by SCOTT C

Toronto’s Kevin Brereton is very slowly creeping up on the American hip hop psyche. Piggybacking on a serious tour with India.Arie, the man known simply as K-OS has taken his musical message from one state to the next, gaining fans, admirers and insight all along the way. His dedication to the reasons for making music at all shine through clearly both on record and in his spirited live performances. The Mirror spoke to K-OS over the phone from a tour bus.

Mirror: So tell me what’s going on in Arizona.

K-OS: I’m on tour, man. I’m out here with India, Slum Village and Floetry. We were just in Nashville last night and made the 25-hour trek to Phoenix.

M: You did a show in Nashville, or you were just passing through?

K: It’s crazy, man. It was a good response and the people were feeling it. It’s really a country, song-writing town, so they were really into the whole acoustic thing. Also, India’s crowd is very open. They’re into lyrics and vibe, so aside from my own apprehensions, I’m not having a hard time with the audiences. I just gotta peep the U.S. and learn a little bit more.

M: What are your apprehensions?

K: I’ve always perceived the United States as different. It’s taking some time for me to realize that it’s no different from any other place on the planet. The people are generally the same at their core in this type of audience. Large, black audiences that have come to hear positive, conscious music. Any apprehensions that I have about them noticing the differences in my speech, or where I’m from, evaporate when I see that they’re just there to hear good music.

M: Do you think we do this a lot as Canadians? I mean, kind of second-guess ourselves in the face of the rest of the world, and more particularly, the United States?

K: A lot of rappers in Canada start using American slang from listening to their music, and waiting for it. Canadians are the observer, and it’s hard when you’re the observer to be intoxicated by culture. When you’re in the culture and you’re living it day to day, living in Brooklyn, South Central or Oakland, you are under the spell of that cultural influence. But when you’re Canadian, and you have time to intelligently observe this on the television and read about it in magazines, you can’t really get intoxicated by it unless you fool yourself, or are from there originally. We’re off the radar, but we know what’s going on.

Virgin territory

M: I understand you’re finally getting an American release for your LP, Exit.

K: Yeah, my album comes out in the States on January 28, 2003. Astralwerks has this young president who heard the record two or three months ago and loved it. It’s a label that’s home to the Chemical Brothers, Fatboy Slim and Beth Orton. They’ve never done anything with hip hop aside from a couple of compilations, so this will be their first—if you want to categorize it—hip hop record. It’s weird to me that this is the record they picked for their first venture into that direction, but it’s cool, man. I also have a release date at the end of February, beginning of March on Virgin in the U.K.

M: I guess most people just thought that because you were on EMI, you had released LPs around the world as well.

K: No, it hadn’t been released. The whole concept with Sol Guy and me was to lay the groundwork across Canada, so that people knew about this record, and that I was trying to do something a little bit left of centre. Now that that’s taken care of, a year later, we’re just starting to get into the States, which I feel good about. I’ve been playing live a lot. I’ve got a lot of remixes ready to go. I’ve talked to the press enough to know my way around certain things. I guess I’ve sort of learned a few things about the music industry. I know how to ride the bike now, so I’ll just coast for a bit. It’ll be time to pedal again soon enough.

M: Being on tour with India and Slum must be something else. Is it too soon to ask if any collaboration is going to come out of this?

K: I try not to force that. We’re all rubbing shoulders now. We’re all watching each other’s shows, and a lot of ice has been broken after six, seven, eight shows. So, maybe in the future? I know India and I have a similar vibe, and we’ve gotten close over this tour. I think doing something with her would be really natural now. I’m realizing that sometimes it takes like one or two years for people to get around to new projects, because it takes that long to suss somebody out and become comfortable just on a personal level. Musicians are just in their own world sometimes. :

With India.Arie at Théâtre St-Denis
on Saturday, Dec. 7, 8pm, $39.50–$55.50

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