{"id":5412,"date":"2012-10-01T13:52:43","date_gmt":"2012-10-01T19:52:43","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/stylusmagazine.ca\/?p=5412"},"modified":"2012-10-01T13:52:43","modified_gmt":"2012-10-01T19:52:43","slug":"relic-abstract-artform-m-kaps-the-happy-unfortunate-vp-nights-09-20-12","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ckuw.ca\/stylus\/2012\/10\/01\/relic-abstract-artform-m-kaps-the-happy-unfortunate-vp-nights-09-20-12\/","title":{"rendered":"Relic \/ Abstract Artform \/ M-Kaps \/ The Happy Unfortunate \/ VP Nights 09-20-12"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a rel=\"attachment wp-att-5414\" href=\"http:\/\/stylusmagazine.ca\/2012\/10\/01\/relic-abstract-artform-m-kaps-the-happy-unfortunate-vp-nights-09-20-12\/120920kp58606\/\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone size-large wp-image-5414\" title=\"120920KP58606\" src=\"http:\/\/stylusmagazine.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/120920KP58606-500x331.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"500\" height=\"331\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p><strong>by Ryan Reyes<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>photos by Khammy\u00a0Phanthavong<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Relic aka Rel McCoy is touring the country in support of his album\u00a0<em>Miles To Go<\/em>. He\u2019s a talented jack-of-all-trades who raps, produces, engineers, DJ\u2019s and sings. The man has won a Juno for producing songs for Canadian hip hop artist Shad. His Winnipeg stop at VP Nights included local openers Abstract Artform, M-Kaps and The Happy Unfortunate.<!--more--><\/p>\n<p>The Happy Unfortunate with their jazzy-boom-bap-centric tracks are a joy to listen to. Case in point: \u201cJuly 07\u201d their first single from their sophomore album\u00a0<em>July Never Dies<\/em>. Their stage presence has improved significantly since the last time I\u2019ve seen them perform. Envoy and Malcolm-Jay effortlessly traded verses on tracks \u201cJust A Minute\u201d and \u201cLong Shot.\u201d<\/p>\n<p><a rel=\"attachment wp-att-5415\" href=\"http:\/\/stylusmagazine.ca\/2012\/10\/01\/relic-abstract-artform-m-kaps-the-happy-unfortunate-vp-nights-09-20-12\/120920kp58492\/\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone size-large wp-image-5415\" title=\"120920KP58492\" src=\"http:\/\/stylusmagazine.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/120920KP58492-500x331.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"500\" height=\"331\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>M-Kaps, a hip hop artist and singer was up next. Smooth is the perfect word to describe his delivery. \u00a0\u201cSole Repossession,\u201d his song that struck me the most, recounts painful relationship struggles.<\/p>\n<p><a rel=\"attachment wp-att-5416\" href=\"http:\/\/stylusmagazine.ca\/2012\/10\/01\/relic-abstract-artform-m-kaps-the-happy-unfortunate-vp-nights-09-20-12\/120920kp58560\/\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone size-large wp-image-5416\" title=\"120920KP58560\" src=\"http:\/\/stylusmagazine.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/120920KP58560-500x331.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"500\" height=\"331\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>Abstract Artform came out swinging with \u201cHere We Are\u201d from their debut album\u00a0<em>Prairie Kid<\/em>. Their high energy set continued with stomping, rap exercises and oh yes songs: \u201cHands up\u201d, \u201cI Am Canadian\u201d and \u201cSummer in the City.\u201d They debuted \u201cBAMF\u201d(produced by Canadian beatsmith\/MPC-Jedi Fresh Kils) a new song from their upcoming album. Kid A then passed the mic \u201clike a regal muthafugga\u201d to Relic.<\/p>\n<p><a rel=\"attachment wp-att-5417\" href=\"http:\/\/stylusmagazine.ca\/2012\/10\/01\/relic-abstract-artform-m-kaps-the-happy-unfortunate-vp-nights-09-20-12\/120920kp58584\/\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone size-large wp-image-5417\" title=\"120920KP58584\" src=\"http:\/\/stylusmagazine.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/120920KP58584-500x331.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"500\" height=\"331\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>Relic grabbed the mic from Abstract Artform and conveyed his appreciation to the crowd. There weren\u2019t hundreds in attendance but he made sure that he connected with his audience. Dude is humble, it\u2019s obvious. He started off with a couple crowd-response chants that warmed up the crowd nicely. He had us hooked by the third song \u201cWork of Heart\u201d off his new LP\u00a0<em>Miles To Go<\/em>. Check out Muneshine\u2019s mellow remix of this track online. Rel McCoy raps well.<\/p>\n<p><a rel=\"attachment wp-att-5418\" href=\"http:\/\/stylusmagazine.ca\/2012\/10\/01\/relic-abstract-artform-m-kaps-the-happy-unfortunate-vp-nights-09-20-12\/120920kp58600\/\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone size-large wp-image-5418\" title=\"120920KP58600\" src=\"http:\/\/stylusmagazine.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/120920KP58600-500x331.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"500\" height=\"331\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>When he spits you can hear every word. His production chops are simply excellent. The masterful use of samples and funky drum programming will leave you head-nodding non-stop. \u201cThe Goodness\u201d showcased his ability as a songwriter to write memorable hooks. He starts off singing during \u201cOut of the Blue\u201d and heck he sounds good. Heck it works. A warning; if you check out\u00a0<em>Miles To Go<\/em> on Bandcamp.com you will want to buy it!<\/p>\n<p><a rel=\"attachment wp-att-5419\" href=\"http:\/\/stylusmagazine.ca\/2012\/10\/01\/relic-abstract-artform-m-kaps-the-happy-unfortunate-vp-nights-09-20-12\/120920kp58611\/\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone size-large wp-image-5419\" title=\"120920KP58611\" src=\"http:\/\/stylusmagazine.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/120920KP58611-500x333.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"500\" height=\"333\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>by Ryan Reyes photos by Khammy\u00a0Phanthavong Relic aka Rel McCoy is touring the country in support of his album\u00a0Miles To Go. He\u2019s a talented jack-of-all-trades who raps, produces, engineers, DJ\u2019s and sings. The man has won a Juno for producing songs for Canadian hip hop artist Shad. His Winnipeg stop at VP Nights included local [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":12,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[434,556,1074],"class_list":["post-5412","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-live-bait","tag-hip-hop","tag-live-bait","tag-vp-nights"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ckuw.ca\/stylus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5412","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ckuw.ca\/stylus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ckuw.ca\/stylus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ckuw.ca\/stylus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/12"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ckuw.ca\/stylus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5412"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/ckuw.ca\/stylus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5412\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ckuw.ca\/stylus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5412"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ckuw.ca\/stylus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5412"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ckuw.ca\/stylus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5412"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}