you up, but you just need to respect it.

G.LUX: Just control yourself. There’s been so many situations where I’m like “I can’t believe this is happening”. Sometimes I think people around me are just going nuts

DUSTY OHMS: Yeah the characters in Essex. People round here say “be careful up in London”, but really when we walk round London people accept us. However, If you walk around here and you have like a strange coloured shirt on or something out of the ordinary, they are like “oi what the fuck you wearing that for mate?!”

So I’m guessing you guys have a thing for the 90’s with all the Hip-Hop influences?

G.LUX: Yeah there were so many things that came out of the 90’s. Musically and visually, so much happened in that time.

DUSTY OHMS: Yeah a lot of my favourite Hip-Hop was from the 90’s. 94 onwards.

G.LUX: It didn’t feel like the 90’s had it’s style at the time, but when you look back on it now and people start to show you stuff, you remember it all. For example the Nike TN hats. You think to that and say to yourself “maybe it did have a style”.

DUSTY OHMS: Yeah you don’t notice it at the time, because it’s just happening. It always comes back around again. For example games consoles.

At that moment I pulled out my gameboy.

DUSTY OHMS: *Gasps* Is that a gameboy?! They are expensive now, because they have got a bit older. They’re wicked man. I’d much rather play that than a phone game. Nintendo always make fun games. Anyone can pick it up. I’m not much of a gamer. I mean it’s definitely better than sitting there tweeting everyone.

DUSTY OHMS: That’s another thing that gets us. When we were going out in the late 90’s everyone would be having a good time, but now whenever there’s a good night everyone is just staring at it through their phones. I find it takes away from the vibe.

G.LUX: plus it sounds awful in the videos too. It’s calm to get a quick video to say you were there, but when I see people videoing their whole night I’m like “???”.

At this point the hangover began to take it’s toll and after all the weed I began to fade to black and so did this interview. It’s needless to say that you need to keep your eyes on Smho Wal, because what the future holds for them is definitely bright.