SUNRISE BANG UR HEAD AGAINST THA WALL: RED LP

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In 2019, I started making the whole breakbeat / soulful jungle sound. Before, when I was creating boom bap the lyrics were too depressing. On a slow beat it made it too moody. But if I put those lyrics on a fast 170-175bpm beat then I feel like I’m partying. I love producers like Roots Manuva, Burial and J Dilla – especially the way you can hear their personality and the things that are important to them in their productions. I love the idea of using things I like to shape my sound. With her debut Headz Gone West EP now released, UKF felt it was the right time to uncover the story behind one of jungle’s brightest prospects. NiaArchives:‘Baianá’ is from another EP, which is going to have a really different feeling to the last one. That was a club record; the next one is going to be the sameNiaArchives, but a lot more refined, a lot more focused on the songs. Half of them, I’m like, “Oh my gosh, I can’t believe this is jungle.” And it is! It’s still 170bpm, but there’s just a lot of musical elements to it. I want the first album to be really special; Lauryn Hill only made one, but it was so iconic! I’m aiming for that level of musicality. Maybe next year. That’d be amazing. In This Article: I started doing it for fun a couple of years ago. I got this Sony Handycam and began filming everything. My memory is really bad, so I like to capture moments on video. I’ve loved making videos since I was a kid. I started adding my own music onto the videos and that allowed me to show everyone what I’ve been producing. That’s how I got the archives name. I love ‘90s VHS and rave documentaries, so I was trying to emulate that.

NiaArchives:Yeah! I think I kind of manifested that. My friend Delphino, who I’ve made a few videos with, he’s Brazilian, and I said to him last year, “We’re going to go to Brazil together one day.” I didn’t know it’d be this soon, but I was so drawn to it — it seemed inevitable. We went into a favela community to film, and meeting the locals, playing football with the kids who dance in the video, that was such an experience. People seemed to appreciate that I’d paid homage to their culture with ‘Baianá’, even though I’d made it into something so different. Nia Archives (Picture: Cosmo Webber) It’s all very DIY! I’ve been independent since a young age and have had to do things myself. With my music, there’s no big label or anything. I’m just doing what I know. It’s not perfect, but I enjoy it. It’s all about having fun right now. Erraticism meets composure on Robbie & Mona’s sophomore album, Tusky . Crafted out of disparate samples connected during post-production, Tusky treads a world of dark jazz experimentalism and finds solace in the abstract. It’s a release filled with grandeur, but knows its limits as glitching electronica unites sultry piano harmonies, vocal etherealism and improvised saxophone parts. It’s an intense listen, but an exciting journey into the unknown.–BR Nia Archives is a multi-talented artist, excelling in the fields of music production, singing, songwriting, and visual artistry. With a diverse range of skills and talents, Nia brings a unique perspective to her craft. Her ability to seamlessly blend different genres and styles sets her apart from other artists. Whether it's creating captivating melodies or crafting thought-provoking visuals, Nia consistently delivers exceptional work that resonates with audiences worldwide. NiaArchives:I’m going to say when I moved to London. I started out trying to make faster, dancier stuff when I was still in Manchester, but a lot of it was really awful; I was just experimenting, throwing ideas out there, figuring things out as I went along. I mean, I didn’t know what a metronome was; everything was out of time. But I kept working at it, and found that there was something in this contrast of writing emotional songs about real-life situations, and pairing that with scatty drums, which are my favourite part of producing. It was weird, but it worked.

Tracklist

I moved out when I was 16-years-old and I feel like that inspired my journey a lot. It was a transformative period. I went through a lot of stuff at that age and needed an outlet to express what I’d been through. It sounds cheesy, but music did save me in a way. I’m not good at expressing myself in other ways, so I started writing. That’s why I have so many lyrics from that age because I was very emotional. I started creating as a form of escapism. That period showed me what I wanted to do, because before that, I was just going through the motions. People told me music wasn’t realistic, but now I’m getting to a point where it feels like I can really do this. Sunrise Bang Ur Head Against The Wall is available across retail on Limited Edition Red Vinyl and will be released on Friday 10 th March. This game changing EP features ‘Biana’, ‘So Tell Me’ and brand new single ‘Conveniency’ released on Friday 3 rd Feb. Was there a moment in time when you felt like you’d made a breakthrough with the kind of sound you wanted to achieve? Haha, yeah! My nanna influenced a lot of my early music because I spent a lot of time with her. I used to go to her house and she would have a big sound system. In Caribbean culture everyone has a sound system in their house. My nanna would always show me tunes. She put me onto bare disco, rare groove, soul and funk. It’s mad how all these little influences changed the way I listen to and write music. I’ve not done any gigs as Nia Archives… Not gonna lie, I’m bare nervous. But in some ways it’s good as there are no expectations. No one knows what it will be like. I only started teaching myself how to DJ last year. I’m literally learning as I go.

