Concrete Playground Chats Briefly With Team Dynamite

The three black sheep known as Team Dynamite have had one hell of a year so far. Releasing their debut album Sheppard's Delight to critical acclaim from the local scene, being hand picked for the RedBull Sound Select program, opening for Pete Rock and DJ Premier and just basically producing some good honest hip hop.

That's the thing about these three. In a scene full of people trying to emulate the past, these guys focus on being themselves and getting weird as hell, which ironically is what leads them to successfully recreating proper hip hop. With confidence and consistency under each arm, it was time to send these black sheep a few questions.

After a few weeks (just when I thought we wouldn't hear back from them) Lance responded in a hilariously terse fashion, displaying a samurai-like sense of pre-meditation.

What music (international/ national) do you each listen to and have taken most influence from, if any?

We listen to all sorts of music mainly hip hop. Personally I like Redman and Andre 3000.

What is your favourite part of New Zealand and why?

We love Auckland (born and raised) but we enjoy Welly for its good vibe and Queenstown for its crispy clean air.

Tell us about your past and history with The HD Crew.

HD is our family. Happy Days is what we love. It started out as graffiti, now it is a brotherhood.

You guys recently got funding for Coconut Lime (above), is this the first time you've received funding from NZ on Air?

We received funding on only our second attempt so yeah pretty gutted we didn't try earlier. *laughs

Did you guys end up meeting Pete Rock and Premier?

Yeah honoured to open for legends, I got a picture with them but that was it. Usually I don't like meeting people I look up to, it can be a let down.

You guys have seriously bizarre flows, fitting in extra syllables and old fashioned sayings everywhere. Is this a product of lots of cyphers?

I don't know where the flows come from I'm just glad they're there. Cyphers help sharpen the flow.

What did you think of The Kapiti Coast buzz and the scene the No Problemo boys are creating down there?

We love it down in Kapiti Coast and we love what the No Problemos are doing.

You guys seem like you really personify New Zealand. Where else in the world would you guys love to take the crew and your kiwi culture to continue making music?

Tokyo and Europe.

Have you guys started work on a new collection of tracks yet?

Sure have. Exciting shit too.

Haz I see in photos is using the machine now. What were you previously using for sampling and what were some of the pros and cons of the different samplers you've used?

Haz used to be hardcore fruity's haha yeah he's machine army now with ableton.

For people looking to get into writing or rapping what are some great little gems of advice Lance and Tony can offer?

Be yourself. Hands down best advice I reckon.

Is there anything else you think I might of missed that you would like people to read about? If so please include

skypirates.bigcartel.com, that is all. Thank you.

Lucky Lance TD

The lads know what they want, who they want to be and everything in between. See they've done what everyone else refuses to do and that's be themselves. What you see is what you get with these three and it really sets the bar for local hip hop, keeping everyone grounded and proud to be who they are. Not a bad knock from the new era, cap wearing, soul searching, pain bearing, fearing only God, lonely in the park, drunken, nothing to nobodies.