Club Chablis, Maarsenbroek. When I first heard where this show was, I thought, probably like many of y’all, "Say what?" But because I had become rather curious after Mathis told me about the group his girl, Jedina, was in. So there I went, taking the train to Maarsenbroek after hooking up with him in Middletown a.k.a. Utrecht. When we arrived at Club Chablis, a Grand Café with a bar and a stage, part of a big shopping mall, the club was already mad packed.

While Mathis started ‘assembling’ his camera more and more people came checking at the club. Before the show we first met with Chaotic Forces, a HipHop group from Maarsenbroek consisting of three MC’s; Sky-Line, Scienc Soul Burns and Galaxy, and one producer, Nikolay. The crew, sponsored by a well-known clothing/sports appealing brand, hooked me up with their new single titled 'Dark & Dusty'. The single features both the original track, as well as a remix, which both are pretty dope. Check the review soon on ART12.

Getting warmer

At the time when the crew took stage, Club Chablis was mad packed and it was becoming kinda hot; as one person in the audience fainted (or was it because she was a big fan?). When they were getting the sound straight the DJ played one of their tracks, which had us wondering "Who’s this?" and "Hmmm, it sounds like it’s a professional group".

While Mathis almost broke his neck to get the best spots to make photos (behind the tap for example), I was, like the rest of the audience, bumping my head to the beats bumping trough the soundsystem. Trying to catch every word they said was kinda hard, since the sound system was quite suited for the Club and not for live performances, or maybe I should put it in reverse order. It’s quite obvious the group has been working together for a while, as they empowered each other perfectly. A little flaw was, in combination with the circumstances, that they’ve might been a little too enthusiastic, going on a little too long. It wasn’t like the audience wasn’t interested but it was getting warmer and warmer and there were still the Henchmen who were next on.

Right after Chaotic Forces ended their performance, The Henchmen took over the place. This group consists of MC’s The Emperor, Graphic, Tha Rookie and Nameless while Jedina brings a soulful vibe to the tracks, as she is the group’s singer.

To the people

Nameless is together with Tha Rookie the group’s producers. The crew represents for Central City, as they call Utrecht. They chose the name 'Henchmen', with one of the meanings being 'trusted helper', according to them. The right meaning of the word was little bit un-clear. So AQ checked it. What does it mean?

Having two 'in-house' producers and a graphic team makes them able to stay fully independent, which also gives them total artistic freedom, something they’re very keen of. They provide themselves with the PR (public relations) and management too. The only thing they don’t do themselves is the distribution. Which, most likely, will be done by a major distributor, so they can deliver a total package to the distributor. It can be brought out to the people right away, free of any unwanted influences from outside.

Being such a tight collective doesn’t mean they are not working with other people. "It’s like a tree, we got to have a strong foundation, from there we can establish ourselves as a crew. Then we go out and work with other people, doing production work, collaborating, and in Jedina’s case, doing a jazz-project in the future. One of her dreams is to make a solo album in a completely different style. I‘d like to make a Jazz CD and perform in small Jazz-clubs all over the world."

Three guys

One of the goals of the Henchmen is to create a healthy HipHop culture in Utrecht then trough the entire land but for now Utrecht is the first project. As The Emperor states it: "There are a lot of HipHop artists in Utrecht and we as the Henchmen want to organize it. So at a given point you will see many other artists out of Utrecht organizing things too." But on a long term they display much bigger plans: "The thing is that here in Holland there are about three guys who are running the HipHop scene and if you try to bring out something independent, what happens is you see the ‘favoritism’ (vriendjespolitiek, sucking dick, etc, ed.) happen. What we want to do is give the independent projects a chance. The way to make that happen is for us to do projects with artists from America, France, England and other countries and then drop it in foreign countries and let it flow back in so they won’t have the power like they’ve got right now". That’s why they want to hook up with other artists. "Because if we don’t break free from the monopoly those guys have then they’re going to continue killing HipHop here in Holland. They don’t give artists a chance if they aren’t signed with one of those promoters". This all shows a great knowledge of the how and what’s in this so-called 'industry'."

The simple fact

The Emperor shows why he’s the member who’s handles the business side for the group, while onstage he establishes himself as an energetic MC, speaking his mind on whatever he feels he needs to speak on. Graphic is the one with the hardcore, battle ready rhymes while he’s 'violently silent' offstage. Don’t get it twisted though.

Whatever flow is suitable with a certain beat, Tha Rookie can adapt to it. He usually speaks of his seven personalities, which means there’s one for every day of the week. Also there are the different characters, together making one human the personality: Tha Rookie. "Tha Rookie’s different flows are able to adapt to any beat that comes out of the speakers. Different beats, whatever the hearth feels, the hand plays."

Jedina, the singer of the Henchmen crew, has been dreaming of this: "When I was 10 years old I used to fantasize of being onstage and performing in front of crowds of people. Nowadays, that’s what I’m doing and this is only the very start of it."

Above all, what makes the Henchmen such a strong collective is the simple fact that they’ve got a good work-ethic, talent, enthusiasm and are all on the same state of mind. All that energy that lies within this group is exposed when they get onstage, they move and perform as a unit. With the crowd gathered in front of the stage I could see Mathis climbing on something every now and then to make pictures. The performance wasn’t too long or too short, and the crowd still had enough energy, although sweating their guts out to give them what they wanted: full attention and cooperation. Performing several songs without really taking a break so at the end it was like they did one maaad long track with different beats.

After the performances they took some time out to provide us with the information needed for this piece, and when asked if they had something they wanted to say to y’all, they mentioned all at the same time: "www.henchmen.nl !!!"

Loot & Mathis (whose pictures couldn’t be developed due to technical problems, it’s a damn shame…)

Chaotic Forces: http://listen.to/chaoticforces
E-Mail: nicolaymusic@yahoo.com

The Henchmen: www.henchmen.nl
E-mail: emperor@casema.net