MOKOTRON Releases Highly-anticipated Album, THE UNITED TRIBES OF BASS
MOKOTRON Releases Highly-anticipated Album, THE UNITED TRIBES OF BASS
March 22nd, 2024
MOKOTRON is a Tāmaki-based Māori producer from Ngāti Hine, who spreads seismic waves of low frequency Indigenous electronic music. Exploring ancient futurism through music, MOKOTRON imagines a reality without colonisation, where the ancestors transition from the ancient world into the modern, creating futures of hope juxtaposed with the hard realities of urban disconnection.
2022 was a breakout year for MOKOTRON releasing two 12” EPs on Spanish label Electro Records, as well as featuring on digital compilations assembled by Crazed Behaviour (UK), Ovelha Tracks (Portugal) and Strange Behaviour (Te Whanganui-a-Tara, Wellington). Their independently released EP TAWHITO was awarded Te Tohu Hopunga Puoro Mariu (Favourite EP / Mixtape) at the 2022 Student Radio Network Awards, with the title track placing fifth on the network’s SRN TOP 10 for the year.
Today MOKOTRON releases the long awaited remix album THE UNITED TRIBES OF BASS. It is a landmark remix project, exclusively featuring Māori and Cook Island Māori electronic practitioners from throughout the motu.
THE UNITED TRIBES OF BASS feature remixes and reworkings by Caru, Big Fat Raro, Akcept, Netana, Hasji, DJ Oboe, GALOLEAFI and Big Wā. They have taken MOKOTRON’S brooding electro and reconstituted it into optimistic electronica, seismic dub, stoic ambient and club ready Drum n Bass or UKG.
MOKOTRON reflects on the last six weeks since the first announcement of THE UNITED TRIBES OF BASS; “It’s been an honour to work with everyone involved, and hopefully this is just the start of something much bigger, not for me as an artist but for us as a people.”
“In the last month Māori electronic music has reached critical mass, thanks to Caru’s remix of ‘TAWHITO‘ and Lady Shaka’s new single. Mr Meaty Boy dropped their first EP, Te Manu dropped a massive puoro dub, Akcept has been shaking sound systems here and overseas with their upcoming remix, and Shaka, Rei, Aroha, Huia and Half Queen have been taking Māori electronic music to the biggest stages. It’s suddenly normal to drop Māori tunes on radio, in the clubs and at festivals.”
“Dropping the first single on Waitangi Day, with this particular remix, with this particular graphic, and in this political context, has created the perfect storm – this is exactly the message we need right now. Already support for the album is greater than I hoped for.”
“The state are busy rushing legislation through parliament to erase our language and dismantle our rights, but music can’t be erased or dismantled. We have a saying that a spear thrust can be parried, but the spear of misfortune cannot. Music is another spear that cannot be parried, blocked or dodged.”
“We should have called this album ‘THE UNITED TRIBES OF BASS: VOLUME 1’ as this will need to be an ongoing project.”
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Photo credit: Ngaru Garland
Artwork credit: Huriana Kopeke-Te Aho