lets make art... the problems of mixing art with pleasure..

its so common that it's become a familiar cliche'. two artists get romantic and think, what if we used our chemistry to make art??!!! Or two artists start making art, only to find more than creative chemistry. What brings me to all this? Well to start with, a good friend of mine has just split with her band, not long after its creation, and the split was way nastier than any break up stories she's ever confessed. so i come home and i'm thinking on this, only to come across an interview. the interview is with the artist, black cracker, formerly the producer/beatmaker of what was one of my favourite bands.

Why the past tense..? well. i'll have to rewind a bit.

several years ago i was at a music video screening at london's gay and lesbian film festival, and i saw this wonderful promo with art-school aesthetics, and the track that went with it? ahhhhh it had abassline that tickled all the right places.

so within days i'd bought the album.

but it wasn't just that the beats were sick and the rhymes surreal, playful and dirty. the icing on the cake is this duo were on bianca cassady's (cocorosie's) new label, the producer: black cracker, had long been part of the legacy of new yorks slam poetry scene. AND she and the mc of this musical project... were together, as in together together. this is where i mention that they were a seriously hot hipster gay girl couple who were very open about being together romantically, who seemed so cool and relaxed in interviews

who made music that sounds like the kind of sex you want to be having in soundproofed rooms.

i. was. sold.

i'm not sure why i never got to see them live .

but in the beginning it seemed like they were only ever playing in their hometown of brooklyn, then i guess i lost track. years later, i move to berlin only to hear they were making a very special appearance at scala. unfortunately i arrived more than fashionably late, only to run into my neighbor saying i'd missed this really cool electro hip hop group from new york, who had hung out for a while and chatted with people there, but had left. gutted does not even begin to describe what i felt.

i told myself they'd be back in berlin again. but much to my disapointment, the next time they crossed my mind i went to their myspace, only to see most of the info deleted, no gig dates, and a direct to their two solo pages. it appeared the band was no more. i and other fans were left in
the dark as to why, as after all its not anyone's business but theirs.

but maybe partly because so much of the intrigue (outside of the music), had been the idea of a couple making this brilliant music together, i couldn't help be curious about their personal
narrative.

spoken word superstar turned producer , dates and then musically joins
forces with bianca cassady.

tours with cocorosie mcing and beatboxing

hooks up with a girl, who isn't that interested in making music

convinces her otherwise. and thus bunny rabbit is born.

black cracker: the producer, the beatmaker, the director, the hype girl vs.

her girlfriend bunny rabbit: the mc, the front woman, the name on the album.

the name starts as her artist name but it takes over. bianca cassady starts a label, they're signed to it. the press love them. they sound great, they're fun live,they look fierce in photographs. before it all goes wrong, they even make this track???!!!

(and hearing those lyrics feels a little odd now)

and then... ????? well thats just it. i'll never know. their old myspace music page is deleted. (and that is serious, defunct bands rarely if ever delete their pages, its generally the way old fans find their way to later projects). and only one of them is featured as a friend on
their old record label's myspace page.

typing in http://myspace.com/bunnyrabbitandblackcracker now leads to bunny's own t-shirt label and a very odd promo video???? black cracker, arguably a genius of a producer, has moved on to solo work, while bunny has a new duo project, her new bandmember is a cute boyish girl, so i can't help but wonder if they're together .

the only clues i have to the end of the story, are this video clip

( the way she says "every mc should learn to make their own beats" stings me a little,)

and these words from the black cracker interview

The terms of my split with Bunny Rabbit where so perverse and destructive that I had no choice but to examine myself.

(note from me: you really should download the mixtape at the end, you'll thank me!)

so r.i.p. the duo formerly known as bunny rabbit and black cracker . i look forward to both of your new projects, but man i wish i'd have made it to that berlin gig..........

Bunny Rabbit - Rio Grande (({in High Definition})) from War Hologram on Vimeo.

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