That was one of the first things to catch my attention – the archive rave-style videos of you going around London. Oh Me Oh My by Lonnie Holley Springing from Lonnie Holley’s enduring ability to render his lived experience into song forms and narratives that look to open-heartedness, beauty and trauma within the same assemblage, Oh Me Oh My comes as another vital chapter of his recorded works. With the likes of Michael Stipe, Jeff Parker, Moor Mother, Sharon Van Etten and Rokia Koné accompanying the LP, a wealth of approaches add to Holley’s genre ferment, which places a present tense, non-simulacra form of blues at the forefront. Moving between refrains and narrative threads, and as content to hit on grooves as it is to pull at the heartstrings or move towards the outer limits (“Future Children”), this one’s another worthy listen from an inimitable artist.–JHYeah. I wrote Crossroads when I was 17-years-old. I’m not sure what was going on at the time, but somehow I wrote enough tunes for a whole album. I’m slowly trying to rework all those old lyrics. Crossroads was originally written over a boom bap beat. It was one of the first beats I started, but the final beat I made last year. BBE’s much celebrated J Jazz series has long delivered a carefully curated selection of Japanese Jazz obscurities unavailable to the average collector. Available for the first time since its release 36 years ago, BBE’s reissue of bassist Isao Suzuki’s 1986 contemporary jazz gem Approach is no exception to this rule. Approach showcases the virtuosic musicianship and innovative compositional vision of its musicians—the prodigious percussionist and drummer Masahiko Togashi, keyboardist Hideo Ichikawa and guitarist Akira Shiomoto, all who join the young Suzuki on this early record, marking the fruitful beginnings of his now renowned career.–AVD I’m still processing that too… I’m glad people are vibing to it. I’m happy it’s released because now I can start making new music. Releasing music is a physical process, but it’s also a mental / emotional process getting it out there so that I can move on. Brought through last year by the awesome EQ50 mentorship helping womxn to progress in jungle and drum and bass, Nia has since been developing into an artist with a real understanding behind her music. With a heritage founded on Caribbean sound system culture, combined with her teenage years spent writing albums worth of music for fun, it feels like music has always been the destined path for Nia – a dream she is finally living. This is UK Grim, put it in the bin,” Sleaford Mods’ Jason Williamson quips in UK Grim ’s self-titled opener. 12 albums in and the Nottingham duo haven’t swayed too far from their aggy post-punk electronica, but UK Grim firmly stands its ground. Its charged-up tales of tales of robbing the till at work, a recovering addict’s nostalgia for drugs and constant jibes at the powers-that-be rattle alongside Andrew Fearn’s minimalist beats–putting centre focus on Williamson’s gripes. With additions from Dry Cleaning’s Florence Shaw (“Force 10 From Navarone”) and Jane’s Addiction’s Perry Farrell (“So Trendy”), UK Grim isn’t revolutionary, but a needed sneer at the country’s current state of affairs.–BR

NiaArchives:It’s a big part of it. One person I really love and am inspired by is Burial; you won’t hear it in the music so much, but more in terms of how you can hear so much of his personality in his music. We know hardly anything about him, but from his songs, you can find out what his favourite show is, and which video games he plays. You don’t need to show everything, to be so upfront about everything. If you want to hear my story, and know about what I’m going through, listen to the music; you’ll learn a lot about me through that. I think even things like the samples I choose, or the breaks that I use, or the way I program things — they all say a lot about me. I’m half-Jamaican, so I’ve grown up with sound system culture, with dancehall and jungle” — Nia Archives NiaArchives:Yeah. I personally am my biggest fan. I love my music! It’s really selfish, but I love that thing of feeling an emotion, and then making music that sounds like it.Absolutely. Looking at what has happened, I don’t think I can recall a jungle artist who has had such a dramatic rise in a short space of time. You’ve really got the scene talking. Definitely. I never want to force anything. When I’m not feeling productive I will go and do something else that’s not music because I want my music to be authentic. I don’t want to force a beat out. I feel like you should always vibe to your music. With my debut EP, I listened to it for a whole year without anyone else hearing it. Making sure I love my music is the most important thing to me. Speaking of improvements, it seems like EQ50 was the big moment helping you to reach the next level. I’ve got a couple of remixes coming up and I’m working on my next EP. After that, I’d love to start looking towards an album. Next year, I want to really delve into gigging and continue creating. I’ve got so much music in the archives ready to go, it’s just a case of working out how I want to present it. I see each music project like an art piece. It’s not just the music, it’s also the visuals complimenting it. Here’s what went down at the after party of the Rolling Stone UK Awards in collaboration with Rémy Martin

Thank you! Before I made jungle I used to make boom bap hip-hop blended with neo soul. I love the sound of jungle drums, so I try to put my melodies and sounds on top of them. Brought through last year by the awesome EQ50 mentorship helping womxn to progress in jungle and drum and bass, Nia has since been developing into an artist with a real understanding behind her music. With a heritage founded on Caribbean sound system culture, combined with her teenage years spent writing albums worth of music for fun, it feels like music has always been the destined path for Nia – a dream she is finally living. Yeah. I wrote Crossroads when I was 17-years-old. I’m not sure what was going on at the time, but somehow I wrote enough tunes for a whole album. I’m slowly trying rework all those old lyrics. Crossroads was originally written over a boom bap beat. It was one of the first beats I started, but the final beat I made last year. With her debut Headz Gone West EP now released, UKF felt it was the right time to uncover the story behind one of jungle’s brightest prospects.

If you haven’t heard anything about Nia Archives then the question has got to be asked – where have you been? Arguably one of the most talked about newcomers breaking onto the jungle scene right now, at 21-years-old Nia is an exciting prospect on her way to big things. Haha, yeah! My nanna influenced a lot of my early music because I spent a lot of time with her. I used to go to her house and she would have a big sound system. In Caribbean culture everyone has a sound system in their house. My nanna would always show me tunes. She put me onto bare disco, rare groove, soul and funk. It’s mad how all these little influences changed the way I listen to and write music.