Booda French // 61 Grace Interview

February 8th, 2012

Having taken a few years out from battle-rapping, and since been fairly quiet on the national Hip Hop scene, Booda French (aka Truth) has recently been filling time in between records making waves with Ipswichs Millionaires By Morning. Gearing up to return to the scene with forthcoming EP Ventolin, Rhythm Circus caught up with Scott French to talk about fatties, funnies and working with J57 from the Brown Bag Allstars.

For those who don’t know Booda French (aka Tuth), what can they expect from your forthcoming EP, and how has your work grown since working alongside Ezra (from hip hop crew Vinyl Dialect) back in the day?
Hold on let me get a cup of tea….OK, so firstly, can I just say something off topic. A sort of disclaimer. I find doing interviews stupidly awkward ‘cos I always think like who cares what I’ve got to say Who the fuck am I? I never know what makes a good interview. I watch and read a lot of interviews online and I really enjoy the sincere ones. But then if I do that I’m a pretentious arsehole. The only other option is to be funny. But if that flops, you look a dick. How long should the answers be? I’ve probably talked too much already on this question. So, Ventolin EP, I haven’t thought about it honestly, I just said I was going to put out an EP and now I feel kind of forced to do it. It’s a bit more ‘Traditional hip hop’ than I’d like to do in future, but I’m really into what I’ve got so far. I’ve only ever done one song with Ezra….which is funny so I think nowadays ,as you grow older, you have a better idea of who you are and how you’d like to be perceived. I feel like I’ve got my own style now. As opposed to doing a lesser version of my influences if that makes sense?

You’ve hooked up with legendary the J57 from Brown Bag Allstars for this latest project. Can you tell us a bit about how the team up came about, and give us a little insight into what it was like to work with him?
I’m not sure. Wait, yes I am. I’ll show it in a diagram form. There’s two trains of contact.

Oli bell (groove criminals) >> jefferson price >> J57

Tanya Morgans Old manager >> Tanya Morgan Tour >> Tanya Morgans old Manager >> J57

We basically got some friends in common. I’m really lucky to work with the guy. He’s awesome at what he does and has a ridiculous work rate & creative output. We communicated via encrypted blog comments posts. Basically I did the original song for 61 Grace and made the beat but lost the zip drive discs’ for my MPC. I really liked the song so was talking to a load of producers trying to recruit someone to remake a beat with the same sample. J proper hooked it up like a real blog diva does.

Download Grace 61 here for free:

You hail from Ipswich, home to the worlds heaviest man, The infamous Suffolk Strangler, two world champion darts players, and queen criminal Margaret Catchpole. How has coming from the 14th worst place to live in the UK shaped your music, and inspired what you do as a recording artist, if at all?
I didn’t even know about all them things. I wish we did this interview on skype or something so I could ask you more about them. I knew about the big guy. I’ve always wanted to be that big for one day only, then go back to normal. Just lounge on bed for a whole day and have someone to wash between my rolls. “I want to go outside today, remove that wall and bring my forklift around front.” I love being from Ipswich. People are going to moan about where they live all day every day. It’s home so I’ll always have some kind of tie here. I like the space it gives me also, get to find my own lane creatively. There’s shit loads of talented people from around here too. There’s a real artistic output, just nowhere to share it…no venue’s, very little press coverage, rah rahrah but the cities got a certain soul to it which I think is only there because it’s not in any shadow. Funny thing is I didn’t live in ipswich until last month. Ha!

Your band, Millionaires By Morning is a collection of some of Ipswichs best musicians. Is there anyone else from the local scene who you wouldrecommend we check out?
Yes. They include but are not limited to:
thecadswaxingcaptorsdelsedsheerantheseghostsneehipistols&vultureslanguidideals ahh man I can’t think. There’s heaps more. I’m trying to do a little project when I steal some of my regions bands music, loop it, and rap over it. So you can find out some other names from that. It’s called “East Angles” and will probably never come to fruition..although there’s two demo’s on Youtube already.

You’ve been competing in rap battles for many years, fetching up more than 300 000 views on Youtube alone, and your battle against Illmaculate became an instant classic.
After your last bout against Cruger at BITW5, are you planning on facing up against anyone soon, and if so, who?
I’ve got a bit of a love/hate relationship with battling. It’s done a lot for me but I’ve never really been inspired to do it. Especially in the last year, I’ve had some of my biggest battles which must have collectively got close to 200,000 views but when I’ve writent them, I’ve pretty much done it to fill time. My performances have been pretty lackluster too. I’ve been apologising to battle fans all year. So no, I’m not accepting any more battles. Not to say that I’m done forever but I’m not prepared to put any more subpar performances out there.

Your battles are known to be some of the funniest out there. Battles aside, can you tell us the punchline to your favourite joke?
Are they really? I always thought people think I’m quite bland and boring? Anyway. Favourite joke punchline:
“Until one hit the windscreen”. See overleaf for full joke.

The video for  61 GRACE is Released March  2012. Watch this space.

Words > Franc Botha

Tags: 61 Grace, Booda French, Brown Bag Allstars, Millionaires By Morning