GEORGE F. LEE / GLEE@STARBULLETIN.COM From left, DJs Solution, Deception, Jami and Compose of the Nocturnal Sound Krew are putting Hawaii on the international map.

Krew got the beats
to play anywhere

The group of homegrown
turntablists has made its mark
in competitions worldwide

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By Shawn 'Speedy' Lopes
slopes@starbulletin.com

We're having battles here every other month until October," Kavet the Catalyst promises the crowd gathered at the SRS streetwear boutique in the Ward Entertainment Center. The DJ of Nocturnal Sound Krew and KTUH fame makes a final plea, microphone in hand. "Buy something if you can ... and don't steal, please."

Despite all the fresh merchandise, however, most coveted of all are the mind-blowing turntable techniques on display. While a half-dozen nimble-fingered DJs create astounding soundscapes with the manual manipulation of records, others stand back and watch the fireworks.

"Checkmate," as this DJ competition is known, pits Hawaii's finest turntable terrors against one other. The bi-monthly event is the latest in a series of noteworthy achievements for the Nocturnal Sound Krew, Hawaii's most celebrated DJ collective. "We needed to give an outlet to the other DJs," says NSK's DJ Compose. "We don't make (money) out of this thing. It's just to promote what we love."

NOCTURNAL SOUND KREW Spinning with Nocturnal Sound Krew.

And what they love, more than anything, is sharing the finer points of turntablism, including advanced scratching and beat juggling techniques, with the rest of the world. Tomorrow night will be even bigger when Nocturnal Sound Krew performs with hip hop heavyweights Jurassic 5 at World Cafe.

There's Tony Balbuena, a k a DJ Deception, whose showing in the semifinals of the 2001 International Turntablist Federation (ITF) competition put Hawaii on the hip hop map. There's also Solution, Hawaii's representative in last fall's Dance Music Community (DMC) contest in San Francisco, whose adroitness on the 'tables is all the more amazing when you realize he's just 14 years old. Logoe, they say, is the wild one; DJ Jami, the all-around technician; ETA, the hip hop scholar. A mind for organization makes DJ Compose the man who holds it down, while Rockadile is the perfectionist and DJ Devise, the creative one. One member, DJ Mana, splits time between Honolulu and his Montreal homebase. Another, whom the crew calls Prynces Leya, is being kept under wraps until they feel ready to unleash her on the battle scene.

"Lowell (DJ Logoe) was actually the first real guy to get down like that," says Compose of the group's origins. "He brought all of us together, basically. I guess this island's so small that whoever was interested in deejaying kinda found each other."

RECOGNIZING THE current upsurge in talent in the Islands, both the ITF and DMC, the two most prestigious of all DJ contests, recently sanctioned regional heats in Hawaii. That guarantees a local champion will be crowned here by both organizations every year. Last fall, Nocturnal Sound Krew's teenage boy wonder, Solution, took the first-ever DMC Hawaii title. Meanwhile, Deception claimed the ITF Regional and moved on to the world semifinals before losing a very controversial battle to the heralded DJ Klever, who would eventually take the world title.

"Not taking anything away from Klever," Deception quickly points out. " 'Cause he's dope, seriously. But we understand how the game runs. It's all good. Nobody heard of us then, so we're just gonna ride it out until the politics of the game is on our side."

Even more impressively, this past fall, Nocturnal Sound Krew battled Eastern Hemisphere champions Killa Tactics from Belgium in a competition to take the ITF World Team Title. "It probably could have gone either way," says Compose. "But I think we just had that little extra something."

It was on the basis of a submitted video recording that Jami, Deception and Compose were invited to participate in the ITF Team Competition and flown to San Francisco for the World Finals. Defeating their first group of foes from Ottawa, they then scratched their way past another crew from San Jose for the Western Hemisphere Title, before out-battling Killa Tactics for world supremacy. A video of the contest should be out within a few months, they say.

THERE WAS A TIME, not so long ago that Nocturnal Sound Krew could do little else but wait for the latest DJ videos to hit the shelves. In the days before G-Spot of Double-O-Spot Productions began flying in top turntable talents such as Q-Bert and Shortkut of deejaying pioneers Invisibl Skratch Piklz, outdated instructional videos were all NSK had to whet their appetite. "We felt like we were all so secluded on this island," says Jami. "Videos would come out, but it seemed like we were always at least six months behind, so when G started bringing guys like Q-Bert down, it brought us closer to what was going on."

Soon after, Nocturnal Sound Krew reached a turning point in the pursuit of their DJ dream. "Scratchcon, year 2000," recalls Compose, referring to the turntablists' summit in California that brought aspiring scratch masters from around the world together with some of the greatest names in deejaying. "That was our first true exposure to what was really going on and actually seeing other DJs, not just on video. It just clicked, like, 'Hey, we can do what they do.' We felt like we could actually hang with them."

"What's good about Hawaii now is (turntablists) here all know each other," adds Jami. "When we see each other practicing our asses off, we know we have to work harder. We make each other better."

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