Eighteen months ago, Nooky was considering retirement. A semi-retirement, at the very least: after all, the Yuin and Thunghutti multihyphenate born Corey Webster had found success both as a radio host with Blak Out, his program on Australia’s youth broadcaster triple j, and with his social enterprise We Are Warriors, which aims to empower Indigenous youth. Perhaps the stress of a career in music, several years in, was no longer worth it.
“I was sick of the bullshit,” says Webster bluntly. “I’d fallen out of love with rapping. I’d become successful in other areas, and it felt like my needs had shifted. I felt like I was done.” When the Noongar rapper Dallas Woods called to collaborate on some new music, Webster felt this was a good use of his new semi-retirement: doing a favour for an old mate, with no major strings attached. He in turn brought in Angus Field, a Gumbaynggirr singer and relative newcomer to music, to provide a hook for one of their new songs: an introspective ballad titled ‘Coming Home’.
None of them expected these sessions to transform into an album and one of Australian hip-hop’s most exciting, and important, new projects. The trio came together under the banner of 3%, a name that alludes to the percentage of Australia’s population that are Indigenous. Their debut album out Friday, ‘Kill the Dead’, is all-guns-blazing hip-hop that speaks directly and passionately about the issues affecting Aboriginal people in Australia – from institutionalised racism to police brutality. “Making this album made me feel like I was 16 again, freestyling in the backstreets,” says Webster. “It brought back something I thought I’d lost: the passion.”
The group debuted last year with the fiery single ‘Our People’, which sampled Sydney electronic staples The Presets’ 2007 dancefloor anthem ‘My People’. Its lyrics dealt with the disproportionate incarceration of Indigenous people in Australia – some of whom are as young as 10 years old. This ruffled the feathers of the nation’s conservative media: Sky News ran a story following the group’s performance of the song for a New Year’s Eve broadcast on national TV channel ABC, saying it had been labelled “the worst fireworks ever” and a “woke shitshow”. 3%, naturally, took this as a badge of honour.
“We’re not biting our tongues,” says Woods. “We either say it how it is, or we don’t say it at all. Lyrically, anyone can get it. We’re not just talking for ourselves, we’re talking for our people. It gives us the strength to be able to go out there and not feel like we’re walking on eggshells. All we’re doing is saying the truth. It’s a heavy truth, and people are always going to get offended.”
Webster, Woods and Field wanted ‘Kill the Dead’ to be reflective of their collective experiences as Indigenous men. This obviously meant political songs like ‘Our People’ and ‘Land Back’, but also more fun and playful tracks like ‘Sleazy Steezy Cool’, which features pop singer Tia Gostelow. The variety on the album is “a testament to our people’s resilience,” says Webster.
“We’ve endured so much, but we’re always willing to move forward. There’s tears, trauma and pain, but there’s also a lot of joy and happiness, strength and resilience. That’s what we tried to do with this album: Just be as honest to ourselves and our people as we can. We wanted to make an album that is accessible and enjoyable, but also a bit of a rollercoaster.”
“We either say it how it is, or we don’t say it at all. Lyrically, anyone can get it” – Dallas Woods
As the new kid on the block, in the booth with two veteran MCs, Field knew that he had his work cut out for him on ‘Kill the Dead’. Though initially nervous, he ultimately found his place within the dynamic, both Woods and Webster encouraging him to continually push his boundaries. “If they’re two of the best songwriters in Australia, and they’re stepping their game up, can you imagine what I was thinking in the moment?” he says.
“My main strength is coming up with melodies, and I was forging the hooks for the songs out of what I was getting from the two of them. Watching them at work, banging out track after track, was so impressive. I’ve never seen anything like it before in my life. It was a really eye-opening experience in this early stage of my career. The chemistry was there from that very first session – we’d only just really met, and I felt like I’d known both of them forever. They showed me so much respect, and accepted me. I’m just a kid from northern New South Wales, and they made me feel like I was so much more than that.”
Even before the release of ‘Kill the Dead’, 3% have started garnering major national – and even international attention. They performed to hundreds in Sydney on January 26, a day of mourning for Indigenous Australians known as Invasion Day, before playing to thousands in the city’s Tumbalong Park for a free event as part of the arts festival Vivid. Next month, too, the trio will make their maiden voyage overseas, performing at Reeperbahn Festival in Hamburg.
The group knows that, for those listening outside of Australia, this may well be their first time encountering the issues facing Indigenous sovereignty and human rights. This is not something 3% take lightly. “There’s a lot you can learn from this music,” says Webster. “There’s some real stories to be told here. This is lived experience – I wasn’t taught about racial injustice in schools, but I learned it outside of school real quick. We’ve received some really touching messages from Indigenous people in Canada, as well as some Māori cousins too. It’s starting to resonate across the ditch, and we hope that continues.”
Woods, too, has high hopes for what comes next for the trio. “This is bigger than us,” he says matter-of-factly. “This is an album about looking in the mirror and seeing a warrior. There’s a responsibility to this music. We’re talking about history, but we’re also talking about the future. We want our people to find pride and worth in themselves. There are all different tribes and clans in this continent, from all parts of the world, and before any kind of government we shared one thing: connection to this land. We’re the next generation of storytellers.”
Field agrees with the men he has come to refer to as his “big brothers”. “When people are listening to ‘Kill the Dead’, I want them to hear great Blak men writing from the rawness of their heart,” he says. “I want them to hear Blak men making music that they believe in, that comes from real issues that Blak men face. I want them to feel that inspiration coming through. We did this album because we believed in it.”
3%’s ‘Kill the Dead’ is out August 9 via 1788 Records/Virgin Music Group