MEDIA ROOTS– An age-old question among activists and the media is how to grab an audience’s attention and hold it. In a society accustomed to twitter feeds, sound bites and news that serves to either placate viewers with entertainment or alarm them beyond reason, knowing how to engage people on serious issues can be quite the challenge.

In order to reach a culture that is over saturated with sensationalism and new technology, one thing though, is for sure– you have to be creative.

Many people would rather be mindlessly entertained than learn about depressing news. So why not use entertainment to inform the masses?  Inspired to combine music and news-room journalism, two European expatriates living in Australia combined their powers of lyrically creative brilliance, comical acting and historical and political knowledge to form the eccentric character Robert Foster– host of Rap News.

From the initial looks of it, Rap News appears to be a one-man show with a series of goofy wigs and costume changes that turn Hugo Farrant from anchorman Robert Foster into multiple other entertaining characters featured in each episode. Yet, upon closer listening, the creativity of the report’s content and lyrics reveal the wit and intellect of Giordano Nanni, the composer, editor, director and researcher who co-writes the episodes with Hugo.

As a team, Hugo and Giordano take on important issues facing the world and critically frame them with ingenious, cutting lyrical verse, all the while using humor to relay their message. For example, their latest episode Rap News vs. News World Order, in which Wikileaks’s Julian Assange made a live debut, Robert Foster wrapped up the show with these words- 

It seems, journalism’s become a dangerous profession

Risking ostracism, extradition

To provide a clear picture of the world we live in

But without truth, history will certainly repeat.

The same wars, in this time of universal deceit,

Telling the truth has become a revolutionary act

So I salute those who disclose the necessary facts.

Some of our other favorite Rap News lyrics are from Obama Wins the Nobel ‘War is Peace’ Prize–

Any serious examination leads to the raw truth

This isn’t a price for Obama, it’s a prize for George Bush

Nobel’s message seems to  be War is Peace and it’s all well

When all is war, and didn’t we read that in Orwell?

Well, From the depths of doublethink and newspeak

This is Robert Foster, for Juice Media

Have a double plus good week. 

Julian Assange thinks these guys have got it right and so do we. Inspired by the duo, Media Roots reached out to the minds behind Rap News to learn how they started, what inspires them and what the future has in store for Robert Foster. 

 

MR: Who are you both? What are your backgrounds?

Hugo: I’m an exile from the UK who left to find greener pastures, both creatively and socially, here in Australia. My background is in teaching, but my passion is rhyme writing and performance.

Giordano: I’m an exile from Italy who came to Melbourne about 8 years ago. My background is history—having studied and written on colonial history—but my various projects and activities embrace music, theatre, indy-journalism and film-making, etc.

MR: What caused your political awakening? What led you both to Australia and ultimately to finding each other?

Hugo: I wouldn’t describe myself as politically awakened. More politically curious, but lacking in discipline, and someone like Giordano has the requisite knowledge to satisfy my curiosity. I was always into bands like Rage Against the Machine back in the day, so I was aware of the potential of music to deliver political messages.

I was keen to participate in that style of art, but absolutely didn’t want to be another rapper complaining about things without the academic clout to back up the arguments. Giordano and I found each other through a mutual rock musician friend, and immediately bonded over shared interests in media, movies, music, conspiracy theories and Medieval Italian poetry.

Giordano: I think one of my first ‘political’ awakenings occurred when I was 18 or so; one of the (few) great teachers I had at University suggested I read Hidden Agendas by John Pilger. It shocked and blew me away at the time. It was one of the first books which sparked my awareness of what was happening in the world, and which alerted me to the vital importance of journalism therein.

But the awakenings have been ongoing since then. Relatively recently, during the 2008 presidential campaign I discovered Ralph Nader—thanks to the Internet and YouTube—not thanks to TV, interestingly enough. Hearing him speak was a real awakening, in the sense that I had long since given up placing any faith in the political process. Nader has taught me that politics can be a noble profession; it’s not that all politicians are bastards, but rather that most Americans seem to vote for the bastards rather than honest ones!

MR: I agree about Nader. How did Rap News come into fruition and why did you choose this approach?

Giordano: Rap News was born in late 2009 but its roots go back a bit further.

