(Street Elite/Shock)

The best description I’ve heard of this track is the lesser of two evils. One group of incapable musicians attacking another equally as incapable group of musicians, taking sides is impossible as each group tends to represent the same attributes and express the same qualities, major label backing, commercial success & rejection from the underground. An embarrassing cry for publicity is the only way to describe this carelessly penned and uninvolving attempt to discredit a key player in the mainstream game.

‘Bang Diss’ is in response to a track done by J-Wess featuring MC Lips, why on earth you would bother responding to someone as insignificant and disrespected as these two still confuses me but to do so they have compiled a small army of up and coming Australian MC’s as well as the established New Zealander Scribe. These additions perplex me, why you would need to include artists not directly related to the cause can only be a sign that you don’t feel you can pull it off alone, an idea that is supported by the distasteful name dropping of recognised Australian artists in Nfamous’s opening verse. Despite my cynicism about the cameos I still think it was ridiculous to involve Scribe, he is recognised in Australia in the same way J-Wess is, the commercial product of FMR pushing this new school, American inspired Gangster sub genre of Hip Hop that refuses to be accepted by the underground scene and who’s popularity is based on sales not skills.

The track begins with an interview type scenario, a carbon copy of the intro to ‘Tha LP’ and flows from this into an abundance of mediocre samples and reasonable cuts provided by Sydney’s DJ Samrai. The quality of the production is immediately evident; Peril has gone for a driving, straight up rolling hip hop beat, which despite its solemn outlook is still quite user friendly. As far as I know this track was done independently, with no input or restriction from major labels, which may be why Peril has produced such a good yet not typically commercial beat.

Nfamous is first to drop a verse, and said verse possibly has the least impact of the five on the single. His laughable rhymes and inability to really bring an aggressive lyric to life portrays him as a fool. At first I was thrown by Nfa’s grand opening attempts but then it dawned on me. Typically, in war, the army tends to sacrifice the soldiers in the front line so the more advanced soldiers can go forth to battle, Nfamous must have humbly realised his contributions are useless and therefore went forth to be shot down first so that his fellow warriors of more skill and ability can carry on. He destroys himself with his infantile lyricism flawlessly leaving a slightly tainted yet not bloodied battlefield for Phrase.

Phrase and Surreal deliver the superlative verses of the five, concentrating on word play, humour and imagination they bring the most entertainment to their lyrics. J-Wess I want to rob you but there’s nothing I like, hijack your Mitsubishi Lancer trade it in for a bike- Phrase. It’s this kind of tongue in cheek humour that allows them to still disgrace their target without coming off too egocentrical or wannabe ganglord. I think that was the main problem with Nfa’s verse, he was acting like Tony Soprano when really he was only Christopher in the food chain.

Nate B’s verse is fairly disappointing, he lacks conviction in his words and flows are staccato, he comes off nervous and apprehensive which is the last thing you would wish for when releasing an aggressive, condemning track. His lyrics are lacklustre, ego driven and lack the ability to really attack J-Wess, instead he tends to take stabs at toy artists and the industry at large. His verse is generic and forgettable to say the least.

In terms of structure and delivery it is Scribe who brings the most to the table, all politics aside his verse is well arranged and his casual delivery comes off suitably patronising, as opposed to some of the others in the crew that tend to scream like they have something to prove or stagnate cos they lack confidence. His lyrics are fairly basic yet tend to outshine those of Nfa’s and Nate’s yet it is the hypocrisy of an FMR artist attacking a fellow FMR artist that gets me every time. It’s also interesting to note that Scribe’s verse has recently been pulled out of the project, the press release claims that it is ‘due to clearance issues’ but a blind man could see that it’s more of a label issue than anything else. This omission makes the cause look even more ridiculous, writing a diss track only to be told by your label you have to pull it? If you put yourself out there as being as ‘hard’ as they are all claiming to be then if you’re what you say you are, you’d tell your label to fuck off.

1200 Techniques are continuously vilified and disrespected in the Australian scene for a number of things. Not dropping their rhymes with their true accent, blatantly mimicking American music and trying to pass it off as Australian and in particular commercially representing an underground culture which they are completely uncharacteristic of. They have made chart topping, marketable hip hop music, they now need to realise they’ve made their bed in the mainstream and they need to sleep there.

In essence this track has defeated its original purpose, by attacking all the aformentioned qualities in an artist they have in turn done nothing but diss themselves. 1200 Techniques have misconstrued their place in the industry; they obviously see themselves as kings of the underground when in reality they are merely a minority in a dog eat dog commercial market, entertaining the idea of incorporating Australian Hip Hop into its label driven, over publicised commercial market. I would be embarrassed to think that this is a representation of real Aussie hip hop or that people would listen to it and associate its amateur concepts and childish wordplay to our scene.