bleubird
Gig Seeker Pro

bleubird

| INDIE

| INDIE
Band Hip Hop Spoken Word

Calendar

This band has not uploaded any videos
This band has not uploaded any videos

Music

Press


"Bleubird - Sloppy Doctor (Endemik Music)"

Sounds Like: dense, dark beat-narratives, self-confessions and sharp cynicisms
Bleubird is coming from a familiar direction. His somewhat uneasy sense of humour and cynicism, his lyrics, which mangle vignettes of modern life with equal parts hope and nihilism, even his rushing, stumbling delivery are reminiscent of Anticon's big man Sole. Bleu is no style-biter though - it's more a case of kindred spirits, both working in the rap medium, both finding some dimly-lit catharsis over the top of jaded leftfield beats. In fact, when Sole turns up as a guest emcee on one of the tracks here, it's initially hard to distinguish between the two. As the distorted electro-beat clunks and stumbles along, with a metal guitar providing the production's angular melody, it could very well be mistaken for Salt On Everything: Pt 2: The Revenge. The sound of worldly desperation is here, cloaked in grimy urbanism.

A quirky sense of humour, self-deprecation, anti-Americanism: It may be the antithesis of mainstream rap and the checklist of the modern day backpacker emcee, but Bleubird is so past that. This wasn't ever about hiphop, which is refreshing.
Sloppy Doctor is a surprisingly united collection of music, considering the variety of producers at work and responsible for looking after the beats side of things. Somehow, all the productions have turned out to be electro-infused, discordant and fairly lo-fi. Why didn't Odd Nosdam's album sound like this? Bleubird attacks each (serious) track with a relentlessness that throws - from Slug to Sixtoo to Alias, there hasn't been an emcee in this scene concerned with self-analysis that's dove in headfirst like Bleu has - whatever the lyrical content has been, there has always been some audible distance between the rapper and their subject matter. Here, there is extreme claustrophobia, a denseness that at its best is almost creepy.

Another vital ingredient: self-contradiction. As if to deny his own profundity, Bluebird scatters little chanted/sung vocal tracks across the album, mini-hoedowns about having a date with Boba Fett and hiphop wordplay jokes about pets. And as if to seal the point about twisted humour, Bleu signs the album off with We The Bomb!, a faux-joueux sing-song number listing all the countries America has exercised military aggression on since WWII.
Listening to Sloppy Doctor leaves me disorientated, confused and gloomy. But in a really, really good way. - dot.alt - XvScott


"Bleubird Brain"

Would you listen to an album called Sloppy Doctor?
What about songs like "Welcome to My Fuck" or "Emo Pervert"?

Intrigued? Repulsed? Confused?

Yes, these are common reactions to Bleubird's quirky brand of hip-hop. But those quick to dismiss him as some rapper with more shtick in his backpack than skills need to listen up; he's got some weird science to drop.

Born in Hialeah and currently residing in beautiful Pembroke Pines, 27-year-old Bleubird (real name Jacques Bruna) fills his days with his parents' home-cooked meals and a construction job. He's a simple man with simple needs, living a quiet life in the 'burbs.

When he's not in South Florida, the dreadlocked MC is traversing the globe, playing huge festivals like the Warped Tour, hopping around Belgium and Switzerland, and cutting albums with German rappers. He's also toured with hip-hop heavies like Grand Buffet and Sole.

Despite the goofy song titles, Bleubird's rhymes are cynical, self-deprecating, and politically erect. "We the Bomb!," the final track on Sloppy Doctor, is a rabble-rouser of a jam in which Bleu checks off all the countries America has bombed or attacked since World War II. "I don't have one political stance, but I love really talking about it, not just quoting Noam Chomsky" he says. "I love to be absolutely serious and totally kidding at the same time."

Doctor, which was released last fall on the Canadian indie hip-hop label Endemik, is riven with that dichotomy. It employs a sarcastic-yet-educated world view assisted by ominous, chunky beats that could be the soundtrack to the end of the world (or maybe just the end of the world party). Bleu is just as likely to rap about hitting on soccer moms as he is about the plight of the working class, which makes it a strange, wild ride through the 20 tracks, through references to 2 Live Crew, The Anarchist Cookbook, Sesame Street, and God. But you can also see Doctor as a first-person trip at warp speed through his conflicted psyche. "Pre-Fab Housing" drops a jazzy bass line over the story of a bike trip through the vanilla landscape of South Florida suburbia ("Soaking up looks from athletic dads/Just because they know what I'd do to their soccer moms.") "That's my neighborhood," he says. "I work construction, and when I come home, I'm filthy. Plus, I have dreads. I pull up and people give me dirty looks."

