Q&A: meet Junor, changing the landscape of Aussie hip-hop

Melbourne rapper, producer and media personality Junor is absolutely killing it at the moment. He recently dropped his latest single Woke Up which features Brian Fresco & Plutonic Lab and they’ve come together to create an absolute vibe an a half. Straight away the song has international appeal. Rapid vocals that are layered over ethereal beats as well as being driven by a commanding essence from the drums. Huge mood. 

As well as contributing to the scene as an artist, Junor has changed the landscape of hip-hop music in Australia. I remember growing up and Aussie hip-hop was almost made fun of but that is a just distant memory now. Junor saw a huge gap in the market when came to Aussie hip-hop. When touring the country he was humbled by all the talent he was seeing and in that moment he just knew he had to help these other artist gain exposure. That’s one of the things we absolutely love about him, his passion is just oozing, you only have to talk to him for a few minutes before you see it. 

Being of mixed raced decent, diversity has always been on the forefront of his artist and media journey. We discussed the vast improvement of representation in the industry but can still see and feel that divide but through gender and culture. 

We caught up with our home slice Junor to chat about the state of music in Australia, his latest release and how he’s been coping through lockdown.

Check out all the feels below:

How did you get into music?

I was drumming from a really young age, making music and even rapping in the playgrounds at primary school. I just loved grabbing even my guitar and just free-styling.

How did you get into contributing go AUD$?

I founded AUD$ and actually started the whole thing. A few years ago I was touring around the country with the group I was apart of at the time. I ended up coming back to Melbourne and did a bit of DJ and set some decks up in my basement studio and was played nothing but Australian hip-hop because I’d been touring around the country obviously and was exposed to heaps of amazing music. I kept meeting people who struggled to get their music played anywhere. I started a little artist ring and did some live streams and straight away it was getting heaps of attention because there wasn’t really anything else like it around. Everyone being like, who is this what artist is that etc. I eventually took it to radio and then started and blog and yeah it just really kept going up and up from there. 

Let’s talk about your new song Woke Up how did that kind of come about?

Back in 2017 I did some stuff with APRA and had been making music and dropping projects for a while and kind of took a bit of a break for a while when I was DJ and that. I was doing song writing sessions with APRA and a heap of artists who are on the charts right now and one of those sessions was with Plutonic Lab who has produced a bunch of incredible stuff. I was also with the homie Kwasi and we made a couple of songs together and one of the songs to come out of that was Woke Up. Brian Fresco was out in Aus and he is a homie of mine and he ended up crashing with me and he jumped in the booth when we were working on the song.

What was it like filming the music video?

At the tome I was renting an apartment in North Melbourne, I was living in this little place that was next door to essentially a half-way house for ex convicts, it was pretty hectic around there 24/7, so we wanted to show off this area it’s cool as hell. I just had the kind of place where everyone would always end up at and essentially everyone in the clip is a mate of mine. It was pretty much a regular night and we just started shooting.

What is your take on the representation of diversity in the Australian music scene?

So my dad’s Sri Lankan and my mum’s Italian and I grew up you know getting abused for being the dark kid in primary school even though my skin tone isn’t even that dark haha. I grew up in an area that didn’t really have a lot of people from diverse backgrounds, it was relatively an anglo area you know. So from the outset I’ve always had that with me and I think it’s really important to understand that white Australians have it so much easier, it’s a lot easier for them to shine comparatively. Obviously growing up as well and having felt that divide firsthand it has really been a key driver for me to push for diversity in the industry and to cast that light on everyone, not just from the expected. There should be no limitations just because of who you are or where you are from. It is really changing in the right direction but there is still a long way to go.

Is there anyone you’d love to collaborate with locally?

Theres heaps of people, I’ve been in sessions with so many people across the country to be honest man but putting a song down on record there has been a lot of that. There’s countless names, homies and people on the scene right now that i’d love to collaborate with like I.E, Hp Boyz, Kwame, Adrian Eagle to name only a few. So many people out here who are just doing great things. 

How have you been handling iso life in Melbourne?

Melbourne has been hectic, I’m originally from north of Melbourne where there’s so much space, heaps of room to run around and whatever but I moved to the city a short while ago and it’s been tough. At the time of the move it obviously made sense because I was working in the city DJ at clubs until stupid o’clock but now everything’s closed haha. I’m in a little box 15 floors into the sky, I’ve had to bring my whole studio here to keep me sane. The hardest part was definitely curfew and whatnot, like before I was still able to head the studio and get out but then it all changed haha. 

Junor is incredibly excited for the direction the music industry down under is heading, saying “The streets are calling for more local music, they’re sick of being fed all the same stuff,”. It’s an incredibly exciting time to be in Australia and New Zealand right now. We haven’t fully hit our stride yet so there’s huge things to come. 

We absolutely dig everything about Junor, to listen to his latest release head to the link below or head to our Vibes Vibes Vibes ✨ playlist to hear more killer songs like this one.

By Sam Seedsman.