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Kix: Tell us about you music, yourself and how you met… Nicolay mentions that Phonte and himself got in contact online, over a forum ‘oka player.com’ a website that “The Roots” started and is still around today. They both found themselves talking about the same topics & opinions in music. After time on the website Nicolay posted his music on the website, to get feedback, and Phonte heard the track and liked what Nicolay was producing, and approached Nicolay about his plans in music, Nicolay liked the feedback that he got from Phonte and he also wanted to do something with his music. They both worked on a track called “Nic’s Groove” produced by Nicolay and never looked back, ‘The Foreign Exchange’ was born.


Kix: What is unique about ‘the foreign exchange’ music and yourself and how you made it your own?


Phonte: Making music your own, is getting to the essence of who you are, and says “there is nothing new under the sun, the only thing new under the sun is you’ as a musician / artist


is about finding your repertoire your sound that makes your completely you, what do you do better then anyone else, is it production, song writing, instruments, etc… you have to find it, what sets Nicolay and I apart in our projects is where we were in that moment, the album ‘connected’ is very much a hip-hop album both younger, as we into that musical influence that the audience wanted to here. ‘Leave it all behind’ was a transitional period in both our times, older, wiser, it represented change of our ages ‘leavin the 20’s to our 30’s’. ‘Authenticity’ is about evolution, dark / sombre songs, capturing the moment. That’s what sets us apart as we are always focusing on being the best foreign exchange,”. Just being themselves in there music.


Kix: Tell Kix about the Release of the Album “Leave It All Behind” (2008) as ‘the foreign exhange’ was going through this change. Nicolay tells us, that the main idea behind the album is that they did not want to make another connected part 2, to make something that was truly


different, consciously they did not sit down and think about the making of the album, they both started working, through time and developed the music that was being


produced. For Phonte he would vocal the track through his RnB singing, and then rapping. As we went on in the


development it became clear that we produced an album, further away from the Hip-Hop roots in the ‘Connected’ al- bum, which was the point. It was a risk,


looking back, it worked, fans liked what we had done, as we did something ‘new’ rather then re-visiting a music form we have carried out. The Reaction to the Album by the fans, now are passionate about that album, at the time of release not many people liked the flavour, as they where expecting more hip-hop. A mixed reaction, fans needed a longer time to discover that we were still Foreign Exchange. It was a different beat all together but it still came from the same makers, ultimately the album got an incredible amount of love from fans and critics.


Foreign Exchange to me has always been an inspirational and experimental group, tell us about your lyrical concepts behind the songs.....


Phonte informs us that writing words is always nerve racking, no matter how many times you write a song. For himself the process of writing never gets easier, its intense, you have an idea in your head and you wish to communicate it so that everyone can understand it. For example, if you have never been in a relationship who hears the song, us going through the ups and downs, they can indentify with the song, and understand what you are feeling. That is a talent that is difficult to pull off, convincing the audience. In terms of coming up with words and lyrics it varies, sometimes the inspiration comes in a second and other times it takes a little longer, and other times Phonte has to walk away, and stop, (mental block). “You will be writing and you will think it all sucks”. Coming out of that situation is a process.


Normally Nicolay will send Phonte a track, a melody for the hook will come in an


3 9 F eb 2 0 1 1 K i x Ma g


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