by christina wagner
Ian Ranne is insane. He DJs, owns a bar, runs Hip Hop Hell all over Downtown and, if that wasn't enough, he has now started a record label. I was more than interested to see what these guys were all about. I'll put it to you this way, the CD stayed in my car for over a week. The great thing about this album, Ian tells me, is that there is one MC and one producer. Straight to the point, a work of art. Signing them was a no-brainer, not only because of the music, but because they are self-sufficient in meeting deadlines, producing amazing material and putting on a fantastic show. Go to myspace.com/thenwordmusic to check out some of their videos or check them out live at Freebird in Jacksonville Beach on July 1st.
EU: The name of your group is pretty interesting. Care to explain?
Nomad: (Laughing) It's simple, yeah.
Notsucal: Yeah, we just took the first letter of both our first names.
Nomad: Plus it's just a cheap way of creating some buzz. (Laughing) That's basically the whole gist of it.
EU: There has been a lot of controversy over MCs using the "N word." Where do you stand in all of it?
Nomad: I don't use it that often. It's just a preference. I really don't have a comment on it, if you want to do it, you do it. But I choose not to use it. It's just not a part of my vocabulary.
EU: What first got you boys excited about music and how long have you been at it?
Notsucal: We started about ten years ago, but within the last two years, we really, really started getting on with...
Nomad: Yeah, we had a group back in the day that we started, never finished, and we were both working with a big collective called Third Dimension. And pretty much he started doing his own thing, I was doing my own thing. And I started hearing some of the beats that he made and he started sending me tracks then, yeah, the rest is history.
EU: You'll have to forgive me, I'm a little green when it comes to hip-hop terminology, but I love the choice of old school soul embedded in your tracks. You produced your beats?
Notsucal: Yeah, I did all the beats on it. Yeah, that's the shit I listened to, ya know? So, if I'm going to sample something, I want to be able to listen to it myself first and foremost, and thank God everyone else is liking it so far too.
Nomad: Basically, yeah, it starts from digging. Digging through the old stuff we listen to here.
EU: There's a real fresh and upbeat vibe in all of your music. What do you feel sets you apart from other hip-hop acts?
Nomad: I would say all the songs are pretty much conceptualized. You'll hear a lot of hip-hop tracks. Let's get five people in the track and rap about different things or let's rap about three different things in three different verses. Pretty much, we start a song and have to have a premise to the song. You might not catch the meaning because it's built on a lot of metaphors, but every song, pretty much has a concept to it. I think that sets us apart from a lot of local acts, for sure.
Notsucal: Yeah, we think about it before we do it. We don't sit in a studio all day, we don't actually record that often. We think about what we're going to do before we do it. Get it ready, get it planned out and then we go in there and record it.
EU: Do you have any fellow jacksonville acts you enjoy sharing the stage with, more than others?
Notsucal: Dr. Beckett, the Smile Rays, of course.
Nomad: Simple Complexity, they are always dope.
EU: You guys are the first act on Hip Hop Hell records. Excited, honored and nervous?
Nomad: I've know this cat for a long time (pointing to Ian). He's always been talking about putting something together. He's kept his word after what, three different groups I've been in. He's kept his word and he's doing his thing now.
Ian: It started over a drunken conversation about five years ago at the Art Bar. (All laughing)
Notsucal: Yeah, I'm excited about it, I mean, Ian's the only one that puts together the showcases that I like to go to. He caters to our genre and for him to pick a record that I'm part of, to do, I'm loving that.
Nomad: We're all pretty much on the same wavelength when it comes to hip-hop so it makes it much easier.
EU: My personal favorite track is D.A.R.Y.L. What inspired the song and where does most of your writing come from?
Nomad: My government name. It just basically stands for Data Analyzing Rocking Youth Life Forms. I took it off the old eighties movie and I turned myself into a hip-hop robot. If you listen to the song, it's based upon a whole bunch of crazy mechanical type of phrases. We have a video for it too.
Notsucal: Yeah Dolfo hooked that up. Go watch it.
EU: What are your future plans? Planning on touring to spread around the album?
Nomad: Promotions, promoting promoting promoting.
Notsucal: Right now, we're doing as many shows as possible. Pretty much, the three of us get together on a monthly basis and chart out what we are going to do for that month.
If you miss the Freebird Live show on Sunday, you can catch The N Word at the Summertime in the City festival on July 15 in downtown Jacksonville with ten other hip-hop groups that represent some of the best new hip-hop acts in the region.
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