BACK TO THE CITY 2009
Nowadays, it is not often that you find a hip hop event which truly celebrates the spirit and culture of hip hop as a whole as it was meant to be. The third annual Back to the City hip hop festival takes over the streets of Newtown, Johannesburg again.
The one day festival on Freedom Day, the 27th of April, presents a day of live music, street art, break-dancing, art installation, skateboarding, film, street fashion, gaming, speakers and panel discussions.
This year there will be over 20 live performances and DJ's will entertain throughout the day. Featured artists include Archetypes; Hymphatic Thabs; HHP; Tumi; Zaki Ibrahim Ben Sharpa; ; DJ Kenzhero; Zuluboy; Prokid; Lemonka mix tape featuring Tuks; DJ Medicine, Fifi, the Anvils and many many more.
One of the aims of the Back to the City initiative is to take a neglected part of Newtown and transform the space with and colour and life, creating awareness as well as sustainable revenue to the surrounding companies. Ten graffiti crews will utilise the highway pillars as their canva**es, creating colourful masterpieces in the city. This year also features the Ice Collectivo, a French Graffiti crew from Marseilles. They will team up with Faith 47, Kasi, Rasty and Hac One over a two day workshop taking place at the Alliance Francaise in Diepkloof Soweto as well as take part in the festival.
Skateboarding and BMX ramps will also be constructed to add another element of street culture to this outdoor initiative. Ritual Stores will host a fine and digital arts exhibition as well as film screenings, which will feature a collective of artists from various backgrounds. These art pieces will be up for sale as well as the Ritual Store merchandise.
Back to the City also celebrates the fifth element of hip hop knowledge of self. This manifests in a daytime educational summit. This portion of the programme is made up workshops and panel disucssions. Topics include music business, sponsorship, distribution and retail. Featured speakers and panellists include TS Records, Pioneer Unit, Buttabing and MTN Xploded.
When: Freedom Day (27 April) 2009
Where: Coner Bree and Henry Nxumalo streets, Newtown, Johannesburg
How much: Back to the City has always been a free event however, due to a reduction in sponsorship and the current global economy, a minimal R30 ewill be charged
PROGRAMME
Programme of Events Timeline
Mini Educational Summit Programme/Indoor
10h00 Facilitators open the summit at City Varsity
Introduction to Programme and Participants
10H15 Business of Music workshops featuring:
Pioneer Unit - Damian
Ghetto Ruff - Lance
TS Records - Sbu
Iapetus - Kanife
Buttabing - Sliqour
Hip Hop Scholar - Thabiso
11h00 Distribution/Retail
Independent Distribution
Soul Candy - Heather
KMD Distribution - Shaughn
Samro
X-Ploaded - Adrian
Vinyl 1980 - Azul
11h45 Sponsorship
Red bull - Sbu
IFAS - Ben
Alliance Francaise - Flora
British Council - Nomalanga
Gauteng Youth Commission
Hype Magazine Mizi
12H00 Artists/Deejays/Promoters
HHP
Tumi
Party People Party People
UnLearn - Dominique
Ba**line - Brad
Showlove - Glenn
Music at Last - Romeo
13H00 Closing and thanks to all participants
Outdoor Festival Programme
12h00 DJ Medicine and Emcee introduction
12h15 Archetypes
12h30 Illiterate Skills
12h45 Dj Medicine
13h00 Abdus, Skye Wanda, Black Moss, Zawe, 2da
13h20 Driemanskap & Rattex
13h40 Iapetus (Thabz, Gini, Robo)
14h00 DJ Tha Kutt
14H15 Red Bull b-boy session
15h00 British Council presents WAPI (Zakes, Kinesis, Flow, Mars, Gaga)
15h15 1st Dance session (ID, Eclipse)
15h30 X-Ploaded mixtape series feat:
(Ba4za, Last Days Famz, Smurf, Qba, Imbube, Golden Shovel, Deep Soweto)
16h30 Emcee Battles
(Adamiz, Snazz, Inta, Jazz, Xplicit, Eucalyptus, Magnanimous, Abnormal Ghost)
16h50 Award Ceremony
(Bhoza & Cap 2 present Honour Award)
(Dom & Ozmic present Appreciation Award)
17h00 2nd Dance session (Freeze Frame, Switch)
17h15 Da Lez and Maggz
17h35 Testrogen (Endzi and Ben Sharpa)
17h55 Kenzhero
18h15 Tumi & Papercut
18H35 Lemonka mixtape feat Tuks, Hakeem, Molemi, Notsi
18h55 HHP & Hamma
19H15 2nd X-Ploaded mixtape series feat:
(Take Away, Zubz, Fifi, Mawetu, Morale, The Anvilz)
20h15 Zuluboy
20h35 DJ Dolla
21h00 Prokid
21h20 Sliquor & Suggasamx
21h40 DJ Soosh
22h00 Closing / Event breakdown