Hugo: It came about through resurrecting a ‘music journalism’ project, which Giordano had previously worked on—an audio precursor to Rap News. I heard about this and liked the idea, and asked if I might get involved. Once we sat down and planned, and decided that I would rap all the characters, it became clear that trying to be serious while wearing so many stupid wigs was probably unrealistic, so the comedy element came to the fore.

Giordano: Yeah, as George Bernard Shaw said, “If you’re going to tell people the truth, you better make them laugh; otherwise they’ll kill you”.

The news-room has become such a powerful and globally recognized icon of knowledge and information: everything is offered daily, to millions of viewers, as ‘the truth’. Rap News appropriated this device but tries to shine a little light on some of the unspoken premises that prop up the cultural fictions regurgitated daily by the mainstream news networks. Back in the days when I still bothered watching TV news, I often felt an irresistible urge to shout back at TV set in frustration. Now Robert Foster provides a channel for that outlet! I guess this also inspired our approach to delivering the news.

MR: Hugo is an extremely good rapper and the rhymes in Rap News are incredibly informative, intelligent and cutting. Have you always used hip-hop as a form of poetic expression and when did you begin incorporating political commentary into your rapping? How long have you been performing publicly?

Hugo: Thanks for your feedback! The informative and intelligent nature of the rhymes comes from Giordano. He provides the ‘juice’ of the dialogue, the research to back it up, and is responsible for all the most cutting elements of each episode. Rumsfeld saying, ‘We’ll write the history books’ as a prime example.

My job is to make the thing rhyme and flow, and put in a bit of puerile humor, as well as over-act! My own rap persona is much less popular than Rap News, but yes, I do perform at festivals and venues in Australia, both with Treats­—an excellent DJ—and with the rising live band ‘Dub The Magic Dragon’, touring India, March 2011.

My stage name is Hugo, but political listeners will not find much juice there—now that I am involved with Rap News, I prefer to wax philosophical, comical and spiritual in my solo work, and leave the political content to a properly researched forum such Rap News.

Giordano: Hugo is being characteristically modest: He is in fact very well known, and highly appreciated, in Melbourne, for rocking audiences and making a real impact on people’s lives through his art. 

 

MR: Your two latest videos seem to have a more professional production than your first couple—the lower third text scroll, the Fox news graphics, etc. Are more people offering to help or are you just refining your skills together?

Giordano: Ever since we launched Rap News, people have offered to help us by offering to donate their talent and skills to the show. Probably one of most rewarding results has been witnessing all this willingness to contribute. As suggested to me by someone who truly understands this—Julian Assange—this willingness to contribute is one of the benefits of promoting a shared value. People want to lend their skills and play a part in it.

Ironically, however, we’ve never been too concerned with trying to look pro: the bedroom-studio-feel being a faithful reflection of the means and time at our disposal—a reminder that anyone can potentially do this.

We started off simply by borrowing cameras and making do with what we had at hand. Our backdrops were bed sheets and the lighting rig comprised an array of six, tenuously balanced desk-lamps. We incorporated new stuff gradually—like the green-screen background—and I am slowly getting a lot better and faster at editing, even though I’m really still just hacking it.

But to answer your question: we decided to call upon reinforcements for the latest News World Order episode because we really needed to replicate that familiar ‘official newsroom’ environment—saturated with useless information, artificially enhanced by fancy graphics, logos and slogans which distract and sedate and constantly blur the line between fact and fiction, information and entertainment. Such visual mayhem couldn’t have come about without the help of some skilled artists: Melbourne-based artist, Zoe Tame, in particular, worked hard to create all the images, replica logos and overlays; while others helped with tickertapes, animations and advice.

Oh and Zoe also designed the kick-ass website: www.TheJuiceMedia.com. So yeah, Hugo and I still do the vast majority of the work, but we’ve also benefitted immensely from the help of other people.

MR: What does the creation process of rap news look like? How long does it take to produce one video—from the idea to the lyrics to the costumes, editing and graphics? How many people are involved in the production and what are their roles?

