Earth Tiger creates songs that swirl together the electrifying textures of hip-hop, big pop, rock and electro dance music into a brand-new sound. Masterminded by artists Cruz Mathews and Tom Taylor, the group spins out clever lyrics, infectious hooks and energetic, inventive grooves that intertwine with bold bass and playful synth layers.
Earth Tiger was dreamed up around a campfire on Christmas Eve in New Zealand, when friends Cruz Mathews, a songwriter fresh out of the Gold-selling New Zealand group Kidz In Space and Tom Taylor, decided to turn their shared passion for ‘90s and ‘00s hip hop into an musical collaboration.
Their debut album titled Holiday has arrived just in time for summer and has already seen their single Lucky Ones added to Flavour and ZM playlists.
The songs on the album are masterfully crafted with spacious sound scape’s that utilise sparse, bass heavy beats. Each instrument occupies its own space in the sonic frequency spectrum giving Earth Tiger a very clean sound and to my ears a tell tale sign of skilled and experienced producers.
Cruz Matthews is from Hip Hop group Kidz in Space and you can hear the similarities in the songwriting. The style of rap is modern with trap influences, occasional low pitched vocals, pre trap triplet flows reminiscent of Flow Rider, a swag in the vocals reminiscent of LMFAO and a foe American accent. If I could be so bold I would describe it as Hipster Hop.
The lyrics are often gritty and raw which helps to balance the overtly pop orientated formula of the songs and keeps the music in the Hip Hop genre while really making the most out of their accessible radio friendly sound. I think these guys understand what’s expected of them from Move The Crowd Records, Warner Music and “radio land” and are going to hit a bulls eye with radio listeners. This is a rare quality indeed and no doubt was knowledge that was hard earned.
Over all this album is a great listen and kept my mind ticking away as I listened to its intricacies in the music and lyrics. I really liked Kidz In Space and although Kidz In Space probably appealed to the more rugged Hip Hop heads. I think this album is set to hit a wider audience and a more lucrative market for Earth Tiger.
Check out their music video Lucky Ones which might just be your new summer Jam for 2017.
About the author jck2
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JCK formed in music school in 2002 as `JCK and the dirty ho bags`. Back then It was James Castady-Kristament as MC and 3 female back up singer and dancers.That incarnation didn`t last long but one of the singers Lou Ludbrook would go on to be the second member of JCK in its second incarnation as a boy/girl duo. They worked hard writing recording and playing shows around Auckland City which eventually payed off. In 2004 they caught the attention of respected Indie label Pagan/Antenna records and scored a record deal. Soon after, they were successful in receiving funding from New Zealand on Air and recorded their debut single ‘Freak in the club’ with an accompanying music video, Freak in the club was a “Hip Pop” single that took the nation by storm and played on all of New Zealand’s music television shows for a good part of a year.
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