Naram - JAHTARI

NARAM

Originally from Wellington’s notorious K-hole region, Naram is a reggae fanatic with a penchant for vintage synthesisers, cheesy 80s horror films, Test Match Cricket and dal makanis.

Back in the day, he primarily operated as a selector – however he always enjoyed producing low-fi digikal riddims for a laugh. Then, in 2010, he took off from New Zealand with a bicycle, a tent, and a plan to ride from Australia to Scotland via Eurasia (also just for a laugh).

During the course of his successful bicycle adventure he managed to procure an iPod Touch from a dodgy gentleman in Hanoi, Vietnam. Using said iPod – and an app called NanoStudio – he started building a few riddims again, usually in his tent each night after a hard day’s pedaling.

While the road to building a good riddim was long and arduous, eventually – some 15,000km on from Hanoi – he struck gold on a roadside in Turkey with a thing called March of the Gremlins riddim. Upon finishing said riddim, he decided to pedal to Leipzig to play it to the man like disrupt – and the rest, as they say, is history.

Now finished with the iron horseplay, Naram has set up shop in Australia’s Coburgistan region (north of Melbourne). Rather than risking a repetitive stress injury to his thumbs with the iPod, he now spends his days in a classic analogue studio/bedroom with a growing arsenal of vintage synths, keyboards and effects – including his secret weapon, the Suzuki Omnichord.

His debut release, March of the Gremlins, features an eclectic mix of digikal delights, some produced in his tent on the iPod – and others built in the aforementioned studio.

As well as producing a steady flow of deadly digikal riddims, he flings down dubplates with Echo Chamber Sound in Melbourne alongside fellow kiwis L Que and Colonel Mustard. He is also the new chief propaganda advisor for Jahtari.