Hugo: A realistic minimum length of production is two weeks. That includes initial meetings and brainstorming, about 24 hours of writing—spread over a few days, and with several drafts winging back and forth between me and Giordano—recording is generally done in two sessions, we source the costumes from fancy dress shops, and the most fun day, as far as I’m concerned, is filming day, when we get to bring the audio to life on screen, and horse around. Then the real work begins in Giordano’s lab, where it all gets edited and tweaked until it’s ready to be unleashed.

MR: Are your videos getting viral just because they kick so much ass or are you getting some outside help with promotion and coverage?

Hugo: We try to keep the ass-kicking level to the highest degree.

We’re not affiliated with YouTube’s partner program, and so we never get ‘featured video’ status. We are regularly offered the opportunity to opt in for ‘revenue-sharing’, i.e. advertizing, but the prospect of earning a bit of money this way is outweighed by the desire to keep the Juice Media Rap News channel free of ads for our viewers

Having said that, we have managed to attract many excellent fans to the show, and they, along with some great contacts in the indy-media world, are responsible for spreading the clips far and wide. We really do feel very grateful to everyone who watches, comments, gets in touch, shares the link, and of course to the numerous people who have donated through the website since episodes 4 and 5 hit the sites.

MR: You incorporate many facts that are under reported by the mainstream, like the 1,000,000 dead Iraqis figure, and Obama’s continuation of Bush-era policies. Where do you guys go to for your information—what media outlets and organizations out there do you think are doing it right? I am assuming Democracy Now is one of them—with the product placement and all.

Giordano: There are many indy-news outlets which do a fantastic job—Media Roots being a good case in point—but there are very few large news organizations which I know about, that are doing it right.

As you’ve deduced so perceptively from Robert Foster’s choice of coffee mug, Democracy Now is definitely one of them. After years of following this show, I am still thrilled about what it does. I really feel a sense of responsibility for how much (and how little) I know about the world around me; so I really value this portal of information. For the past 2 years I’ve had them as my computer home page.

Amid the wasteland of mainstream journalism, Amy Goodman and the DN crew have set a proper standard for how ‘news’ ought to be delivered and debated. It’s an hour-long show, with in-depth interviews that truly elucidate subjects, which are not given anywhere near the attention that is due to them in the mainstream media. And, above all, they don’t waste broadcast time reporting on sports!! They are not entertainers and media hacks; and, most importantly, they are independently funded. I can trust them.

Other than this, I rely on links to website, articles by indy-journalists, and random bits of information that come my way.

MR: I couldn’t help but notice the play on the phrase “New World Order”. A lot of people think that the New World Order is an elite group of globalists embarking to take over every aspect of life on this planet. Others think it is simply a powerhouse of ideas and groups of people for the purpose of control and profit maximization. What do you guys think the New World Order is and why did you choose to portray O’Reilly/Fox as part of it?

Giordano: It’s a good question Abby.

We tend to think that many popular understandings of the ‘NWO’ are falsely premised on an externalized source of power. This is appealing, since it evokes that basic paradigm of good versus evil—and sure enough, we always identify as the goodies.

But let’s look at it this way: The two descriptions you provided for the NWO—‘a group of globalists embarking to take over every aspect of life on this planet’ and ‘a powerhouse of ideas and groups of people for the purpose of control and profit maximization’—could well apply to the general behavior of western/westernized society over the past six hundred years—some sections of that society of course benefitting more than others!

In this sense we are virtually all beneficiaries and patrons of the ‘NWO’ in one way or another; which makes the prospect of defeating it somewhat paradoxical—or hypocritical. It’s a fascinating issue and it goes to the very heart of what we’re trying to say. We’re actually planning an episode, which will focus precisely on this subject; hopefully it will make more sense expressed in rhyme! But it’s probably not going to be what most people expect to hear.

 

MR: I love the Wikileaks endorsement of Rap News. Did Assange reach out to you after seeing your work? How did you get him in the flesh for your recent video?

Giordano: Julian really loved the first Rap News episode we did on Wikileaks, Wikileaks v. The Pentagon, in which Hugo impersonated Assange as a quirky, matrix-like trickster.

Subsequently, ahead of Wikileaks’ latest historic disclosure of 400,000 documents relating to the Iraq war, Julian made contact with us and invited us to take a sneak peak at some of the Iraq War Logs in view of informing the content of a new episode.

