Contemplating The 21st Century Issue Of Choice

Joel Ma [performing under Joelistics] is setting an example for the "ADD music lovers" of the 21st century. "[They say] gimme the first eight bars and I'm just going to try another song. I'm personally trying to limit myself to one album a week just so I can know it, and yeah, that's really hard to do. I'm not very good at it, there's so much good music that I want to listen to. Then I get overwhelmed and in a way I don't end up listening to any of it, all music becomes just background fodder."

He's refreshingly honest with his take on "the music industry, which is a horrible beast into and of itself" when he talks about the struggles faced by up-and-coming artists in an environment characterised by free sharing, the death of the record and the ever pervasive conundrum of "too much choice" available in the age of the internet. "From the inside… it's a pretty tough time to be making music. The new norm of free music makes it hard. It's kinda scary — music just exists as files in the cloud. It's an overwhelming time to be a music listener; you have access to everything and in having that it's hard to really fully enjoy any of it because there's just too much.

"It's kinda scary — music just exists as files in the cloud. It's an overwhelming time to be a music listener."

"The radio format has a lot to answer for in terms of Australian music at the moment. I mean, triple j is a beast, and it's an undeniable force for young artists or any artists who want to tour the country. I don't hate the js, but also I'd probably listen to PBS and Triple R any day of the week."

If you're thinking Joelistics sounds familiar, it's because he was a member of Melbourne hip hop outfit TZU. The name was continuously mispronounced, leading to the band changing it to the phonetic spelling: "You say T-Z-U, I said tsoo. It came from the Chinese word for 'teacher' and particularly from Lao-Tsu who wrote the Tao Te Ching [expressed in appropriations of repetition, rhyme and rhythm — a book that can be read as an analogy of human spiritual experience and awareness]. Everyone used to think it was from Sun Tzu, who wrote The Art Of War. That was probably the funniest thing for me and Pip.

"The solo stuff is more personal and more embracing of I guess other styles of music and other influences. I don't feel a massive sense of ownership or desire for people to understand it the way that I made it. They can choose to interpret it they way they want." He is, admittedly, far from being a purist despite his introduction to hip hop coming from "the golden age '90s hip hop". "I'm not a purist anything. I'm not even genetically pure; I'm half Chinese, half Australian. I don't have this concept of sticking to a traditional form at all, particularly with music. I think the most interesting stuff happens in between the genres."

Although his music is socially and politically charged, he claims he writes because "I just like to write stuff. I've got a real grudge against setting anyone up for some sort of way of thinking. I'm not a teacher… It's all about my own selfish expression and discovery and attempt to not repeat myself. It's just art, that's it."