Music Makers
How Thuderheist was conceived. Plus, Young Jeezy makes his big-screen debut
By Ingrid Randoja
Thunderheist Stripped Bare
A few years back, Montreal DJ/producer Grahm Zilla accidentally sent an MP3 remix he was working on to his MySpace pal, Toronto vocalist Isis. She thought it was amazing, added her own vocals and sent it back. Suddenly two artists — who had never met in person — found their musical match, and Thunderheist was born.
The Toronto electrorap duo’s debut CD Thunderheist (available March 31st) highlights its fierce brand of booty bass, which is turning heads even in the film world where the producers of The Wrestler picked the duo’s raunchy anthem “Jerk It” to use as background music in Marisa Tomei’s strip club.
“Me and Grahm went to see the movie in a small theatre in Toronto,” says Nigerian-born Torontonian Isis. “It was surreal. Hearing the song in the movie was one thing...but watching our names scroll up in the credits, that for me was ‘Oh my God.’ If I wasn’t cocky before, I am now [laughs].”
For Zilla, getting his tune in the movie proved weirdly personal. “The crazy part is that I’m the son of an Olympic freestyle wrestler, Gord Bertie,” Zilla reveals. “He competed in the ’72 and ’76 games, and I was conceived in the Olympic village in Montreal,” he chuckles. “When I told him, ‘Hey dad, I have this song in this movie called The Wrestler,’ he started freaking out, and then I had to tell him it was pro-fessional wrestling, and I’m sure he was disappointed.”
Singers On Screen
Atlanta rapper Young Jeezy makes his acting debut — playing himself — in this month’s Janky Promoters, which stars Ice Cube and Mike Epps as two sleazy music promoters who book Young Jeezy to play a gig, but can’t afford to pay him.
Listen Up!
The first priority when creating a cover album is matching artist with tune. International charity War Child dealt with the dilemma by asking iconic musicians to pick one of their own tunes, and then choose a present-day star to rework that song. The result is the benefit album Heroes (available March 3rd), which includes inspired retakes such as Duffy doing a soulful rendition of Paul McCartney’s “Live and Let Die,” Scissor Sisters sexing up Roxy Music’s “Do the Strand” and Franz Ferdinand ripping up Blondie’s “Call Me.”
Out this month
March 3
Neko Case - Middle Cyclone
Bell XI - Lights on the Runway
U2 - No Line on the Horizon
March 10
Jadakiss - The Last Kiss
Taylor Hicks - The Distance
March 17
Pet Shop Boys - Yes
Kelly Clarkson - All I Ever Wanted
March 24
Busta Rhymes - Back On My B.S.
Papa Roach - Metamorphosis