Rapspot – the metabunker

Back at Roskilde

Matthias Wivel — Sun, 03 Jul 2016 22:12:43 +0000

I spent parts of the last few days at the Roskilde Festival covering its hip hop programme for the Danish hip hop website Rapspot. I unfortunately missed most of the two first days, but managed to catch some great music on Friday and Saturday. At this stage of post-Brexit chaos, it was particularly great to see some of London’s finest uniting us in mosh. Fantastic.

If you read Danish, my coverage is here, here, and here. Astrid Maria B. Rasmussen, who took the above photo of Stormzy, has posted several great photo galleries from the festival here, here, here, and here (graffiti).

The Week

Matthias Wivel — Sat, 04 Jul 2015 22:15:58 +0000

It’s been forever since I did one of these. Such is the half dormant life of this blog. But anyway, the itch is still occasionally there so here we go.

The above video was made a few months ago to coincide with the opening of the Sansovino Frames exhibition at the National Gallery. We had just successfully acquired the beautiful Venetian (non-Sansovino) frame which now adorns Titian’s Allegory of Prudence, partly through crowdfunding, and which features in the clip. I think it encapsulates well some of the very real pleasures of working with great artworks: the fact that details count; the kind of holistic thinking the works demand of you when you plan their display; and not least the passion and expertise that they demand. I appear for a brief moment and contribute nothing, but do watch the video for the insight it gives into our framing department and the great work Peter Schade and his staff do there.

OK, here are some links:

London Art Week. I haven’t yet really done the rounds, but I did have a chance to look at this drawing attributed to Sebastiano del Piombo. I’m unsure about the attribution, but it doesn’t make it any less beautiful. And while we’re talking Sebastiano, there’s what I do believe is bona fide painting by him in Christie’s day sale.

Mikkel Sommer. A rising star on the Danish comics scene. He hasn’t yet delivered a work really delivering on his great talent, but if he keeps dropping gems like this brilliant GIF he’ll keep at least this reader watching him.

Roskilde 2015. No, I’m not there this year, sadly, but if you read Danish, you can follow the coverage of the hip hop at the festival by my homies at Rapspot here. Prominent in the line-up was El-P and Killer Mike’s by now ubiquitous-in-hipsterdom-but-no-less-awesome-for-that project Run the Jewels. They surely killed it, if their performance last weekend at Glastonbury is anything to go by.

A certain tendency in hip hop?

Matthias Wivel — Mon, 02 Sep 2013 09:20:19 +0000

Over at RapSpot, I’ve just reviewed Chicago speed rap veteran Twista’s incredibly poor showing in Pumpehuset, Copenhagen this past Saturday (in Danish, unfortunately). A large part of my criticism is the fact that he lip synched almost his entire concert, which ties in with the reservations I recently expressed about the Wacka Flocka show at the same venue. The difference was that Twista for over twenty years has marketed himself as the fastest rapper alive and in this represents the kind of virtuoso technique that one has to be able to deliver on stage as well as in the booth in order to retain artistic credibility, whereas Wacka Flocka has not and does not. Also, Twista’s show was lazy and poorly conceived. A shame, but the real issue seems to me that this kind of approach to performaning live is proliferating in hip hop.

Photo: Klaus Køhl.

It’s About that Time, Roskilde!

Matthias Wivel — Thu, 04 Jul 2013 13:32:38 +0000

Photo from Roskilde 2012 by KenYen

Once again, you know where you’ll find me this weekend. At the Roskilde Festival, covering the hip hop acts and assorted as part of the RapSpot team. So tune in over there, and witness the strength of sneed knowledge.

2012: The Year in Hip Hop at Rapspot

Matthias Wivel — Sat, 05 Jan 2013 22:11:34 +0000

As always, we the people of Rapspot have selected our favorites (as well as the wackest) of the year 2012. The text is in Danish, but check out the list anyway, there’s some good stuff on it and for once I agree with the to highest-scoring records. I hope to write up my own shortlist soon, so stay tuned.

Above: watch Kendrick Lamar break down the truth behind the most personal track on his brilliant major label debut album good kid m.A.A.d city.

Big K.R.I.T. Interviewed

Matthias Wivel — Wed, 18 Jul 2012 22:27:42 +0000

At the Roskilde Festival I had the pleasure of interviewing one of the up-and-coming stars of Southern hip hop, Big K.R.I.T., who blessed the festival with an awesome concert on Sunday afternoon, closing the show after his country cuzzin Yelawolf had torn up his part of the program. A great afternoon. Check out the interview, filmed and edited by Kenneth Nguyen for Rapspot, above and visit K.R.I.T.’s website where you can download several of his mixtapes for free.

And keep checking for him. It’s great hip hop music, going places.

Wrapping Roskilde 2012

Matthias Wivel — Sat, 14 Jul 2012 22:28:29 +0000

Right, it was a great festival, as usual. A little unusual for me though, in that I was commuting from Copenhagen every day and didn’t spend nearly as much time in Roskilde as I normally do on account of my family. This means I’ll forego my usual analysis of the festival as a whole this year (here’s the last one I did) and be content to direct you to the coverage I contributed at Rapspot.

I reviewed Blitz the Ambassador, The Abyssinians, Sage Francis, Dominique Young Unique, Yelawolf, and Big K.R.I.T.

Soon enough a video interview with K.R.I.T., conducted by yours truly, will also be available. I’ll let you know here and via Twitter.

And the rest of the crew delivered the goods more promptly than ever, so hop over to Rapspot and check it out. It’s all in Danish, but foreven for those who don’t read our guttural there are plenty of images, as well as a few select videos — including one of the stagediving incident during Yelawolf’s unhinged concert.

Photo of Yelawolf by KenYen.

Roskilde

Matthias Wivel — Fri, 06 Jul 2012 12:34:31 +0000

Yes, I haven’t been posting a whole lot here for some time, and it will be a while longer because this weekend I’m at the Roskilde Festival reporting for Rapspot, as I have for a number of years. Last night featured Janelle Monae’s showstopper of a performance from which the above image by my man Klaus Køhl is taken. Myself and the rest of the Rapspot team are reporting on that and much more over at the place where we dwell.

Normal programming to resume presently.

Roskilde Festival 2011: No Hangover

Matthias Wivel — Mon, 04 Jul 2011 21:38:12 +0000

Yes, I missed the festival this year, damn it. Would have loved to wyle out with the Odd Future crew, peeped Atmosphere doing their new sh*t, and checked for the Big Boi/Janelle MonÃ¡e double feature, etc. And just to have been there, as usual. But it was not to be.

Fortunately, others were, and as usual my peeps at Rapspot delivered comprehensive coverage of the hip hop and -related events at the festival, with more to come in the next few days. Drop by there and check it out.

Photo of Tyler the Creator (OFWGKTA) by Kenneth Nguyen for Rapspot.