Macromantics gives hip-hop to town

Miss Macro, of the Macromantics absolutely blew me away, both in interview and in performance. 

It isn't often you find a female hip-hop emcee, and it's even more rare when you find a hip-hop female emcee with a thick Australian accent. 

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Sample hip-hop course of Macromantics  Kelly Lewis  By KELLY LEWIS

calendarplus@tucsoncitizen.com Tucson, meet Miss Macro, aka Romy Hoffman, of the one-woman, hip-hop Macromantics. Miss Macro is a sassy Australian rapper whose lyrics and performance possess the attitude of a tiger walking into a butcher shop. It isn't so much the fact that she's a female MC that sets Miss Macro apart from the crowd. Rather, it's her willingness to address taboo issues such as war, religion and female sexuality in lyrics that seem to roll off her tongue in a matter of seconds. In a telephone interview from Melbourne, Miss Macro says she is excited about performing in Tucson for the first time this weekend. "Hip-hop works for me in my life," Miss Macro says. "It's a raw, here and now, immediate response to (the) world. And I love how it isn't perfect and doesn't try to be." A self-professed "darker type of person," Miss Macro says she was pleased that her first album to be distributed worldwide, "Moments in Movement," showcased her upbeat side in songs such as the trumpet-based opening track "Miss Macro." "Moments in Movement" also touts a guest track with one of underground hip-hop's biggest name, Sage Francis. "I think Sage is one of the most important writers of our generation," Miss Macro says. "We met years ago and we seem to share that same intensity and rawness in our music." The song on which Francis raps, "Locksmith," is one of the darker songs on the album and explores the effects of a broken household. "I'm a product of my father's trade and my mother's substance," raps Francis. Although the album is generating buzz among the hip-hop community, Hoffman says it is her live performance that cements her fan base. "I see myself as a performance artist, not a recording artist," she says. At times quite reminiscent of the playful harmonies composed in the Black Eyed Peas' "Elephunk," and often filled with hilarious vulgarity, "Moments in Movements," is riddled with silly, in-your-face beats and nonsensical lyrics such as those on the third track, "Scorch" which says: "Mmm Kah!/ You can't/ front on boom-bah./ Scoops, ah./Fruit, yum/ come get your crew cuts." But while lyrics such as these show off Miss Macro's playful side, the album as a whole is filled with powerful messages. "I want to affect others. People seem to think this world is theirs and they can do whatever they want with it, and I don't think that's the case," Miss Macro says. "I think people need to take responsibility and give back to others and to their surroundings." As she wraps up her tour with Deerhoof, Miss Macro says she has plans to record another album. "On the next record, I will feel more pressure because the response has been so great for this album," she says. "But music for me is a survival mechanism and next time around I want to show more of my insanity and where the world is around that." IF YOU GO What: Macromantics, with Experimental Dental School and Deerhoof When: 7:30 p.m. Saturday Where: Club Congress, 311 E. Congress St. Cost: $10 advance, $12 day of show Info: 622-8848, ww.hotelcongress.com