BLISS N ESO [07:05:08] MUD HUT BEATS Fans get ready. Converts prepare to be, well converted. Bliss N Eso have a new album out and the guys are starting to think big. Whether it's enlisting a full African choir or collaborating with world freestyle champ Illmaculate, the Sydney-bred trio are ready to build on the success of 2006's 'Day of the Dog' - in the process stepping out of the shadows and into the national consciousness. I for one didn't know much about them. So I was one tentative music journalist when I was asked to interview Jonathan Notley aka MC Bliss about their forthcoming release 'Flying Colours'. But a quick chat followed by a few hours of iPod shuffling later and surprise surprise I like their new album. “It's definitely a step up we all believe for us and it's got a new found maturity to it for us ... but (it) still has that classic B and E sound to it, so we are really pumped about it,” muses Bliss. “I think production-wise the beats are a lot more solid, more polished and (sic) better mixed, but especially in the lyrics we have definitely focused in a little bit more.” That focus is self-evident on the album, a more structured effort than their earlier releases (particularly ‘Flowers Through the Pavement’, which was basically created as outtakes from 3am free style sessions). Whether it's the dirty bass and grime of ‘Woodstock 2008’ or the collaborations with world scribble-jam champ Illmaculate this album hits the mark more often than not. But it’s the band’s charity collaboration with a full African choir on the Citizen Cope track ‘Bullet and the Target’ for which the album, and probably the group will be best remembered. So how does a hip hop crew from Sydney end up working with the Zulu Connections Choir from South Africa? “We were on the ‘Make Poverty History’ tour of Australia and the guy who runs it also runs the Oak Tree foundation and he was telling us about this 21-piece African choir that he's got touring around Australia and we kind of hinted to him that we wanted to collab with them ‘cos it would be pretty crazy and he was really keen on the idea.” And while the track was first laid down in Sydney, it took a strange heady mix of MTV and Evermore to get the group on the plane to Africa to shoot the film clip. “Then later, he invited us over for this documentary they were shooting with Evermore for MTV to spread awareness about what was happening which just worked perfectly with the fact that we had done this track and we were going to the villages where the choir comes from. “They (Evermore) were really cool dudes and we actually had a few jams with them in a mud hut at two in the morning ... Jon (Hume) broke out his guitar and we were beat boxing and rapping and we filmed the whole thing ... it was awesome.” So is there any chance of a collaboration between the NZ Coldplay-a-likes and the boys from B and E? “Yeah, well every time we see them we are like 'that night in the mud hut that was awesome we are going to have to do a song one day' and they are like 'yeah man!'” Now that would be thinking big. Paul Shields Bliss N Eso’s ‘Flying Colours’ is out now on Illusive Sounds. back to top ^

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