While he was born and raised in South Florida, Bleu still finds himself at odds with many of his friends who are content to stay here forever. And on Sloppy Doctor, he has much to say about suburban kids who wanna be gangstas. The second track, "Crybaby Crunk," comes all guns blazing with the line "Florida's only gold teeth and tennis shoes." Is that true, Bleu?

"There's just this crazy phenomenon [here]," he says, "like, kids from rich Jewish families who, years later, come with a Jesus tattoo and a .22 in their pants."

Bleubird likes getting a rise out of people. He's been known to get on stage in tight, pink, biker shorts and rant about the economy; he thrives on crowd reaction. But on the Florida dates of the Warped Tour last month, he says it was a fellow rapper who had a problem with his message. "There was this guy from New York, Immortal Technique, and he got up on stage after me and said, 'No more pussy rap.' Just because I don't get up there and act tough, I get negativity."

Indeed, Bleubird's message often falls on deaf ears. At a show in Pennsylvania last year, he was thrown out of a bar for simply trying to hype the crowd. "I started the show, and no one was paying attention," he laughs. "So I just started freestyling about the people standing at the bar. I told them if they wanted to hear a certain song, to write it on a piece of paper, put it in a bottle, and throw it at me." Seven versions of the same song later, Bleu was grabbed off the stage by his feet and thrown outside. "I really wish they would have thrown me down the bar, like, by my belt," he laments.

Bleubird recently returned from a two-month tour of Europe. He plans to go back out in September, after playing one of his first Broward shows this week. And, ya know, the living-at-his-parents-house gig is cramping his style. He's gotta get back out there and drop some more knowledge on the masses, while wearing, say, a pair of cutoff jeans.

A guy with a song called "The Boogie Man Screams Like a Girl" can do that. - Newtimes - BY AUDRA SCHROEDER


"Hater play >> MC Bleubird goes from jeers to cheers"

Bleubird is a walking contradiction. His first name's French but he doesn't speak a word. He works at a vegan restaurant but he eats meat. And as anyone who's heard his debut CD Sloppy Doctor can attest, he's one of the most positive yet bitter MCs you'll ever have the pleasure of nodding your head to. In a single line, he'll sound as political as Noam Chomsky, as dirty as 2 Live Crew and as emotionally fragile as a young girl's diary entry.

When it comes to performing, sometimes he rocks a crowd (in Germany they wouldn't let him leave the stage) and sometimes a crowd rocks him (once in Pennsylvania, he was grabbed off the stage by his feet and thrown out of a club). While his unorthodox verbal blasts and frankly cynical, abstract and sometimes silly lyrical content aren't the kind of ringtone material commercial radio is getting payola for, it has garnered him a diehard underground fanbase from South Florida (his birthplace) to Switzerland, as well as nabbing him respect, collabos and opening spots with everyone from Grand Buffet and Anticon's Alias to Deerhoof and Xiu Xiu.

Mirror: Your flow is pretty intense. How did it develop?

Bleubird: I'm pretty much a clusterfuck. Between what I'm listening to, what I'm reading, what I'm doing, it's like 100 different things. Music is a culmination of all that... it's kinda dumb to say "chaos," but that's what it is. It took a lot of trying. My first raps six years ago were horrible. They were garbage.

M: Okay gimme a taste.

B: It burns me to even say them, but it was shit like, "I'm a motherfuckin' knight in tattered armour, sound bomber, quiet stormer." It was pretty bad stuff. But I can appreciate it 'cause it was where I was comin' from at the time. I had to really work on that shit.

M: Did people call bullshit on you back then?

B: I never really ran into too much trouble. I got "white boy"-ed a lot, but that was back in the day, not that it even mattered. Now there's that whole argument like, "Oh, this is real hip hop, and that's backpacker hip hop and this is indie hip hop. I mean, I've been called "fag rap." I've been called, y' know, a whole slew of names. But I just ignored it all and kept going. That's pretty much how I formulated my style: I dove head-first into it and went all out.

M: It must be hard to keep your chin up when people are constantly buckin' you.

B: Yeah but it's just fuel for my fire. It's like they say, "Opinions are like assholes: everybody has one." I just played a show with the Shape Shifters where I got pretty much booed off the stage and got called a "cracker." But then, Percee P - the legendary rapper from the Lord Finesse days - just happened to be in the crowd and gave me a hug after the show and was like, "Those are the same people that were booing us when hip hop started." So out of this horrible situation came something that made it worthwhile. It's like they also say, "All great truths begin as blasphemy." - Montreal Mirror - by RAF KATIGBAK


"Bleubird Q&A"

