MOK Arguably one of the most exciting new acts to emerge from the Brighton scene.
Alternate Urban Pop collective MOK, are a group of musicians and producers from Brighton. Dark, bass heavy electronic beats peppered with short sharp and shocking rap verses have drawn comparisons from South Africas Die Antwood, the UK’s Young Fathers, Prodigy and Professor Green. However it is the powerful and hook riddled pop vocals and infamously explosive live shows that has put them firmly in a league of their own.
Their raw and brutally honest approach to making music has seen them garner early support from BBC Introducing, BBC Radio 1 Xtra, Amazing radio, Juice FM and more in only a short time together. The unforgettable energy and unrelenting force of their live shows has seen them regularly entertain at festivals around the country such as Blissfields, Shakedown, Brownstock, Forgotten Fields, The Great Escape and more.
Absolute checked the band at the Alternative Escape and watched them conspicuously deliver one of the finest electrifying sets. Dexterous, and with frantic interchanging of emotions, the band grind, twist and challenge genres over thundering beats. MOK’s Jack Hannan on drums delivers a tribal groove with thunderous hits worthy of a John Bonham tribute gig. A band can only be as good as the sticksman, and the band have the finest. On mic one, a truly subversive rap force spits out in disicplined fashion by one Lee Jones. Sharp lines and observations are set off against the sublime vocals of Gracey Croucher on mic two. She soars over the band dynamics with her unique pitch perfect, cool tones. On recordings, the bass of James Penhallow shakes the the foundations with warm sines. Live, he throbs his bass bin into submission. Dex Barrow’s guitar lines underpin the pads and snakely distorted synth layers courtesy of Joe Bailey.
The art of their production sound makes a combustion of lyrical grime, sizzling synth layers and fierce vocals that all together penetrate deep. This is perfectly captured in their videos created by Bezann Productions.
Just like the stamp that Beastie Boys, Rage Against The Machine, Chemical Brothers and Chase & Status made on their generation, MOK is bang on the path to hit the big league.
Absolute’s Kasia caught up with the band to dig a little deeper…
Q When did MOK form? How did it come together?
The current line up of MOK formed in 2013, but we’ve all been making music individually and as friends together throughout our whole lives.
Q What are your general musical inspirations?
General Music inspirations come from the music we grew up on and what our parents listened to, same as most people. But what really gets us motivated and inspires us to make music is finding brand new sounds from all over the world that are original and pushing boundaries.
Q You have both a live show and a sophisticated studio sound. How do they meet? Do you work off midi signals and augument the live instrumentation?
We find it comes together very smoothly actually. The beat is usually made first with full instrumentation and then its decided between us whats kept in and kept out in the live show. It always manages to sound very natural and organic even with the use of samples and backing tracks. Its all about getting the balance right.
Q Gracey, your sublime vocals have a unique sound. Who do you admire?
Thank you! I admire lots of different people for their style and the way they interact with music and life, I get inspired all the time but I enjoy trying to keep my sound to what comes out naturally to me.
Q What are the plans for the next year?
We took the beginning of this year off to focus on recording and writing new music for a new set. Once we’ve got the finishing touches we look to book out the shows for the rest of the year. As our live show is a massive part of what we do we want to make sure its completely ready. We’ve just had our first gig of the year last night at the Alt:Escape/TGE and we’re looking forward to the next one already.
Catch MOK live
BBC Intro – On the Radar – Hastings –
Thursday 15th June
Blissfields Festival – Saturday 10th July
Electric Battlefields Festival 22nd July
www.facebook.com/mok.uk/