Phat Beats, Dope Rhymes: Hip Hop Down Under Comin' Upper

How Aussies came to belong to the hip—hop nation.

Ian Maxwell's sophisticated story of Australia's hip—hop scene follows the lives of a small, influential group of rappers from Sydney's Westside in the early 1990s. Maxwell conveys the excitement of the scene and the struggles of the white musicians to define Australian hip—hop, showing how discourses of nationalism and community are played out in everyday life. Whether describing composition in a bedroom, confrontation in a radio studio, tag...