1. According to your bio, you have skills that surpass those of everyone else in the whole wide world, ever. Fine. But who comes close in modern times? What about historically (for this you'll probably have to think outside of hip-hop)?
-listen man, you know who writes that shit for me...14yr old interns..
i steer clear of the business end if you catch what i'm throwing
you know what i'm saying?
to quote my good friend doug " people talk shit on hammer, but run up on hammer...he will woop your ass!" oh, and mikey mcdonald, and steve augeri (perry's replacement). steve guttenburg, chevy chase ... big into him ...
don't really care much for history though...only losers care about what happened
i'm into what's happening
soon the US is going to enslave another race with blunt force and alot of bowties are gonna spin ...
ronald reagan ronald reagan ronald reagan
2. In "I Make Weird" you note that: Information is not knowledge/Knowledge is not wisdom/Wisdom is not truth/Truth is not beauty/Beauty is not love/Love is not music/Music is life. Please elaborate on this, with special emphasis on Truth not being Beauty. I was pretty convinced of that one.
-man ... that's a frank zappa quote ... it ends "music is the best!" because it is! truth isn't beauty becasue fake boobs can pop and make-up can be cried off ... doves do it ... thugs do it, and i bet hipsters cry alot.
3. The state of hip-hop in Montreal: how bad is it? Can anything be done? Note: I meant for this question to be more about audiences than artists, but that was pretty unclear, clearly.
-bad? wow!..scott da ros, sixtoo, p-love, matt kelley, kid koala, bully records, endemik, khyro, scratch bastid, ghislain porier...this place is choc full of churches and artists. things are gettin done around here.
4.. The state of New York-style pizza in Montreal: how bad is it? Can anything be done?
-now you're talkin, it's bad ... we're so close ... yet so far from a NY slice. this one time i was in jersey and i ate dis slice and i was all like freakin wowzers man. i think if the city showed rambo one , two, and three, for free at all the theatres all the time ... forever ... the pizza would change here.
5. Some of your jobs: Dishwasher, waiter, bartender, gymnast, ditch digger, stonemason, ninja, camp counsellor. First, I assume you didn't get paid to be a gymnast or a ninja, but if so, how? Second, which of those jobs prepared you most for becoming a hip-hop legend? Can we assume there's a Karate-Kid element to this kind of training, in which the skills come from unexpected places?
-i was more of a competition gymnast, the ninja was a straight up lie ... nothing prepared me, i'm a dishwasher and i can build a couple things, legends have helicopters and rare diseases.
sure ralph machio had a hand in shaping my skills
we used to run together up in chino
he taught me how to run on the beach with little shorts
and the soccer ball thing.
6. Seriously, what's the story of you beating Josh Martinez in a dance battle?
-bloomington indiana, site of the "little 500" bicycle race, me josh and doug, in a living room, my running man was clean, doug had a nasty uprock, josh busted out the roger rabbit! doug brushed his hair, then i levitated and hummed the american national anthem (in english). no one contested. win-win situation
7. Florida (wherever you lived) vs. Montreal: what do they have in common? That's right.
-funny that you ask ... christ.
8. Desert island list question - variation: you've got a TV, carousel DVD player, and a generator. Which five CDs or DVDs would you want to have if stranded for the rest of your life? (The island has plenty of
coconuts, pineapples and delicious wild boars.)
-easy ... police academy 1-5, bring back the whole cast ... sweetchuck, mahoney, tackleberry ... michael winslow, the guy who did all the sound effects with his mouth ... he was in spaceballs, too! i want to make a record with that dude. i would just eat coconuts and pineapples WITH the delicious wild boars and try to befriend them and ride them around ... - Midnight Poutine by John Mac


"Bleubird - Sloppy Doctor (Endemik Music)"


Like pop rocks and cola flowing down the pipes together, Bleubird's debut album, Sloppy Doctor is an explosive mix. Hip-Hop's spectrum has covered it all - underground, emo, satire, indie, and whatever else. But never has it been done like this before. Bluebird is as zany as Grand Buffet and as thought provoking as Sole, and does it all without spreading himself too thin. It all begins with the album's inscription, a sincere thank-you to those who have encouraged him that gradually turns into something else. Before you realize why what you are reading sounds familiar, Bleubird has fused his own words into the lyric’s to Chicago's "Glory of Love." As unusual as portraying himself as both Osama Bin Laden and the Virgin Mary in his cover art, Bleubird's production runs the gamut, with samples from Seasame Street's Grover, Outkast, and even Bleubird's cat, Spider, is featured in two interludes. Masked beneath the oddities, Bleubird's true self becomes evident. He is a man on a musical mission who has sacrificed relationships and stability, loves his family, fears his country's demise, and refers to God as "she." His story is the ordinary plight of the artist - but Bleubird is representing for the team: "Wearing a mirrored suit, reflecting everybody's pity. Right back at ya." The album's first track, "Crybaby Crunk" reveals his southern roots not only with the opening line, "Florida's only gold teeth and tennis shoes," but with the tongue-in-cheek beat that makes you want to bounce, bounce, bounce. "Te Boogie Man Screams Like A Girl" is emotionally stirring and proof that even funny guys are tortured souls. Equally powerful in its production and lyrics, its strong violin line, good use of panning, and a beat that has as many change-ups as Bleubird's delivery make the song an album highlight. The closing track is an appropriate end to this unpredictable ride. Enlightening his listeners, jiggy-style, Bleubird delineates the 23 countries the United States has bombed since World War II - and he does it with such melodic grace it's as if you're re-learning the alphabet. Who else can pose such a serious subject matter and still make it fun to say, "Khadafi ain't shit"?
by Sonya Tomlinson - Portland Phoenix


