{"id":9025,"date":"2014-05-29T14:37:49","date_gmt":"2014-05-29T14:37:49","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/stylusmagazine.ca\/?p=9025"},"modified":"2014-05-29T14:37:49","modified_gmt":"2014-05-29T14:37:49","slug":"super-duty-tough-work-grown-up-hip-hop","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ckuw.ca\/stylus\/2014\/05\/29\/super-duty-tough-work-grown-up-hip-hop\/","title":{"rendered":"Super Duty Tough Work :: Grown up hip hop"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"promo1\"<\/a><\/p>\n

by Martyna Turczynowicz<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u201cIf I\u2019m being completely frank, most music that\u2019s categorized as hip hop in Winnipeg that I see, I\u2019m really not feeling,\u201d says Brendan Grey, the brains and vocals behind Super Duty Tough Work and one of the Sleeping Giants one afternoon over coffee.<\/p>\n

Grey believes that hip hop should \u201cin the very least, draw on the four elements of b-boying, graffiti, DJing and emceeing, and the kind of ethics and morals that were a true part of Hip Hop\u2019s birth and inception,\u201d he tells\u00a0Stylus<\/em>. \u201cHave a good time, party,\u201d he adds. \u201cNot just party like go crazy, but have a good time, treat people well, treat each other well.\u201d<\/p>\n

Grey sees hip hop as a genre that\u2019s become \u201cso mainstream, so far away from those original morals and it\u2019s not connected to the original culture, it\u2019s become a corporate selling point for anything and everything, completely diluted and watered down.” When hip hop was born, \u201cthere was a strong aspect of social commentary that stemmed from social issues,\u201d which he senses is \u201ca little lost right now.\u201d<\/p>\n

Young people who have been raised on that kind of mainstream hip hop have a completely different understanding of it, Grey believes.<\/p>\n

\u201cTheir connection to it and their understanding of it is completely different, so what they want out of it is completely different,” he says. “Even those who are drawn to the older stuff, when it was more pure, they find it doesn\u2019t satisfy those more superficial needs.\u201d<\/p>\n

Grey\u2019s has been involved in Winnipeg\u2019s hip hop scene for almost ten years. He met Nereo II, one of the original members of Sleeping Giants, \u201cIn a battle at Wise Guys at U of M in 2003. We used to meet up and have ciphers in Merchant Park. That was a big thing for emceeing, b-boys and graffiti artists at the time.\u201d<\/p>\n

In 2006, they teamed up a few others and formed Sleeping Giants. The band\u2019s been working on an album since 2010, but \u201cfor whatever reason it\u2019s never been able to have to come out, the sound\u2019s never right. It\u2019s just never right.”\u00a0Recently Sleeping Giants have taken up working on the record again and he hopes that \u201cin the next month or two you\u2019ll be seeing some material.”<\/p>\n

This brings us to 2014, and Brendan\u2019s latest project, Super Duty Tough Work.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe goal with SDTW is to give that really raw, authentic, hip hop sound, using a live band, live instruments and a DJ. Just high quality music and high caliber lyrics. Something that has a little bit more value than the other things I\u2019m seeing.\u201d Most importantly he adds, \u201cthe goal is to have fun and to play music that I\u2019d like to hear.”<\/p>\n

It\u2019s grown-up hip hop, with the funk that\u2019s expected from the genre and a polished sound that comes from working with seasoned musicians. The performance aspect is a big part of Super Duty Tough Work too, the band is comprised of a rotating group of musicians, featuring different people on bass, percussion, keys, sax, at each show. It adds flavour to the performances, percussionist Tony Ustel tells Stylus.<\/em>\u00a0\u201cThe rotation of musicians performing makes every show feel like it\u2019s the first time,” says Ustel. “Everybody\u2019s excited to be there and there\u2019s always a new dynamic.\u201d<\/p>\n

Working with young people counts as another of Grey\u2019s passions. He volunteers in drop-in centers and after-school programs, helping kids develop musical skills and being what he hopes is a positive role model \u201cwhether you have great parents or bad parents, you\u2019re still going to be influenced by outside factors. Everyone looks to someone different. Some people look to soccer players, movie stars, fashion designers or whatever. Some people look to musicians and artists.\u201d<\/p>\n

That doesn\u2019t mean artists have to be squeaky clean, Grey says, \u201cBut artists whose market is younger people who are in the stage when they\u2019re beginning to make decisions based on outside factors should take into account that they have power and influence.\u201d \u00a0There\u2019s room for everything, he\u2019s not saying that \u201cAll these different things in Hip Hop can\u2019t exist, they just can\u2019t be the only thing people see. Especially if that\u2019s what being used to represent hip hop when that\u2019s the furthest thing from how and where it started.”<\/p>\n

Grey knows as well as anybody that \u201c Nobody wants, cheesy, corny music. Nobody wants to be talked down to or beat over the head. A part of Hip Hop is that it\u2019s this raw, jagged, painfully truthful reflection of society.\u201d He points at Will Smith as an example of a musician with a positive message who produces quality music Most people, in hip hop who consider themselves to be \u201cMore hardcore or whatever, probably wouldn\u2019t really respect Will Smith, but he has moved a lot of units. So there are a lot of people listening.\u201d \u201cI recently read an interview with Nas where he said and this is a quote that \u2018Will Smith can rhyme\u2019. \u201c<\/p>\n

In the end, Grey says \u201cIt all depends on how you do it, and I guess the trick is how you balance it.\u201d<\/p>\n

Super Duty Tough Work will be playing at Souled Out Saturday May 31, with Keisha Booker, Jupiter Storm and The Silver Fox at FrameArts, 318 Ross. Doors at 9pm, tickets are $12.\u00a0\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

by Martyna Turczynowicz \u201cIf I\u2019m being completely frank, most music that\u2019s categorized as hip hop in Winnipeg that I see, I\u2019m really not feeling,\u201d says Brendan Grey, the brains and vocals behind Super Duty Tough Work and one of the Sleeping Giants one afternoon over coffee.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":12,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[434,563],"class_list":["post-9025","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-features","tag-hip-hop","tag-local"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ckuw.ca\/stylus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9025","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=9025"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/ckuw.ca\/stylus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9025\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ckuw.ca\/stylus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9025"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ckuw.ca\/stylus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9025"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ckuw.ca\/stylus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9025"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}