Hykoo - Wears a Gas Mask

For a long time, Hykoo was synonomous with Melbourne’s Awakenings Crew. However in 2006, shit done changed. Hykoo is rollin with Taos now and rappin to a different beat. With the release of his next album “The Crooked Unseen” gettin ever closer, Ground Up spoke to the man in the mask.

For a long time, Hykoo was synonomous with Melbourne’s Awakenings Crew. However in 2006, shit done changed. Hykoo is rollin with Taos now and rappin to a different beat. With the release of his next album “The Crooked Unseen” gettin ever closer, Ground Up spoke to the man in the mask.

You rapped over ‘The Champ Is Here’ on Ground Up V1, are you trying to announce something?
Yeah, I’m the motherfucking champ, and I’m here. Hahaha, nah - I just liked that beat.

You recently signed with TAOS Recordings, home of Infallible and Illistr80z. Why did you switch from Awakenings to Taos?
Awakenings is a crew, they released some product but the more I took a back seat from management and focused on my music, the more I realised that I had outgrown that style and I need a bigger advertising budget to make me look sexy. Ugly rappers understand these things.

Is it all gravy with Awakenings?
Nick Sweepah is throwing up in my toilet right now! Haha, sike. We all crew, and the Awakenings management still help me out with a show here and there and career advice. I love those fuckers!

You’ve been working pretty closely with Esscay, doing a few shows together. Are there plans for future collabs between you two?
Esscay is the homie. I used to live with that cat and it took a while for us to click musically. We get along real well and it’s all jokes, but we’re both serious about our music. Once we found common ground on the mic it’s all on. We’ve done a few mixtape joints together and we’ll definitely be putting it down in the near future. He’s my boy on stage though, come and see one of our shows and you’ll see why.

The Crooked Unseen is the name of your upcoming album. What’s with the title?
I hate when people ask these questions, haha. Crooked means not straight, off centre, not quite right. Unseen means not visible, out of the picture, behind the scenes. The Crooked Unseen means eerie things going on that you can’t see. It’s a metaphor for paranoia but taken literally it means different things to different people.

The album has some heavy hitters from the US underground. How did you hook up so many collabs?
The collabo’s sorta hooked themself up. It started with one cat who was a friend of a friend and his boy from Kansas also designed my cover. Then I did a collab with a kid in his crew and he hooked me up with some cats in the New York scene. The Chicago cats were meant to come down on tour but it never happened, the failed promotor did however ensure they collabed with his favourite Australian artist before they came. Okweezay was a little more succesful in his touring endeavours, and both times he’s came down we’ve worked on joints.

Are there any locals on the album?
Wait and see, I could name drop for days, but once it comes out people will know.

Was it a conscious decision of yours to look to the US for so many collabs? Are you looking to crack the US underground market?
The initial decision came from my opinion that Australian hip-hop doesn’t measure up to the rest of the world’s standards. So I started judging my music against my favourite rappers, rather than the guy next door. If the album sells well here, I have no doubt in my mind that it will be in stores in the US / UK / NZ.

Who is providing the beats for the album?
Weapon X / Styalz Fuego / Phrieq [USA]

When is the album dropping?
Haha, in the near future. I’m not going to give a date, otherwise cats will be setting their calenders and they’ll hate me if it’s late, or get pissed off it’s early. That’s a loaded question, and I’d like to answer it with another question: When do you want it out?