Of course, we jumped at the opportunity and were aboard planes within a fortnight. We arrived in London only two weeks prior to the scheduled launch of the Iraq War Logs, on October 23, which meant that we faced the absurd and terrific challenge of writing, recording and filming an entire episode in under 4 days—a stunt we pulled thanks to the invaluable help of two awesome Wikileaks crew-members, and thanks to our friend and supporter back in Melbourne, Asher—aka Mama Wolf.

As for the cameo, we asked Julian straight up, thinking that his appearance might be a historic and comedic event—not just for Wikileaks and Rap News, but for that demographic of the internet community which has been so avidly following what’s going on with Wikileaks. Despite a couple of initial raised eyebrows, Julian was totally up for it. We didn’t pull any punches on the gags, either. Thankfully the man has a great sense of humor.

MR: Awesome! What issues today are of greatest concern to you both?

Giordano: I wouldn’t know where to start; all the seemingly separate issues, which I could list, are really interconnected. I am deeply concerned about environmental issues, but I don’t think it’s just about energy use.

If I had to choose one central issue, I’d point to the ongoing treatment of, and attitude towards, ‘Indigenous’ cultures on this planet, which represents an ongoing war on alternative philosophies of life. I think there’s a strong correlation between this war and the multiple problems we face today—especially the devastation of our environment. 

Hugo: For my part, modern humanity’s general belief in separateness is probably my over-arching concern. We have spent centuries alienating ourselves from the planet, which gave birth to us, and separating ourselves from each other, along barely relevant racial and cultural lines. We now face the dramatic, inevitable consequences of our desire for separateness. But if reading philosophy has brought me any concrete conclusion at all, it is that ultimately, and in a very real sense, as Neil deGrasse Tyson asserts, ‘we are all connected’. By perceiving our connectedness, even to the aspects of life we judge as negative, I strongly believe that true lasting evolution can take place. Rejecting and excluding those aspects only leads to their perpetuation.

MR: What are some of your biggest musical, poetic and political inspirations?

Hugo: Too numerous to mention, but in terms of comedy, certainly the great, great Bill Hicks, the guys behind South Park and Team America, Chris Morris for his incredible work on Brass Eye and The Day Today, and of course, the 90’s BBC comedy The League of Gentlemen—if we could get access to their make-up department, I’d be one happy over-actor.

As for hip hop, my top inspiration is now-defunct but never surpassed French outfit Saian Supa Crew, and from Australia, close friends and personal heroes, DJ Treats, Julez, Mantra and Elf Tranzporter.

And as far as literature goes, it’s all about Dante Alighieri and Jonathan Swift. Gulliver’s Travels is a satire broader than any before or since, and is the benchmark against which all such work must be measured.

Giordano: My mind has been blown, and my soul nourished, by many more powerful and precious sources of musical and poetic inspiration than I can even mention—from William Blake and Leopardi, to Pink Floyd, Roger Waters in particular, to Rage Against the Machine; from comedians Bill Hicks and George Carlin—who saved my life by revealing the comedy of it all—to writers like George Orwell, Jorge Louis Borges and Herman Hesse, who have been guiding lights.

As for political inspiration, I listen carefully to what Noam Chomsky and Ralph Nader have to say these days, while they’re still with us.

MR: Do you hope to team up or collaborate with any other political or media players in the future?

Hugo: The beauty of the project is that we don’t really need to. If we want someone in the show, like Donald Rumsfeld, we can just come up with a poor impersonation of him and get some laughs out of the hokiness of it. Nevertheless, we’re always open to offers, and when the possibility of that episode 5 cameo was mooted, we jumped at it. So the answer is, ‘definitely’; but in the meantime, we’ll just keep doing the bad wig, bad accent, bad hand gestures thing.

MR: What else is in store for Juice Media and Rap News? Are you planning any other projects or just focusing on these segments for now?

Hugo & Giordano:  We’re really going with the flow here, working during the glitches of our less-adventurous lives. TheJuiceMedia will continue it’s less glamorous but highly valuable purpose of broadcasting Indigenous, Aboriginal Australian voices to a wider local and international audience. We’ll keep developing Rap News, exploring the vastness of topics and narratives, which are out there begging to be translated into rhyme and reason. We hope that Robert Foster’s voice might one day become an important one. Stay tuned.

