GETTING SPRUNG SOLO

When Joel Ma gets on the phone to Scene HQ he’s rubbing the jetlag from his eyes.

Such is life when you’ve just returned from touring a highly successful debut solo album throughout Europe. ‘Voyager’ turned plenty of heads about Australia during the winter, but the record’s also been attracting its fair share of European fans since its mid-May release. “I went overseas for six weeks and did a bunch of shows in Europe,” explains Ma, a man better known by his stage name, Joelistics. “It was really cool, and I just got back two days ago.

“I’ve always been a bit sceptical about Australian hip hop in non-English speaking countries in Europe. But I’ve built up a lot of contacts now, and I had some great shows in Berlin, Hamburg and Amsterdam. It’s just like anything: you need to build an audience and do the gigs. I would have stayed longer but I had to come back for a gig this weekend at the Espy.”

Ma made his name with TZU, the Melbourne-based hip hop collective known for a party-starting, crowd capturing brand of rap music. The weight of numbers and inclusion of a regular backing band meant their shows have always packed plenty of instrumentation, so Ma has had to rethink things significantly for his solo shows.

“For the first tour I was with a DJ and just rocking it over instrumentals, but I soon realised there’s a part of me that always wants to tinker with instruments and make something more capable of having a little bit of chaos to it, so unless I know I can possibly make mistakes it doesn’t feel exciting. I want music to be something that’s happening but has required rehearsals and has attention to detail – not just a rapper spitting over beats that have already been recorded.”

It means Ma will be stretching to the limit what two people can manage when hits the stage for Sprung Festival. “We’ve put together a show that’s part electronica and part band. It’s a lot of cables and things hooked up to other things,” Ma laughs. “But yeah, we’re ready to absolutely murder Sprung. I’m really excited by this festival. It’s the first proper Australian hip hop festival and it really sounds like they’re trying to put on something original.”

JOELISTICS HITS THE BRISBANE RIVERSTAGE FOR SPRUNG FESTIVAL OCTOBER 15. SPRUNGHIPHOP.COM.AU