Fashion, Poetry and Music. 

These past couple of weeks, we've been following some incredible visionaries in fashion, music and poetry.

We caught up with young pioneers chasing dreams and making waves. Each of them, whether its in the fashion retail industry, poetry scene and music landscape, have made a solid name for themselves despite being young.

We took to the East Coast, eThekwini, eGagasini to hang out with Kundai Vera, known on these streets as Project Kay as he filmed his new music video. As music producer, visual effects artist and of course music artist, Project Kay exhibits raw talent and skill for enticing the audience. What a pleasure to watch him in action.

The Amazing Slum Intellect, an Eastern Cape born, but Durban-bred poet took a few minutes out of is time to share with us his rise in the fast growing industry of poetry. We were awed at his humility and even more impressed by the rhymes he spit for us.

Last, but definitely not least, trendy guys from fashion capitals Joburg and Cape Town, who you'll know as the owners and founders of Cove Fashion chat to us about their online retail store. Access to fashion should have no limits and these guys provide just that.

Enjoy!

Music producer, visual effects artist and music artist Kundai Vera, also known as Project-Kay gives us an exclusive behind the scene into the making of his music video for his song “What I want”. He also lets us peak into his journey of his musical life to becoming what he is today.

Project-Kays  Musical Timeline.

·         Born in Harare Zimbambwe (8 March 1988)

·         Moved with his family to South Africa as missionaries in 1995 at age 7

·         Started playing keyboard in Church at age 8.

·         Started making his own compositions at age 12

·         Moved to Lesotho at age 15 ( June 2003)

·         Started making beats with e-jay at age 15

·         Moved to more complex programs in 3 months

·         Formed a rap group with some friend’s called Mic-Vandalists

·    Moved to South Africa in 2006 and enrolled into college and studied sound Engineering in Durban

·         Was top of his class with 14 distinctions and was made studio manager in his final year

·         Worked in various studios around Durban and currently works for one based in Westville

·         Learnt video editing and visual effects to broaden his skill base and picked up directing

·         Released a free to download Beat-tape with  Phil the Kritik (2010)

·         Formed a hip-hop group Clockwox with Ushe-S and Soulbass

·         Entered Durban Film Festival Short film competition in 2012 with his first short film “the love note” which was one of the featured entrant’s at the price giving

·         Directed music videos for Connecting Stars, Clockwox himself and others.

·      Currently working on his Album (The Dark Knight Villain) and is realising an EP (The Dark Ages)

·       The leading track of the EP “What I want” featuring local Durban rappers Flowsik, Ushe-s and Clara-T was produced and engineered by him. The music video was Directed and edited by him  as well.

·         Project-kay’s goal is to become a successful music producer and film director in the years to come.

In an effort to get the word out we’ve created a series of behind the scenes clips to promote the track which we will be releasing on our YouTube account once a week to help promote the music video. To give a little background on the song “What I want” is a song by Project-kay featuring Ushe-S, Clara-T and Flowsik. It’s a very grimy hip-hop track which features fast paced flows over a very hard drum driven beat produced by Project-kay (song to be released 2 weeks from now). Due to the nature of the rhymes and feel the track we decided to shoot the video in an old prison in Pietermaritzburg (KZN). This behind the scenes clip features one of the artist’s featured on the track “Clara-T” and is an on set interview with her where she talks about her experience on set. 

Link To Behind The Scenes "What I want"  Music Video.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P5MPd1zdesA


Behind the Scenes stills.

www.pkmedia.co.za

THE AMAZING SLUM INTELLECT

Tell us a little about yourself.

Its nothing interesting , I’m from Lusikisiki but grew up in Durban started writing when I was in grade six , it was some pretty weak stuff though. Until I met this guy called Mystic who I becam close friends with that’s when I grew a lot as a writer 

How did the name Amazing The Slum Intellect come about?
 My rap name before was Mini Virus, when I met mystic in boarding school I rapped for him and he thought it was amazing and so he named me Amazing. The Slum Intellect I named myself, so it was Amazing The Slum Intellect a mixture of what of what Mystic thought and what I think of myself.

 

Where or who do you draw your inspiration from?

From everything, stuff that  I have gone through, things that I see and generally from other Artist. If your a poet and I enjoy your poetry, then I am going to draw inspiration from your technique as a writer and try to improve myself.

Do you have any great writers that you admire?

Frantz Fanon I enjoy his work, George Orwell and Mongane Serote. Myself also, I would like  to believe I’m great writer.

What made you enter the Human Rights Day event that you actually won?

I got an invite on Facebook  to go check it out. I entered I was not even aware that it was a competition, all I  wanted to do was perform.

Do you let other people read your poetry?

I do not let them read, they can hear it I can recite anything for anyone. If I give them my book there is a whole lot of scratched out lines , I don’t want people seeing stuff that I wrote and did not think it was good enough.

Where would you like to go with your poetry?
 I’d like to believe that I will be a established poet one day. In the sense that I can say stuff and influence people on how they think and how they view the world, I hope it is not just for entertainment.

Advice on how people can embrace poetry?

I think poetry starts with music; most people say it’s the other way round. In this day of age not a lot of people listen to poetry. You really have to start from the music and then introduce poetry through music. Which is why I rap and I’m with a production called No way Out Productions because we are trying to push the message through the music. Once someone has gotten into the music, then they can phase the beats out, phase the instruments out and listen to the words.  

Link to The Amazing Slum Intellect Reciting one of his poems.

https://soundcloud.com/thequadrant4/the-poem