Funky Bijou is the collaborative brain child of French DJ/producers Marrrtin, Deheb and Freshhh. As far as I can tell, using my mediocre French language skills and uncanny ability to analyze film and photos, this track was inspired by a recent cratediggin’ trip DJ Marrrtin took to Mumbai and Delhi. He must have returned to France with at least a couple of suitcases full of gems, because after he got back he compiled an 80-minute mixtape of strictly Bollywood funk and Indian breaks (see cratediggin’ link above), and a few months later released the “Funky Bijou Anthem” with his homies.
It’s a pretty catchy song, and coupled with the accompanying video it makes for a genius mixed media presentation. Purchase the limited-release vinyl here.
I had never heard of these guys before I found this video, and I couldn’t find much information about them in a language I can actually read. But after searching around the internet a little bit, I was able to determine that at least two of these dudes, Deheb and Marrrtin, have been busy as solo artists for a minute now. Deheb dropped a hip hop album titled The Goldsmith (Deheb means gold in Arabic) earlier this year, which featured a bunch of American indie hip hop artists like Casual, Shabaam Sahdeeq and Emilio Rojas over his beats. He made a promotional mixtape for it that was featured over at 2db back in March, and it’s worth checking out. DJ Marrrtin has a few mixtapes and solo albums, ranging from more funky breakbeat stuff to mellowed-out hip hop, that you can sample and purchase over here.
