Photo by Julien Barrat
BAD COPY has stood the test of time. Tracing their beginnings back to the mid-90’s, the Serbian hip-hop group, comprised of Ajs Nigrutin (Vladan Aksentijević), Timjah da Sensei (Rašid Kurtanović) and Wikluh Sky (Đorđe Miljenović) are still going strong. In the early days, BAD COPY teamed up with Oneya, who was launching the first Serbian hip-hop label, Bassivity. Honing their skills while heavily collaborating and recording with the founder of the label, the trio earned a name for themselves in the former Yugoslavia. They are famous for their use of humor in their lyrics, and their prolific collaborations with other artists originating in the Balkans. After a rather lengthy hiatus the group has since then gotten back together and opened for SNOOP DOGG at this years EXIT festival. NOTHING BUT HOPE AND PASSION caught up with Timjah da Sensei (Rašid Kurtanović) for a quick chat right before they took the stage with an enormous welcome from the audience.
You were on a break for a while. How long since you played EXIT?
This will be our third time at EXIT. Since we took our break, our last show at the festival was about 5 years ago. Our first show was in 2004
You are one of Serbia’s most influential hip-hop groups. What originally drew you to the music and why did you choose hip-hop to be the specific musical style you choose to express yourself?
As a kid we started to listen to hip-hop, and we found our selves in that music. Of course we all listen to a lot of different types of music, but hip-hop for us offers the combination of rhythm and long verses which makes it a really good platform to say a lot of things. It’s the form
Who are some of your biggest hip-hop influences?
Well, definitely A TRIBE CALLED QUEST is the biggest and OUTKAST. You know I stared off with groups like PUBLIC ENEMY and many others, but I still listen to A TRIBE CALLED QUEST heavily.
BAD COPY’s lyrics are famously funny, why did you choose to use humor to spread your message?
Because we felt that there was a lot of artists that were really straight, very “let’s just say it how it is”, so we thought, let’s flip this concept and do something different. And also it’s natural, because when we are talking to each other we are always joking around
Who are you most looking to forward to seeing at EXIT this year?
Well, we’re pretty busy playing two shows this year at the festival, but we will definitely listen to SNOOP and FATBOY SLIM.
How does it feel to open for Snoop?
Awesome. It’s the first time for us and this year EXIT had the idea to have artists from here to open for headliners, so last night there was also a local artist playing alongside Nile Rodgers as well.
What’s the best part of Exit for you?
It’s great you know, it’s good for Serbia to have a big festival and I hope because I see from year to year that interest in coming to Serbia is going down and I hope that is not going to continue. EXIT is the only festival with really big foreign names and I hope that it continues to grow.
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