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Rap News vs News World Order ( Wikileaks and the War on Journalism)

 

Rap News: Obama Wins Nobel War is Peace Prize

Check out more about Juice Media and Rap News at http://thejuicemedia.com or find them on Facebook.

Lyrics: http://www.reverbnation.com/rapnews

Downloads: http://www.reverbnation.com/rapnews

 

Written by Abby Martin and Alicia Roldan

Dystopia, Collage & Acrylic on Matte Board, 11” x 14”

To check out more of Abby Martin’s art go to www.ABBYMARTIN.org

 

MEDIA ROOTS- As the world of art becomes increasingly homogenized, it is growing harder to come across original art that has societal and political significance. With the exception of Banksy and a few others, rarely do you see a prominent artist putting themselves out there to make a bold statement or provoke controversial thought. Like every other commodity in this corporatist system, popular modern art has become an over-produced, unoriginal, profit driven industry.

In times of perpetual wars and endless threats, dissenting propaganda artists have always been a crucial element of communication, organization and reflection. For our generation- there is Nathan Janes (AKA Red Baron), a propaganda artist and political activist who refuses to sell out to the system.

Janes is the mind behind PUPAGANDA, a pop art website countering the societal saturation of ‘meaningless advertising art’ by providing more inspiring, thought provoking work.  According to Janes, “It’s time people quit living a life of constant entertainment and start engaging in critical thought while questioning the barrage of commercial images and propaganda that they are faced with each day.”

His motivation is to open minds by depicting the machinery the global elite use to advance their own agenda.  And he does it with a man’s best friend – Janes uses the comforting imagery of dogs because they serve as an artistic tool for individuals to explore contentious topics.

Janes’s art has been featured in multiple prominent publications and he has been commissioned to do paintings by celebrities like Caprice Bourret and Pete Wentz of the band Fall Out Boy. Media Roots recently sat down with Nathan Janes for an exclusive interview about his artistic and political endeavors.

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MR: What was your political awakening? Why did you start making political art?

NJ: My political awakening happened about three years ago. My journey began when my musician friend Photon Man gave me a copy of Terrorstorm by Alex Jones. It wasn’t long before I transformed my art from “Pop ARF” to “PUPAGANDA.” My previous “Pop ARF” artwork focused on the heartwarming appeal of dogs; I promoted the message of the prevention of cruelty towards animals but many of my paintings were just aesthetically pleasing without any particular message. While I still have compassion for dogs, my focus today is to awaken the general public to the ways in which we have been trained to follow our masters much like dogs. 

Since I have begun to create more powerful and thought provoking paintings, interest from art publications and other media that once promoted my work has ceased. Today’s artists found in the mainstream media and major galleries, create work lacking careful analysis of society. Artists that make strong statements about the Establishment and the ways in which we are being controlled and managed may never be promoted widely because we are a threat to the status quo.

MR: Why do you paint dogs and how does that fit into the messages you relay?

NJ: Dogs are the perfect subject to communicate my message because people still have empathy and compassion for dogs. We have been exposed to dehumanization through a constant flow of images on television, in movies, and in print depicting so much violence against our own kind that people no longer have compassion for one another. When something tragic happens to another human being, we are unable to react but if a dog is abused in anyway there is a sudden swell of compassion. There are also many parallels between the ways that dogs are trained and how we are conditioned by culture, which make for powerful paintings.

MR: What mediums do you usually work with?

NJ: I work in acrylics and usually paint on stretched canvas.

MR: Did you have any art school training or does painting come naturally for you?

NJ: I am a graduate of the Columbus College of Art and Design in Columbus, Ohio. My work today is a representation of my hard work and incredibly intensive practice.  I began training to be an artist as a freshman in High School. I am not talented or gifted; I have just applied myself and developed my skills and technique over many years.

MR: You just launched an international campaign that sparked attention worldwide, including a plug from Adbusters. What is Unplug the Signal, and why should people get involved?

NJ: Unplug the Signal is a campaign to turn off televisions.  I designed the campaign to create awareness of the gross manipulation of reality that is broadcast by the six major corporations controlling the content of television. With the average American adult watching more than 4 hours of television each day, the television plays a major role in continually creating the perceived reality in which we live.  The television has been used as a weapon of mass deception for the last half a century; it manages society and culture through such techniques as perception management, behavior placement, predictive programming and crisis creation.

