Ratking
RATKING exist as New York’s next great band. Like the Beastie Boys and Yeah Yeah Yeahs – local bands that came together as punks before developing into any sound they want – RATKING manage to mix youthful hardcore energy with pure, NY beats and rhymes in a post-hip-hop crew that could only exist in 2012. Wiki, RATKING’s 18-year old frontman, grew up in Manhattan, playing Germs covers in his school music room (he has the groups motto NOGOD tattooed across his chest). At 13 he was spotted in the audience by Wu Tang’s GZA and invited to come up onstage and perform, as GZA proclaimed “Wu-Tang is for the babies”.
Check out this Creative Control-directed video for his underground banger “Wikispeaks”. It showcases his tremendous lyrical ability and also his allegiance to the city of New York City.
Check out this episode of “On The Road,” which links up with the band at their Brooklyn studio for a couple of off the wall cyphers, before traveling with the group to a late-summer gallery performance in Chelsea.
