I started this blog with the aim of celebrating Australian music inclusively. I don’t care what genre it is, if it’s mainstream or alternative; if it’s good it’s good. So I was excited to find a track that seems to celebrate the same ethos: Flume’s remix of Yolanda Be Cool and Gurrumul’s collaborative effort “A Baru in New York.” Gurrumul and Yolanda Be Cool wrote the song about Gurrumul’s totem animal, a baru or saltwater crocodile. Flume’s treatment has taken it to another level.
These are three acts that come from very different areas of the Australian music industry. Most of us wouldn’t expect any joint effort to work. But then you listen, and it does.
“Gurrumul is so impressed with how his song with Yolanda Be Cool was reinterpreted by Flume,” explained Gurrumul’s friend and collaborator Michael Hohnen. “Gurrumul and I listened together to the remix, sitting on the floor, in front of a huge stereo system. He proclaimed at the end of it – “that sounds like a crocodile movie”.
“Gurrumul has embraced this song ever since he created it with the Yolanda boys, and even appeared in the beautiful music video. Flume’s managed to create almost electro-orchestral backing, while retaining the sense of history and dignity which is such a quality of Gurrumul’s music.”
If ever there was a track to bridge the gap between indigenous music and more mainstream fare, this is it. Wow.
Image used with permission from Stephen Green Consulting