People should get involved with this campaign because the television remains our greatest threat to individual sovereignty and the largest obstacle to becoming a truly informed individual. In order for individuals to see the real locus of control and look beyond such things as the false left/right paradigm, they will first need to be able to get beyond the paradigm conditioned by the television. In order for people to wake up, this information needs to be shared between families, friends, and neighbors. The campaign has just begun and already the message is spreading. I am very happy with the feedback it has been receiving.

MR: What are your three favorite pieces and what do they represent?

NJ: My three favorite pieces would be those that focus on the engineering and control of society through television:

Total Indoctrination, Acrylic on Canvas, 48” x 48”, 2009

This painting represents how totally absorbed someone who regularly watches television can become, where they see everything within their lives relating somehow to television. It depicts a life where anything outside TV is rejected and all thoughts and discussions are just recycled conversations from TV and slogans from those sold to us as authorities and experts.

TV Mind Control, Acrylic on Canvas, 36” x 48”, 2009

This piece depicts the hypnotic affect of television as those who watch become a subject of mind-control. Too often the brain is switched to standby and all information is collected and accepted as truth without any questioning.  When viewing television, we do not consciously rationalize the information resonating within our unconscious depths; the hypnotic affect makes us highly suggestible.

 

Unplug the Signal, Acrylic and Masonite, 20″ x 16″, 2010

“Unplug the Signal” represents the constant flow of information that is transmitted by the television 24 hours a day. It is this signal which places the viewers all on the same page and makes them highly predictable. Plato’s Cave serves as an allegory for this phenomenon. In Plato’s cave, people view the shadows on the wall and interpret these shadows as reality. When one of them finds a way out of the cave and returns to tell the others what is outside, he and his message are rejected. When individuals are so thoroughly engrossed by the message of television, they will reject any information outside of the paradigm it presents while attacking and ridiculing the messenger.

 

MR: What is in store for Nathan Janes?

NJ: I am currently working on a painting of the President’s dog. This painting is a critical assessment I created in response to the threats to our liberties as sovereign citizens of this Republic. As for what’s in store, I will be working on a painting on Tiananmen Square, Chemtrails, implantable microchips and other projects that will spread the message of the Unplug the Signal Campaign including poetry, song writing, and the development of an literary allegory.

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Find out more about Nathan “Red Baron” Janes at PUPAGANDA, or follow his work on Facebook and YouTube. Get involved in his Unplug the Signal campaign at UnplugtheSignal.com

Abby

MEDIA ROOTS– I remember singing Paul Revere with fifteen year old Giovanni Giusti as a freshman in high school at our table in art class.

Now I’m hearing his band The Limousines get introduced on the radio in the same breath as the legendary Beastie Boys.

In high school I knew Giovanni as a witty, sarcastic, Italian kid who loved hip hop and breakdancing. It’s through that lifestyle that he got turned on to turn-tabling, where he developed his passion for building, breaking down and reconstructing beats.

Giovanni studied music at Expressions, a bay area music and visual arts college, where he was able to master his engineering skills and perfect his sound.

Under the name Nozebleed, Giovanni released his first solo album called Heart Beats Digital which consists of experimental hip hop beats and beautiful ethereal melodies built upon hundreds of samples taken from him and others. The album is a whimsical candy land for electronic music- it’s girly and fun, light hearted yet multi-layered.

His second release, Romantics of the Rhino, also embodies the imaginative style and playful yet heart felt quality as Heart Beats, but Romantics contains a darker, more passionate build up and feel. The album is most likely a reflection of his mind state during its development and production. As an artist, Giovanni wears his heart on his sleeve, and isn’t afraid to express his emotions or display heartbreak through his work. He processes his life through music and also embraces it as his therapy to overcome his personal struggles.

After releasing Romantics, Giovanni once again decided to challenge himself by tapping into the art of lyricism and writing with his third release- Apology Accepted. Admittedly not gifted with natural singing abilities, Giovanni didn’t hold back from adapting the emerging technological capabilities of autotune to manipulate his voice to coincide with his fresh beats. It was a totally different style for his fans, but he doesn’t regret the exploration into new creative avenues, since it all has made him who he is today.

