In 1981, artist/curator Diego Cortez organized an influential exhibit called New York/New Wave, from which the term No Wave was born. The exhibit aided in legitimizing a community of visual artist, filmmakers, and musicians of a punk subculture.
Fast forward three-and-a-half decades. Now, two months since the release of its new album, So It Goes, Ratking, the uptown trio, is managing to reintroduce No Wave to the downtown world of NYC, but this time through the lens of hip-hop. The group is making waves in the music industry, appearing on a recent cover of Fader, working with sound engineers like Young Guru (Jay-Z’s engineer), and nailing a record deal from Hot Charity/XL Recording—also home to M.I.A., Jack White, Adele, and FKA twigs. The inventive trio seems to be striking a new chord in the rap scene on and off the Internet with an emphasis on embracing more left-field sounds of hip-hop. We met up with two of the group's members, Wiki and Sporting Life, to discuss the historical relevance of No Wave and how working in the hip-hop capital affects a rapper’s creative process.
KYLE WUKASCH: Where are you guys from in the city?
WIKI: Upper West Side
SPORTING LIFE: Washington Heights
Where did you get your monikers?
Wiki: Someone gave me the name when I was younger, so it naturally became a nickname. And kids just called me that.
No reference to Wikipedia or anything?
Wiki: It kind of is but it also takes on its own thing.
SL: He’s kind of like a dictionary because he's as smart as Wikipedia, and he loves history. [Laughs]
And Sporting Life?
SL: I'm really into sports: anything that has to do with the crossover between "sports" and "life," especially in music.
Your album, So It Goes, has a fairly stoic title. What inspired it?
Wiki: The idea came from Kurt Vonnegut's Slaughterhouse-Five, but it’s kind of like the music and hip-hop of New York City in general. This isn’t just now, but people have been like: "Hip-hop is dead," or "It’s not what it used to be.” So, all right, it’s dead, but this is what it is now. It still lives on what it was, but it’s nothing new.
You liken your music to No Wave. Is Ratking No Wave?
Wiki: No Wave is like a subculture, not a genre. There isn't one type of band that is a No Wave band. When it’s No Wave, you just know it reminds you of that time in NY.
Can you explain the connection between No Wave and hip-hop?
Wiki: No Wave was going on at the same time as hip-hop was and it was influenced by hip-hop. Hip-hop was another scene that would sometimes cross over into No Wave and influence the music. Even when we’re talking about Ratking, it was inspiring to think about how there was this No Wave thing going on downtown, while uptown hip-hop was going on. There was this parallel between the two which [made] putting them together something organic.
SL: Dudes who were great musicians were trying to put these things together. "I've got this weird, out-of-tune tape machine," or "I've got this weird-shaped, out-of-tune guitar." Busted drums, just [making] shit. That alone is inspiring.
So, they were making highly textured music that was simultaneously very experimental?
Wiki: Exactly. Taking turntables, creating effects, and then sampling obscur
Fast forward three-and-a-half decades. Now, two months since the release of its new album, So It Goes, Ratking, the uptown trio, is managing to reintroduce No Wave to the downtown world of NYC, but this time through the lens of hip-hop. The group is making waves in the music industry, appearing on a recent cover of Fader, working with sound engineers like Young Guru (Jay-Z’s engineer), and nailing a record deal from Hot Charity/XL Recording—also home to M.I.A., Jack White, Adele, and FKA twigs. The inventive trio seems to be striking a new chord in the rap scene on and off the Internet with an emphasis on embracing more left-field sounds of hip-hop. We met up with two of the group's members, Wiki and Sporting Life, to discuss the historical relevance of No Wave and how working in the hip-hop capital affects a rapper’s creative process.
KYLE WUKASCH: Where are you guys from in the city?
WIKI: Upper West Side
SPORTING LIFE: Washington Heights
Where did you get your monikers?
Wiki: Someone gave me the name when I was younger, so it naturally became a nickname. And kids just called me that.
No reference to Wikipedia or anything?
Wiki: It kind of is but it also takes on its own thing.
SL: He’s kind of like a dictionary because he's as smart as Wikipedia, and he loves history. [Laughs]
And Sporting Life?
SL: I'm really into sports: anything that has to do with the crossover between "sports" and "life," especially in music.
Your album, So It Goes, has a fairly stoic title. What inspired it?
Wiki: The idea came from Kurt Vonnegut's Slaughterhouse-Five, but it’s kind of like the music and hip-hop of New York City in general. This isn’t just now, but people have been like: "Hip-hop is dead," or "It’s not what it used to be.” So, all right, it’s dead, but this is what it is now. It still lives on what it was, but it’s nothing new.
You liken your music to No Wave. Is Ratking No Wave?
Wiki: No Wave is like a subculture, not a genre. There isn't one type of band that is a No Wave band. When it’s No Wave, you just know it reminds you of that time in NY.
Can you explain the connection between No Wave and hip-hop?
Wiki: No Wave was going on at the same time as hip-hop was and it was influenced by hip-hop. Hip-hop was another scene that would sometimes cross over into No Wave and influence the music. Even when we’re talking about Ratking, it was inspiring to think about how there was this No Wave thing going on downtown, while uptown hip-hop was going on. There was this parallel between the two which [made] putting them together something organic.
SL: Dudes who were great musicians were trying to put these things together. "I've got this weird, out-of-tune tape machine," or "I've got this weird-shaped, out-of-tune guitar." Busted drums, just [making] shit. That alone is inspiring.
So, they were making highly textured music that was simultaneously very experimental?
Wiki: Exactly. Taking turntables, creating effects, and then sampling obscur