Featuring vocals from the first lady of Equiknoxx, Shanique Marie.

Earlier this year Equiknoxx embarked on their first trip to West Africa, playing across the Ivory Coast and visiting Ghana in the process. It is from this trip that the footage for the surreal video for Gavsborg’s track ‘Did Not Make This For Jah_9’ was taken.

The track appears on Kevin From Ivory Coast, a beat tape-influenced EP from Gavsborg that was inspired by the Equiknoxx producer’s childhood, when he would listen to Mobb Deep and Erykah Badu on compilations like Funkmaster Flex’s 60 Minutes Of Funk tapes, as well as Alric & Boyd’s ‘Fat Block’ weekly hip-hop radio show on Fame FM, Kingston, Jamaica.

The project resulted from a back-and-forth between Gavsborg and Shanique Marie, who would send the producer ideas in the form of voice notes of vocalised abstract stanzas, around which we would create the tracks. Both the EP and the video were completed in lockdown.

The titular ‘Kevin’ is the name given to the metal sculpture that features in the video and on the EP’s cover art, who was created and gifted to Gavsborg by Abidjan based Ivorian metalwork street artist ‘A​ we’. According to Equiknoxx, the name was given to the sculpture by “a wonderful kid from Ireland.”

Kevin From Ivory Coast is out now on Equiknoxx Music.

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We stand in solidarity with protestors fighting across the globe for justice for the murder of George Floyd and protesting against continued systemic racism and police brutality, who are showing extreme bravery and strength in the face of increasingly violent abuse by police officers.

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