Music From the Underground #1 - GAIKA

I'm currently working on an article about one of my favorite drugs but between research and writing it's taking a long time to complete, so I thought I'd take a break and share with you some music I really enjoy and at the same time start a series of articles about musicians/bands/artists that I feel don't get enough attention. Anyway, let's begin, shall we?

[Disclaimer] Good headphones or an excellent speaker set up are a necessity to fully experience the music I'm sharing with you here. Seriously, those shitty laptop speakers just aren't going to cut it this time.

[Additional Disclaimer] This is not a review, it's merely me sharing some music I enjoy in the hopes that you will enjoy it too.

In this article I'd like to introduce you to a very interesting artist from Brixton, London, who creates a sound all of his own. It's been described as having a reggae and dancehall vibe with elements of grime, R&B, and trip-hop too. Gaika is fairly new on the scene, as a solo artist at least, self releasing his first mixtape, 'Machine', in 2015. Earlier in his career he was a part of Manchester based rap group Murkage. I don't know very much about Gaika or Murkage and I'm not going to pretend like I do, so let's leave it at that for an introduction and I'll drop more information as we go along.

Here is a link to Gaika's Soundcloud page to check out if you want to dive deeper than the few songs I'm going to share here. You can also download Machine there for free.

Anyway, from his 2015 release we have this dark depiction of modern life, and an even darker video to accompany it.

[Gaika - Blasphemer]

And here we have another song from Machine.

[Gaika - Bohdy Knows at 90 (ft Bi-Polar Sunshine)]

Ok, so that's a brief introduction to Gaika's first offering, but now it's time to move on to my personal favorite release. It came out a year later in 2016, released by Mixpak and can be downloaded for free here

To start us off, here is a short film that accompanies the mixtape. If you only watch one video I'm sharing today, make it this one, it is well worth a watch.

[Security a short film]

Now, if I was to share my favorite songs from Security I'd probably end up sharing the whole album so instead I'm going to limit myself to three four songs that show off the range of styles that make Gaika what he is, but I highly recommend you listen to the whole mixtape, it really is worth the time. Now, on with the show.

Here we have a type of song that I colloquially refer to as a fucking banger. This is where those headphones or good speakers come in handy.

[Gaika - GKZ]

And here's a song that would fit right in at pretty much any club.

[Gaika - Buta ft Miss Red & Serocee]

Ok, let's take it down a notch with this next one. Something nice and mellow to take us back down to earth.

[Gaika - In Between]

And last but not least from Security we have a fantastically warped sonic tour of the modern world.

[Gaika - White Picket Fences (ft 6Cib)

Alright, still with me? Good, we don't have to much longer to go before we reach the end of this article.

At some point in 2016 Gaika signed to Warp Records (more on Warp in a future article) and released my favourite Gaika song to date, 3D. It was the first single from the Spaghetto EP, Gaika's first release with a major label. I've got to be honest here and say I'm not a huge fan of Spaghetto, perhaps it's because I haven't listened to it enough, so I'm only going to share 3D, which is another hard hitting track about city life.

I can't say enough good things about this song, it is both sonically and lyrically perfect for the times we currently find ourselves in.

[Gaika - 3D]

Phew, that took longer than expected, but at least it was a break from what I was supposed to be doing. If you managed to make it through that mess then I thank you very much for taking the time to check out an artist I feel is totally underappreciated, and I hope you have found some new music to listen to as you make your way through this life.