Black Noise Returns After US Tour

Black Noise have just returned from a very successful tour of the USA.
We at bruinou.com have been following their updates, tweets and posts these past few weeks and that certainly made us proud to be associated with Black Noise and Heal The Hood.

The group did shows at The Kennedy Center in Washington DC and Trinity University in Connecticut.

Emile spoke about Hip Hop and Politics on panels in DC and Connecticut and then flew to Stanford University in San Francisco to speak about Princess Vlei and Knowledge of Self.
Black Noise kept true to their form by doing workshops in both communities, as well as an area called Baltimore, where the series “The Wire” was filmed. People were impressed with Black Noise usage of various South African sounds in their music, as well as dancers mixing up hip hop and Zulu traditional, Nama and gumboot styles.

At the One Mic Festival in Washington DC, they shared the stage with the likes of Nas, Talib Kweli, MC Lyte, Jean Grae, and many more of the world’s best hip hop artists.
It was particularly exciting because four new members have never traveled internationally before. Black Noise dancers, Leeroy Phillips aka B-boy Mouse and Stefan Benting aka B-boy Malis from Lavender Hill are the younger members. While seasoned Hip Hop MC Jean-Pierre aka JP from Kraaifontein and Nantal Hopley aka DJ Madfingaz from Grassy Park also experienced the culture of Hip Hop on foreign soil for the first time.

Black Noise amazed their audience with a show that told the story of Hip Hop in South Africa and they also screened the Heal The Hood Projects documentary “From B-boys to Being Men”.
The documentary features the work of the Heal The Hood Project and the success stories of working with Leeroy Phillips, Stefan Benting and Alfred Burgess.
They are now all fully-fledged members of Black Noise who have participated in training to teach and make a living from their creative ability.
Alfred Burgess is currently South Africa’s number one break-dancer/ b-boy and placed in the top 8 in a competition in the USA, while Stefan and Leeroy placed in the top 16.

Emile is quite excited about what the future holds for the new generation of Black Noise members. “I am very proud of them because they have grown into amazing young men. They first attended his free break-dance class in 2005 and have since learned to teach their own classes and recorded an album with him last year. Today they earn a meager, yet honest living from their talents and Heal the Hood now aims to tour Black Noise in order to ensure that they can make a decent living. It might mean traveling nationally and abroad, but at least then they can continue to pass on their talents to the next generation as have done, for free.”

Black Noise is now working on a new album and plan to tour the Western Cape in June, South Africa later this year and we are in talks to tour France, Sweden and Norway.

As always, what would such an exciting story be without us showing you a video or two?
Click here to watch the full length performance of Black Noise at the Kennedy Center One Mic Festival and also check out the Trinity Festival video below.
For more information, pictures and bookings of Black Noise, please email Emile at emileyx@gmail.com