After a couple of months with a lower post frequency, I’m trying to catch up here on the blog. Today I start with one of the best Swedish hip hop albums I have heard in a while. It’s the band Supersci, hailing from Sundsvall, who released the record “Entropy” in April, a record that certainly deserves a place in the spotlight.

It’s a thematic album which interestingly revolves around the physical concept of entropy, a measure of the disorder of a system, and the law that states that the disorder in the universe constantly grows. They twist and turn this theme in a number of ways, witty, playful, thoughtful. The music is mainly based on electronica and is quite varying, both catchy and creative. They have rooted their sound in nordic ambiences but don’t hesitate to bring in world music in the shape of of  latino- and african rhythms, along with other influences. They are accompanied by a row of well-chosen guests and you get to hear Kristin Amparo, Cleo, 7evenThirty, Isabel Neib and Rapper kC contribute to the songs. Taste three of the songs from an impressive album.

Supersci’s site – on Facebook – on Spotify – on Wimp

There’s no question that there is an imbalance between men and women when it comes to recording artists. If you look a little deeper than the top lists it’s even worse: looking through the numerous Swedish pitches I get I estimate that around 10% come from female artists or band with female members. I have no simple answers to why it is like this, but I think that it’s one of the most important challenges for the Swedish music scene, to change this, and most certainly for other countries as well. There is some hope, though; this year I’ve received more music from female artists than ever before, if that counts for something.

Hip hop is a genre that’s often in the line of fire in discussions about the lack of women. I’m not going to dig deeper into that here, since Meadowmusic hardly can be seen as representative for this genre. Instead I’m going to present a couple of great women in Swedish hip hop, because they do certainly exist, here below in the shape of Cleo and Rawda. In interviews with Peter Wickström from Awesound they tell us what’s been important for their musical careers, about songwriting, and other stuff.
(I’m afraid these interviews are in Swedish without subtitles.)

Awesound TV

This post is also the start of a collaboration between Meadowmusic and Peter Wickström from Awesound TV, where we aim to present some interesting interviews with artists and others. Most of the time as video interviews, but we may vary with other formats as well. Besides making interesting artist interviews Peter also runs Awesound where he offers song coaching for artists, choirs, well anyone who wants to take their singing ability to a higher level.

Cleo

Nathalie “Cleo” Missaoui is a fascinating artist and person. She creates fantastic music both as a solo artist and in numerous collaborations; with Looptroop  Rockers, Adam Tensta, Syster Sol, in the Swedish-South African music project KWAAI last year and presently together with Kristin Amparo, to mention a few. Everything shoe does is also permeated with a passion for social issues; against rasism, social injustice and violence, on stage as well as off stage. She’s the kind of person that doesn’t ask permission, a doer, while most of just sit in the TV sofa muttering something about disagreements. Here are a few songs and a chat she had with Peter Wickström.

Rawda

Rawda is a young interesting hip hop artist. She kickstarted her “official” music career in the Autumn with the cheeky single “Backspegeln”/”Bli inte sur”. Here she is in an interview where she tell us about her career so far, about songwriting etc. You’ll also find the music video to one of the songs from the single, “Bli inte sur”.