The Kitchen: September 2017

OJ River is a Makati-based emcee and producer. For a while, he’s been releasing banger after banger in his SoundCloud account. OJ has worked with many other emcees in the game in the last couple years, rappers like Bugoy Ni Koykoy, Ives Presko, Ankhten Brown, and Eyedress have jumped in a track with him. And he’s also one of the core members of the MKT-based supergroup, “Bawal Clan”.

I first fell in love with OJ around mid-2015, his soundcloud account was, I can call, the most colorful sets of tracks I’ve ever heard in a SoundCloud. Each track varies different styles that OJ has embodied for the past couple years (Tracks like ‘Blood on My Apes’, ‘#WA’, and ‘nevergonfade’). Before I became a music writer, I was one of those kids where I listened to local rappers on the internet. OJ River was the guy that introduced me to a whole different dimension of hip-hop at the time and it reinvigorated that sense where I don’t need a tv show VJ or a radio show to introduce me artists locally.

OJ River’s style has this raspy delivery: accompanying gritty production helps him in executing his lines. Effortless you can say but his voice has so much personality in the majority of his tracks.

What I observed in OJ’s music is his representation of the Makati street culture; A scene where kids skate around the PNR stations, graffiti artists spraying walls somewhere around the Guijo area, and rappers gathering around the Bagtikan corner/Malugay area for a freestyle session. OJ River showed the other side of Makati like no one else did in their entire careers. Right now, he’s been working with the “Bawal Clan” and other of their collaborative efforts, I wish great luck in this dude’s wonderful career. He definitely needs to be archived not only for the contemporary hip-hop scene but for being a part of Makati’s street culture as well.

OJ RIVER - BLOOD ON MY BAPES