Skylounge Red 27/2/04 at the National Museum of Australia

The National Museum of Australia’s courtyard is a fantastic space. It is big, as colourful as the museum itself, and delightful for your curiosity. After attending one of the other in the fantastic 4 part series that the annual skylounge festival comprises of, Skylounge Red had the most to offer on paper it seemed. Not only did it feature Sub Bass Snarl, the terminally excellent purveyors of live electronica from Sydney, but this one had the added attractions of The Ladiez Of The Jump Rope 4 Art Skipping League, and recent JJJ feature album subject, Diverse.

Whilst this weeks animations were not as inspiring as the ones in the past (and also paled in comparison to the glory that was Tropfest the previous Sunday), they had captivated the crowd, and got them in the mood for performance.

Gingerly but happily, the Ladiez of the Jump Rope 4 Art Skipping League stepped up, stretched and laid their Tour Of Booty upon us. Combining performance art, hip hop and skipping, the Skylounge punters were treated to what Im going to go so far as suggest was the most culturally relevant and morally challenging performance seen in Canberra outside of a theatre in quite some time. The story, executed by the 20 strong contingent of girls, told of the evolution of “skip hop” from the early nineties to the present.

Not shy in the slightest, the story brought up issues of race rarely talked about in any form of discussion, especially in popular culture, it cleverly used the race divisions theme as a metaphor for the divisions within hip hop culture, making the story pertinent as well as confronting. Told through a combination of narration, rhymes and dances, the story progressed with aplomb. Highlights were definitely the skipping displays, as well as some very well scripted passages of dialogue “Pro Skaters? They are the ones I especially like!”

Confronting all with the admittance that the Ladiez Of Da League are “Ho’s” from the outset, yet bringing up issues of race and gender with only abstract judgement, everyone was left with a lot to think about aside from being awed by some radical jump rope performances and some rather phat hip hop throughout… whilst only one of them could rhyme really well, the sum of the parts far outweighed any flaws in the whole. A spectacular and important group, the Ladiez Of The Jump Rope 4 Art Skipping League were by far the highlight of this Skylounge, and I strongly recommend experiencing this excellent group.

Next up was Diverse. The Chocolate Industries MC was well described to me the night before by (fellow ITM Skylounge reviewer) Optimus Rhyme as we saw him up in Sydney “For a dude who switched from Poetry to Rap for cash, hes not too bad”. Tonight, he came out yelling and hyping and not really able to adapt. A large portion of the crowd took off when Diverse started up, a sad reality that despite hip hops growing popularity, a large portion cant tell the difference between Ja Rule and Chuck D. Diverse, assisted by Sydney dj Bonez, performed lots of songs off his brilliant One AM album, with relatively clear delivery. The highlight of the set was undoubtedly “Wylin Out” the track he recorded a few years ago with Prefuse 73 and Mos Def, and the lowlight was certainly the brief ending of his set, about an hour short of the listed ending time. Other than that, we were blasted by the beats of the incredibly talented producers he has behind him, such as RJD2 and the sound at the NMA this year was quite fantastic… But the vibe just wasn’t right, and what I thought would be the highlight of my year, catching Diverse in an awesome surroundings, turned out not to be. That said, it amused some of us that throughout the course of his show, his travel time to Australia extended by from 14 to 19 hours, as well as his “I know we aren’t exactly inside… but Who’s in the building?” hype routine…

Overall, Diverse ended far too early to really recommend going and seeing him, so Sub Bass Snarl returned on to finish the night. But as the crowds drifted out, and all that remained were pashing 15 year olds, my friends and I checked the rest of the music from the bus stop – the music did carry that far, honest. And it was Sub Bass – they make such lovely music, that im really not sure how to approach it critically… Except to say that they will always provide you with excellent sounds, and you should check them out whenever they are in town. Or you are out of town, and see them listed.

Skylounge is a fantastic festival, still ironing out its teething problems. But im sure when it rolls around next year, I will be the first one vying to get every Friday night off in Febuary to attend them all.