Giovanni’s beats gained a lot of notoriety in different circles, including jumps on Adult Swim and spots on numerous television shows. And once Eric Victorino of Strata heard Gio’s music, he was drawn in. They started to collaborate their creations, and the rest is history in the making.

The Limousines’s full length album, Get Sharp, is a slick and extremely catchy electronic pop album. It’s the kind of album that worms itself into your dreams and you wake up singing the lyrics to.

Eric’s voice is strong and melodic, and he carries Gio’s beautifully smooth yet complicated beats effortlessly. The Limousines are gaining a ton of attention all over the world and they’re lining up tour dates left and right. They already have two hit singles off the album- Very Busy People, and Internet Killed the Video Star, and that’s just the beginning.

Media Roots recently sat down with Giovanni Giusti for an exclusive interview about his music and whirlwind journey as The Limousines.

MR: Who are some of your biggest musical influences?

GG: My influences range from early jazz like Dave Brubeck and Wes Montgomery, Miles Davis, Al Green, Van Morrison, to newer stuff like Bat For Lashes, Daft Punk, New Order, Friendly Fires, Yeasayer, Calvin Harris, Chromeo, Vampire Weekend, Phoenix, Lady Gaga, and Kanye West.

MR: How did you get into beat making?

GG: My buddy Todd and I used to scratch on turntables all the time, and through doing that I got more interested in the beats stuff, because I was scratching over the beats and they were just more intriguing to me. I wanted to learn how to do that, so I Googled it. Then I bought a MPC out of college and started just sampling records and figuring it out.

MR: What was the musical transition for you from mixing records to developing the beats of Heart Beats Digital and Romantics of the Rhino?

GG: I was doing hip hop stuff which was mostly sampling old records and chopping those up, but with Heart Beats it was pivotal because I was incorporating synth sounds over the samples and was creating new melodies and new music through that- like I would find a key of a song through what I am sampling, but then I would build it into something else. It was a really good learning experience for me.

MR: Did you get a lot of good feedback from both those albums?

GG: Totally, people still love it. Then I started to get into the more electro emo shit, which I kinda laugh at now. But there are fads in music and you have to go through them, you have to always be changing. It’s weird for me when an artist doesn’t ever evolve their music.

MR: People have to respect the fact that your talent is versatile. Apology Accepted was such a different sound for you, was that you trying to evolve your style?

GG: Yea. I think if I didn’t go through that phase I wouldn’t have the Limousines, because the Limousines blends that style but it’s more serious. I wanted to do ridiculous, poppy ass shit, just as another outlet. And I can’t sing for shit which is why I used autotune. You should’ve heard me from my bedroom, my roommates would be like “Wow, Giovanni is singing again and it’s terrible”- the dogs were barking and shit. But seriously, it totally helped me with my music writing skills and chorus to verses stuff.

MR: All your albums before have been associated with love in their themes, it seems like you are pretty in touch with your emotions and you aren’t afraid to put it out with your music. A lot of artists make songs about love that are overplayed. But your music seems to take electronic music into the route that Atmosphere was taking hip hop with God Loves Ugly in the sense that you made it more playful, sexy and more relatable to women.

GG: That’s awesome.

MR: Sample wise, where do you find most of your beats and sounds?

GG: I have my own library of beats. I recorded a lot of sounds from my room and archived them all into categories of synth and drum sounds. It’s a mess.

MR: Do you still work out of a studio from your house?

GG: I have my studio in my garage right now. I record Eric’s vocals with Todd from this hip hop studio in Fremont called Street Symphony and we do stuff there, but I also jump around from studio to studio. You don’t need expensive gear to make something sound cool. I engineered a lot of the record too. It not what you got, it’s how you use it.

MR: Damn straight. Were you a fan of Strata before you met Eric?

GG: I honestly had no idea who they were. I got introduced to Eric by a colleague who showed him my Jay-Z remix album. Eric was going through the band bullshit. They were touring constantly and barely breaking even every night. He wanted another outlet. So he’s like I gotta make an album with this guy but it was hip hop, and I didn’t really know what he wanted to do at first.

