Hip-hop Star Frees Her Inner Foodie
Richmond artist switches from MC to series host, exploring cool New York eateries with celebrity pals
Richmond hip-hop MC Jasleen “Horsepowar” Powar is riding to success as a global tastemaker.
One moment, she is blowing audiences away with sharp rhymes and strident beats at the TD Vancouver International Jazz Festival. The next, she’s in Bushwick, New York City, rapping with local chefs about one of the world’s most popular dishes as host of a new program on the online food channel First We Feast.
The Curry Shop is a show that should have hit the airwaves ages ago. But perhaps it’s best that this quick-paced program touring New York spots serving up cultural spins on classic curry didn’t happen until Horsepowar took the reins.
From her irreverent delivery and dance moves to her clear love of the subject matter, she’s in her element.
The 25-year-old who BBC Asian Network DJ Bobby Friction once named as an artist “a step away” from becoming an international star has taken the next step.
“It’s really exciting to have landed the hosting show, because First We Feast is doing some really innovative and interesting things with food TV,” Powar said. “It was the most chill audition ever. I was in New York, met with the producers who were already aware of who I was and what my persona — being a loud, proud, brown woman who is here and not leaving — and it happened.”
Known for parlaying that stance into feminist raps floating on Bollywood samples, EPs of trashy comedy rhymes or insightful spoken word, Powar discovered there was an inner foodie waiting to be freed when she took on the Curry Shop role. It was also liberating to take on a show that addressed a cuisine Powar felt quite selfconscious of growing up, being worried about eating it, leaving the house smelling of it and a myriad of other unfair social pressures heaped upon a humble dish.
But cooking turned out to be liberating.
“In the past, when songwriting wasn’t working, the place that it led me to was the kitchen, where I could express myself making some really intricate and challenging recipe,” she said.
“Now I get to add that to my arsenal of what I do artistically, which is so cool. I’m not a badass cook at all, although I do have a few, totally random recipes that are pretty awesome.”
A typical episode of the Curry Shop sees the host and one of her many NYC insider guests heading out in search of some delicious dish. That this requires her to break into spontaneous Bollywood dance moves at any moment is just who she is.
“You know, that’s just something I do, always,” she said. “Usually, in the show when that happens, there isn’t any music even playing. I’m mostly hearing When You’re A Jet from West Side Story in my head because, New York and all.”
But besides the dynamic delivery that makes the Curry Shop shine, there is the serious side of searching out hole-in-the-wall eateries in all five boroughs. Curry is a thing.
This mixture of aromatic, savoury and picante ingredients ground up into a paste used to make a sauce foundation to cook a wide variety of ingredients in, has travelled the planet since trade began. Whether by Silk Road caravans travelling from China to Venice, by boat from Goa to Macao, or from the supermarket to your table top, curry is a mainstay meal.
Over the course of the episodes already posted, Powar and company chow down on Filipino Palasang Pinoy to Japanese Curry 101 and an explanation of the Malaysian Chinese curry hot pot with Crazy Rich Asians star Ronny Chieng. Celebrities and gourmet goodies is a pretty righteous employ.
“I’m eating delectable meals at really great restaurants with cool guests and getting paid,” she said. “I can’t complain. And who knew that this was the next obvious step, or new chapter, in my life of who I am.”
Her latest music video Bold Woman outlines “who she is” at this stage. Over a cool, jazzy beat, she outlines what she needs in love and takes it right back to the classic rock that was all around her growing up by riffing on a lyrical hook from Tom Petty’s Breakdown. Horsepowar is a true fusion artist. Directed by Toronto Muslim photographer/videographer Masooma Ali, the video presents the Curry Shop host in a very different light.
The camera really loves Powar and her music videos are always theatrical and beautifully shot, even operating on a tight budget.
“I really love how she sees me, and it was a journey to find this identity of the bold woman,” she said. “As far as the Tom Petty, you caught me, but I think a lot of my audience, that is an element of my taste that they may not know. Young, brown women may, likely, not be growing up on the classic Petty tracks, so I can share that.”
Sharing her art and identity could be seen as a the very foundation of Horsepowar’s career. This is an artist with global ambition and impressive drive who loves where she is from and where she is going. New York City is lighting her up in a way no Canadian city could.
“It’s great for everything and every day is so fast and you learn so much in a place where people are running the show,” she said. “Vancouver is so beautiful, clean, small and in a bubble where it’s all so fake-nice. New York is so much of everything, with something for everyone and I’m overwhelmed in the best possible way.”
She says the city is key to the further development of the “bold women she is going to become.” For now, it’s time to go find another place for a perfect curry.