1300 (One Three Hundred) is an Australian hip-hop group founded in a garage in West Sydney in the early 2020s. Formed by five Korean-Australians who found each other through the Korean music community in Sydney, the group self-produces some of the best beats I’ve had the privilege of hearing. With their exceptional EP George being released only a few months ago, 1300 are definitely on the up-and-up, cementing themselves a place in the Australian hip-hop scene that deserves to go global.
Introduced to them by my Australian friend Claudia (thank you for real), I am yet to find a 1300 song I dislike but I will say “Foreign Language” and “Superbad” reign supreme for me. Rapper Goyo has described 1300 as a blank palette that lets them freely create whatever they want and this is extremely evident throughout their current releases. Flowing seamlessly between Korean and English – “high octane bilingual flows” as Goyo described them to Esquire AU – backed by beats from their very own Nerdie and Pokari.Sweat, every song has its own unique blend of rap, house, pop-punk and hardstyle influences (including Smash Mouth because the emo to K-pop/K-RnB/K-HipHop pipeline gets to everyone). They’ve honed their sound to perfection with a flavour of both Western and Korean influences thanks to the members differing backgrounds. Everyone will find a sound that suits their listening tastes.
Their first well-known song was perhaps “Oldboy”, a homage to the 2003 movie. Not straying far from the influences of East Asia also comes “Rock Lee” with respect to the icon from Naruto. 1300 are definitely not shy about being influenced; their latest EP George is inspired by Curious George (yes the monkey, you can see why the album art is how it is) and features lyrics largely based on anxiety and disconnection with leading single “Ape Shit” (feat. sokodomo) focusing on the loss of innocence. The other 8 songs are so good it is a little ape-shit how they put out an EP with so much variety that somehow feels extremely cohesive and totally 1300. They manage to blend the right amount of wild beats and basslines with genuinely emotional lyricism surrounding “coming of age in an era of doom-scrolling, deep fakes and digital misinformation”. It’s no mean feat that’s for sure.
Nerdie has said before he wants 1300 to change the game for K-pop and I truly believe they can. K-pop has a somewhat sour (and unwarranted) reputation for not having “real” rappers and music production despite having some of the coolest line deliveries, flow and production values I’ve heard in years. Whilst unexpected of a Hip Hop oriented group, they also aren’t shy of some choreography which you can see in their equally nuts and experimental yet cool music videos. Regardless of any language barrier that may be had in listening to music in a foreign language (hah…), it’s still exceptionally easy to get on board with what you’re being given. It’s extremely cliché but music is a universal language and 1300 are fluent.
They’ve previously told interviewers they felt they didn’t deserve the success that came to them fairly early on and I’m just here to say they deserved more. 1300 only released George in April and I’m already eagerly anticipating whatever crazy project they put out next. I know no matter what I’ll be obsessed (and replying to every Instagram post with “pls come to England” – sorry Brazil for stealing your joke). If you’re not listening you’re missing out for sure.
EM’S TOP 5 SONGS:
Superbad
Foreign Language
Woah Damn
Rock Lee
Lalaland
WORDS EMILIE GIBSON
PROOFREADING BEATRIZ GOMES
Comentários