Illy
The Chase | 2011-04-06 00:30 | Written By: by AIR
We ain't covered very much Hip Hop on these here pages... so here we go.
Illy surprised us last year when his album "The Chase" debuted at number one on the Jagermeister Independent Charts. But we shouldn't have been surprised at all. On the strength of lead track "Happiness" (featuring Owl Eyes), he'd been all over our airwaves for a few months. When the full album of hooks and melodies dropped, the music buying public (or what remains of it) lapped it up. "The Chase" was full of sweet collaborations with hip, beautiful young singers, Illy's own rhymes were a pleasure to listen to, the songs were radio friendly and the ear-worms were everywhere... check out Ciggarettes and Diamonds (featuring Wren), case and point. Great stuff.
When someone writes a history of Australian hip hop 20 years from now, I think the benefit of hindsight might group Illy, Pez, 360 and their contemporaries as a kind of "second school". They're all MC's that grew up listening to the music of the ground-breakers, The Herd, Downsyde, 1200 Techniques, Pegz, Bliss N Eso, TZU and Hilltop Hoods.
There's no doubting that this "Second School" is influenced stylistically by aforementoned pioneers but they've also gleefully added pop smarts, synths, interesting musical references and melodies to the mix. They're taking Australian hip hop to newer, fruitier, more interesting places. This stuff has the potential for wider appeal...
Thats not to say that the artists that i've mentioned above have had their day, not by a long shot, but it feels to me like Illy and his fellow Generation Y MC's are the artists that will take Australian Hip Hop to new and exciting places for many years to come.
We've embedded Illy's latest clip above. Unmistakeably Melbourne, full of all the all the qualities we've mentioned.
