King Kapisi aka Bill Urale Photo: Supplied
When King Kapisi won the APRA Silver Scroll in 1999 - the first time the prestigious award had been given to a hip-hop song - it was belated acknowledgement of a genre that artists in this country had already been making their own for more than a decade. But it was also recognition of a singular musician with a unique vision who would go on to make one of the outstanding local albums of the early 2000s.
King Kapisi is the performance persona of Wellington-born Bill Urale. He grew up in Island Bay in a large Samoan family in which the arts were a vital part of daily life. His mother was a school teacher and visual artist. His older sisters worked in theatre and film.
Bill liked to read: fantasy novels were a favourite, but he was also drawn to books about history, especially the history of the Pacific.
If Wellington's hip-hop scene was more political, Auckland's was more professional, and before long any Wellington rapper hoping to make a career had moved north. It was during a stint in Auckland with the short-lived hip-hop collective Token Village that Bill began calling himself King Kapisi - an alias with a touch of humour, 'Kapisi' being Samoan for cabbage.
Kapisi began laying the instrumental tracks for his debut album himself, avoiding the common practice of sampling, instead creating all of the music from scratch.
Already proficient on drums, bass, keyboards and guitar, he played almost everything, bringing in just a few experts for specific roles where required.
'Fix Amnesia' is the track that opens Savage Thoughts and it makes a strong statement of intent. Kapisi wants his rhymes to cure the historical memory loss that has stopped Polynesian people from questioning or resisting colonial domination.
That theme is picked up again the next track on the album, the Scroll-winning 'Reverse Resistance', in which Kapisi zeros in on religion and the part the church has come to play in Polynesian society.
'Saboteur' turns the lens away from religion and towards other by-products of colonialism, like the gangster mentality that Kapisi sees as a form of self-sabotage. The song has the striking addition of Teremoana Rapley, Kapisi's musical as well as life partner, and her voice cuts through both as a rapper and a beautiful melodic singer.
The track is one of several that features a string arrangement. When I first heard the album, I wondered if these were intended as an ironic touch, evocative of genteel colonial parlour concerts and in stark contrast with the rapper's self-described "savage thoughts".
But the answer is more complex than that. As Kapisi explained to me, the strings were in fact played by Samoan violinist, Vivaldi specialist and founder of the Turnovsky Trio, Sam Konise. To Kapisi, they are Samoan music.
Returning to the colonisation theme, 'Screams From the Old Plantation' harks back to some experimental recordings Kapisi made with fellow rapper Kas 'The Feelstyle' Futialo. The track also features DJ Raw from Gifted and Brown, and includes ukuleles and vintage recordings of Samoan choirs combined with the scratches and beats.
In a way, this closing track sums up everything King Kapisi set out to achieve with Savage Thoughts. It's playful yet pointed. It's funny and ferocious. It's intrinsically hip-hop, a musical form invented by African-Americans, and yet this is a version that could only have come from deep in the Pacific. It has a proud sense of place and yet it looks outward.
To quote Kapisi's motto, emblazoned on the cover: Samoan Hip-Hop Worldwide. All of this makes Savage Thoughts an essential New Zealand album.
