Life moves fast for Melodownz
Despite his low-down name, life’s pretty hectic for Auckland rapper Bronson Price – aka Melodownz.
The Avondale-raised artist with Samoan, Pā kehā and
Ngā puhi heritage has tentacles spreading into many media, from film to music to photography, and has spent years working through a world’s worth of colabs with some seriously big names.
On Friday he dropped his debut full-lengther, Lone Wolf, which features a stunning colab with the famed funkster Bootsy Collins (ex James Brown, Parliament-Funkadelic and Deeelite) as well as enlisting his old school choir (Avondale Intermediate), and yesterday he was at his pop-up store on Auckland’s K Rd selling merch and showing off photography linked to his latest community project. And all that off the back of a seriously familyfocused fortnight in which he lost his auntie and saw the birth of his new daughter.
The Melodownz formula is as much to do with community as it is with music, and the past few weeks have also seen the release of his Lone Wolves short films which profile well-known faces from around Avondale (from former Tall Black Lindsay Tait, to long-time market busker Jane, and his local baker, who used to be a policeman in Vietnam).
He’s also resurrected his Kava Corner YouTube interviews, which in the past have featured him sharing kava with broadcaster John Campbell, boxer Joseph Parker and musician Benee, and which this time around feature actor-singer KJ Apa and one of the smoothest RnB stars in the country, Teeks.
With all that on his plate, it’s maybe no surprise he had to pull the plug on a couple of headline shows in Auckland and Wellington, telling his fans ‘‘the last few weeks have been a rollercoaster’’.
‘‘Releasing my debut album this Friday has coincided with losing one of my clsoest family members and the birth of my beautiful daughter,’’ he wrote.
‘‘I’ve had to take a step back and put my family first – and will be rescheduling my headline show dates in Auckland and Wellington. It’s important that I am present for my daughter and also make space and time for my aiga who need me at this time.’’