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King Daniel : into the Lion's den!
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One
of the most promising MC's to bless many a Southern
Africans... over the last few years one could really
see the development in style, the growth in concepts
and the potency in delivery. You know this cat got madd
ideas and when you get the chance to speak to him you
get a sense of how much he values his artforms! Truely
inspirational! |
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King Daniel's
interview : |
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"Born in
October '79 in East London, I took on the name King
Daniel after reading the Ible and discovering myself
to be a modern day version of Daniel. I recall in St
8 another kid in the school started bringin mags like
source and vibe. At this time we was heavily caught
up in the r&b shit.. I then started to rade with
cats..pornmags and whatnot for the source. Soon after
this , we started wearing our school pants baggy, much
to the surprise of the teachers who thought we were
smokin weed or somethin. But that was only to come later...
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In '98, I relocated to CPT to study further and was
(briefly) registered at some university in the area.
I can't recall much of the academic year, youknowhatI'msayin!
It is here that I first clashed hiphop culture personified.
A writer name Falco came to out history of art class
to speak about grafitti. From then on I was hooked.
We went to matinees and shows all over the mother
shitty, where they'd often have open mics. Almost
by coincidence I ran into 3 or 4 cats who ultimately
introduced me to the underground, namely Fungus the
Mutated Lung , Gini Grindeth, Frank Talk and Gemini.
We all found that we stayed in the same area, and
we was constantly ciphing, skateboarding, bombing
trains-so you know the streeet was our backyard. |
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joined forces with 5th floor cats who were in my view
the only cats who was repping underground at the time.
Form this point on, we constantly ripped mics, always
eager to outscript the next cat. It is this cameraderie
that I believe sharpened our collective skills.We then
stumbled upon the concept that is the Uncanny Cessmen.
If you an comic book fan you'll immediately recognise
the influence. We decided with Cessmen to focus more
on writing hard lyrics that none could come close to,
and try they did. This is where we innovated the style
which so often goes over muthafuckas heads. |
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We
played at 2002's 'Fire on the mountain'. This was the
first outdoor hiphop festival of its kind in Southern
Africa showcasing acts such as Groundworks, BaseMental
Platform, Chronic clan and many many more cats who travelled
out there, some at their own expense. In 2003 I suddenly
found myself in the proverbial belly of the beast. On
a possession of marijuana charge. I was there for 30
days and nights. It is out of this hardship that I penned
'King Daniel in the lion's den'. |
| This was ultimately a 3-track
studio demo with beats by Marcus Wormstorm and a few
cuts by sibo, self-published and distributed out of
my backpack at gigs where we happened to be playing
and on a street level. I opted for the person-to-personapproach
as opposed to commercial style, due to the fact that
I feel most kids are not yet economically powerful to
the point where they can buy everyting they want and
need. Yet these are the kids who have supported us all
the years. It was thus my little way of giving back
to the community of CPT. |
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Early
2004 we began to conceptualise on the Uncanny Cessmen
compilation, and in between takes and while cats were
sleeping, I began to script 'Lyrical Miracle'. This
would be the full lenght debut record-almost an epilogue
to the Uncanny Cess project. Now complete, it's a 15
track epic which I hope, contains a little somthing
for everyone. Althiugh I was often told that a long
solo is not what cats are trying to hear' I took it
upon myself to see it through to the end. |
| At this point
we are, dare I say, finished with both projects as far
as recording is concerned, save a few retakes and masterings
here and there. Most of the beats are constructed by
myself, and others by friends like djpnice, the knowledgeist,
maf from First Case, Nomadic Ambassador (from Life forces,
East London) and Markus Wormstorm. We also featured
a lot of super nice guys from CPT such as First case,
Black Dillinger,Cross and Spencer, and Multiverse to
name a few... so keep a lookout. The rest is up to you..................."
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| Graffiti
: "It all goes together, there are the so
called ‘hand of Hip Hop’ as KRS would put
it…all those elements work together.So at times
you find…hey we’re DJ’ing and wouldn’t
know how we got to that point…just that you know
its Hip-Hop. We’re living it …we keeping
the dream alive. And gettinig into CPT life, I was surrounded
by alot of spray-can artist and I just immediately got
into bombing at that point… |
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| We took out alot of trains
in and around CPT & JHB. As for now, I can’t
say that I’m as heavily involved like I was, but
I do come out at least once a month. I always feel for
the come back piece… like sometimes your fingers
are just itching to write, then you must just go out
and do your thing…to ‘write what I like’
on that Steve Biko type…" |
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To
be continued ... |
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Page 10 : Fifth
Floor ... “Hip-Hop artistic/ original- we don’t
bite/ From b-boys to DJ’s to graffwork we stay
tight!"... Click here [...] |
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