Pre-Bonobo Warmup: BARAKAS, a Simon Green Side Projekt

By dizzurt at October 16, 2009 | 1:28 pm | Print

So before Simon Green blesses us all on Sunday night with a Bonobo DJ set, lets get familiar with a little of what you can expect. I’ve just discovered Barakas, his self-proclaimed alter ego, and have picked up a few tracks from the Tru Thoughts record label. This project first started out with co-owner of the label Robert Luis, and first went under the moniker Nirobi & Barakas, with a 3 track, 12″ release in 2005. After a few gigs together, it was time for Barakas to continue this dance-floor intended “low-end wobbly goodness” on his own. He has put out a few tracks under this name, but mainly incorporates it into his Bonobo DJ sets.

A full review of his upcoming show at Le Poisson Rouge will be coming sometime next week, and because I am new to the Barakas tracks, I’ll let Tru-Thoughts & his Myspace do the talking.

From Tru-Thoughts artist bio:
Barakas is Simon “Bonobo” Green’s Mr.-Hyde-like pseudonym, allowing him to delve further into deep jazz, hip-hop, drum n bass, break beat, funk and soul to move dancefloors worldwide.

Whilst his live band have been wowing crowds with their performances of Bonobo’s beautiful melodic songs and soundscapes, Simon Green’s DJ sets have developed into an impressive, eclectic mix of the deep jazz, hip-hop, drum n bass, break beat, funk and soul.

This development helped lead to the birth of Barakas, when Simon teamed up with Tru Thoughts A&R Robert Luis to create their dancefloor side-project under the aliases Nirobi & Barakas.
After producing a few tracks to be played in their DJ sets, the pair were inundated with requests and decided to release the Bungee Jump Against Racism 12 on Tru-Thoughts.

Following on from this success, Barakas is continuing to knock out some, as he describes it, ‘dance floor wobbly goodness’ whilst retaining elements of the mellow, organic melodies and rhythmic intricacies of his unique Bonobo sound.

Barakas myspace
Barakas is a side project of Simon (bonobo) Green. An alter ego if you will, an evil twin if you must. It started with the single “Bungee Jump Against Rasicm”, a collaboration with Tru Thoughts head honcho Rob (nirobi) Luis. The story goes thus.. “they both discussed making some tracks as DJ specials to play out in their sets. The only remit being the tracks have to rock the dancefloor! A few weeks later they recorded the tracks, and having both been inundated with people asking what the tracks were whenever they played them out, Mr Luis took a leaf out of Puff Daddy’s book and decided to release them himself!” Now stepping out solo, Green has been working to this formula to bring some low end wobbly goodness to a dancefloor near you…

Stream. BUMP. d/l. repeat. Blow Speakers. repeat.

Barakas – Stabillo Bossa

Barakas – Kes

Nirobi & Barakas – Bungee Jump Against Racism

Related posts:

1. Bonobo DJ Set at Le Poisson Rouge
2. Bonobo – Flutter (clip) Camp Bisco 2009
3. BONOBO LIVE – Music Hall of Williamsburg, NYC
4. Bonobo North American DJ Sets
5. Bonobo: Black Sands

Artists Audio Dizzurt News barakas, Bonobo, le poisson rouge, Nirobi, Robert Luis, simon green, tru thoughts, Use Your Head