Ex KU students release first official music video

By Adrianna Haynes 

The River catches up with ex Kingston students ‘The Superneeks’ who  talk to us about their new single and breaking into the music industry.

Black British, Lewis Scott and DatBoyWes are the talented and dynamic group behind ‘The Superneeks’ who create music by blending ‘complex lyrical skill, infectious melodies and quirky beats’.

How Superneeks began 

The trio consists of Kingston university graduates, Jonathan “Black British” Mensah and Lewis “Scott” Osbourne, and Academy of Contemporary Music (ACM) graduate Wesley “DatBoyWes” Osbourne.

The boys have come a long way since the all-nighter sessions in the Penrhyn Road LRC, and say that without coming to university, there would not have been a group at all.

The boys met in 2007 at the university, but did not start making music together for another two years, during that time they each honed in on their own skills before developing into a group.

“It has given us a huge network that we may never of had and a lot of experiences in our songs are drawn from that time,” says Lewis.  

He also praises the business management course he studied at Kingston and how it has benefited them as a group.

He said: “so far we’ve been self- funded and fully independent, so every task we go through we sit down and plan it out logistically and most skills were taken from the business management course.”

Swapsies Video

‘Swapsies’ premiered on digital television channel Flava TV last month and was nothing less than surreal for the group. “It was mad, I was getting people ringing me up and saying ‘I’ve just seen you on TV!’ it was definitely one of the most exciting things to happen to us so far,” said MC Black British.

‘Swapsies’ is the first single released from their forthcoming mixtape ‘Flyer than a superhero’, and was directed by filmmaker Joel Carvalho. “It was really fun to film”, says singer and MC Lewis, “It was filmed outside so a lot of people were standing around watching”.

The business management graduate said: “I was nervous because I didn’t know what to do, but as it progressed it went really well.”

The video perfectly represents the boys’ distinctive style and contemporary sound and is a debut that they are all very proud of.

“I think the video captured the energy of track really well”, said Jonathan, who studied media and cultural studies at Kingston.  

That ‘energy’ is the group’s unique mix of ‘funky, slick and sometimes funny version of modern Hip hop and RnB’, with an eclectic sound that is influenced by artists such as Kanye West and Outkast.  

House producer, Dat Boy Wes has described how effortlessly they all adapted to the shoot.

He said, “It wasn’t scripted or story boarded, we went out with Joel Carvalho and Fabio Pires (photographer), and just winged it basically. It was extremely fun.”

The future of Superneeks

Apart from releasing their new track, the group have been keeping busy working on their new mixtape, with the release of a second video already in the pipeline for their track ‘U turn me On’.  

“We also performed at a mini festival in Portsmouth,” adds Black British about the town group members Lewis and twin brother Dat Boy Wes are originally from. “That was a new experience for us that we definitely benefited from.”

So what can we look forward to from Superneeks in the near future?

“We have our mixtape ‘Flyer than a superhero’ 99% ready with a few more videos to come,” Lewis reveals.

“We have so much new material we’re gathering and writing for a follow up so it should be an exciting next 12-18 months.” 

For more information on Superneeks, go to @superneeks on Twitter, or visit the Superneeks Facebook page.