Then I heard his music and I was like wow this guy’s lyrics are amazing and he can really sing. So he hit me up on AIM and he created a Myspace page called “The Panic Room”. We started working stuff out together. I showed him all the new experimental music I was doing and he dug it. Then we would just start sending melodies back and forth…

I met him in a studio in Oakland for the first time to record Scrapbook EP. It was more down tempo Postal Service, kind of softer stuff and now we have evolved into a crazy poppy darker style. So ya, that’s the love story. We fell in love too.

MR: Tell me about the artwork on Scrapbook.

GG: Scrapbook EP is a little white 7’’ on vinyl. It’s really cool and the artwork is super special. The cover of the album is a photo of my parents getting married on a rooftop in Hawaii- the photo is really epic.

Each picture is from a different memory and in every corner of the photos there are little notes scribbled about that memory, like one of Eric and his brother hugging and looking at a blank television. All of the songs represent time passing us by.

I grew up on vinyl, my dad had a huge vinyl collection, and to hold your own music on vinyl is really awesome.

MR:  There is a fuzzy quality produced by vinyl that is unmatched by anything else. So how did you start gaining so much popularity as The Limousines? Was it with the Scrapbook EP?

GG: We showed it to Eric’s friend and he played the song New Year’s Resolution on Sound Check on Live 105 where new local music is introduced every Sunday. We started getting more attention, and it was cool to see our initial sound pick up even before Very Busy People.

MR:  How did you guys develop Get Sharp?

GG: We didn’t even really know each other when we were starting this album, and Get Sharp evolved from learning each other’s ways. I would send him a dark beat and a happy beat. It was really cool because our styles would juxtapose perfectly together. I would send him a dark beat and he would sing happy lyrics over it, or I would send him a happy beat and he would sing some fucked up depressing lyrics over it like in The Future.

MR: So Eric writes the lyrics?

GG: Yes, 100%. But I have some input. If I think something isn’t good we’ll throw it out. Eric is a genius with that- whatever he spits out is either catchy, important or something you have to think about. It sets us apart from other pop acts who only sing about the clubs or the hos. We are deeper with that aspect of pop. There are a lot of different elements going on.

MR: When I knew you as Nozebleed, I remember you saying that you were nervous to play live. How does it feel to now headline packed venues and open for groups like Matt and Kim?

GG: It’s weird. The one thing I still have insecurities about is that I create all this music in my studio at home, like a baseline, drums and then melodies on top of that. So it’s like how do you recreate that live and represent? We started out by just throwing parties and playing behind a table with crazy lights. It was fun. I started to get more confident.

MR: The live show of yours was really impressive. It was a totally different sound, more gritty and raw with the live drummer. The venue was huge but you guys pulled it off, the whole room was raging and the bass was bumping.

GG: Ya, I was sweating all over my gear, it was terrible. But no, we are all for incorporating other people like live drummers into shows and we are also cool with playing sweaty dance parties just as Eric and I.

MR: What’s next for the Limousines?

GG: Mostly we want to keep going with shows and get a tour going, but with the economy right now a lot of people aren’t going to see shows and you see labels collapsing. We are going to go no matter what though even if a label doesn’t jump on board with us. Bands like Metric and Tech Nine did it by themselves with the right networks, which I believe we have. It’s just the difference of Eric and I promoting the album instead of 40 employees at a label doing it for you.

It’s really cool being number one Manila in the Philippines. No one goes out there and we really want to go out and play. But right now, we are just busy pushing the album, playing shows and working on some cool new covers.

***

Giovanni knows that the ride could be a fast one that might end at any time- his attitude is one of pure appreciation and reciprocation of love from his explosive new fanbase. Most importantly he is having fun. The music industry is a cut throat world and he isn’t expecting anything more than what he is getting day by day, any new thing is just a bonus.

He always had a unique style and an inspiring artistic depth and flow that I knew would take him places, but the thing I respect the most about him is his love for his friends and family that has kept him humble and true to his roots.

You can check out and buy every Nozebleed album on Itunes. To learn more about The Limousines, visit them at http://thelimousines.com/ or find them on Twitter or Facebook.   

Check out the video for The Limousines’s most recent hit single, Internet Killed the Video Star.

Abby