Discography

SOLO:
*Rip U$A-the birdfleu-2LP-Endemik/Hectic Recs(2007)
*Rip U$A-the birdfleu-CD-Endemik Music(2007)
• Pilgrim of St.Zotique - 12"EP - Endemik Music (2006)
• From Supercold to Superheat - CD - Steve Todd + the Bird Music (2006)
• Sloppy Doctor - CD (Japanese Release) - Granma Music/Endemik Music (2005)
• Sloppy Doctor - 2LP - Endemik Music/Vinyl Kingz (2004)
• Sloppy Doctor - CD - Endemik Music (2003)
• Does Mans Short Life Span Make Any Sense - CD-r - Independent (2002)

APPEARANCES:
• Nuccini! - Matter of Love and Death - CD/LP - 2nd Rec (2006)
• Scott Da Ros - ...One Kind of Dead End - CD - Endemik Music (2006)
• Rushya (Ancient Mith and XNDL) - Split - 12" Subbversiv*rec (2005)
• Candy's .22 (Barfly and Stereo) - Livin La Vida Boo Hoo - CD/LP - Side Road Records (2005)
• Debmaster - Monster Zoo - CD - Hipnotik (2006)
• Zucchini Drive - Being Kurtwood - CD/LPD - 2nd rec (2006)
• Zucchini Drive - Easy Tigers EP - 12" - 2nd rec (2006)
• jdwalker - Them Get You Them Got You - CD - 6Months (2005)
• Scott Da Ros - s/t - 7" - Endemik/Movemusics (2005)
• Scott Da Ros - They Made Me Do It - 7" - Endemik/Subversive*Rec (2005)
• Sole - Live From Rome - CD/LP - Anticon (2005)
• Caveman Speak - Tell All Residents - CD - Shadow Animals (2005)
• Grand Buffet - 5 Years of Fire Works - CD/DVD - Fighting Records (2005)
• Grand Buffet - Pittsburgh Hearts - CD - Independent (2004)
• Nomar Slevik - Paper Bullets - CD - Independent (2004)

COLLABORATIONS:
• Gunporn - Pretty Pretty Please - CD/LP - Shadowanimals/Subversiv*rec (2004)
• Les Swashbuckling Napoleons - 7" - RightLeft Records (2003)
• SMTH - The Mic Chord Noose Theory - CD (2000)

COMPILATIONS:
• Beyond Space Vol.2 - CD/LP - Beyond Space/Subversive*rec (2005)
• Moon-circle Project Presents Lunar Orbit EP - LP - Mooncirle Projects (2005)

Photos

Feeling a bit camera shy

Bio

In this age of war, confusion, and numbness, Bleubird comes barging in unhindered and unannounced. Flying the flags of rebellion, honesty, and self-expression, his music is the reflection of a life lived within the struggle; the soundtrack of an artist attempting to swim against the current without drowning or shedding his integrity. “Masked beneath the oddities, Bleubird’s true self becomes evident. He is a man on a musical mission who has sacrificed relationships and stability, loves his family, fears for his country’s demise, and refers to God as ‘she’.” Sonya Tomlinson (Portland Phoenix)

Performing with intensity and passion bird continues to tour the United States, Canada, and Europe with his eyes set on Japan and Australia for the upcoming year. This show is forever on the road, only stopping home in Montréal to record and work a grip of odd jobs like a professional factotum. Drawing inspiration from diverse life experiences and a solid work ethic, seeking to challenge and entertain audiences and minds of all types.

He is driven by progressive sounds and ideas, and a need to make a difference; working both with sample based and live musicians from around the world to continue pushing the music in new directions. Bleubird is a rapper, but think Abbie Hoffman meets Jello Biafra meets Propaghandi...rapping, respecting tradition but shrugging off it’s limitations, betraying with a kiss. A provocative spectacle of humor and social commentary smashed together into a sloppy package of finesse and undeniable energy. Buy this car, support post rap.