history :: The New Corroboree

Back in 2001 I spent months researching "Aboriginal Hip Hop". At the time, I could only find a couple of independently released songs, two compilations, and great material unrecorded, captured inside people like Wire MC. In 2002 my research was published as an article in now defunct JUICE magazine. Now in 2006, my 2001 lecturer Tony Mitchell has given the topic a mainstream stage in The Age newspaper. Get the latest issue of Meanjin for the whole story!

The new corroboree
The Age, 1 April 2006

The oral traditions of Aboriginal societies have paved the way for a vibrant hip-hop scene, but the local rappers are not simply mimicking US styles, Tony Mitchell finds. It is also helping preserve indigenous languages...

Hip-hop's connections with traditional Aboriginal culture are perhaps best expressed by MC Wire, who performs a track called, "It's a modern day corroboree" and who told Moses Iten in 2001: "This is my lyrical healing. I can't go and get scarred any more and I can't become a traditional man. I'm a modern day blackfella, this is still Dreamtime for me. Hip-hop is the new clapsticks, hip-hop is the new corroboree"...

Read the full story here.