To say that I fell in love literally overnight would be a vast understatement.  I’ve been smitten on The Foreign Exchange since the day I heard “Nic’s Groove” off their first album Connected.  Who are they?  A hip hop duo consisting of Phonte (of Little Brother) and Dutch producer extraordinaire, Nicolay.  Their music is a fusion of hip hop, neo-soul, downtempo, and R&B.  They kind of grab your heart, lovingly poke at the bruised parts for a while and then kiss it all over and inject it with sunshine before they put it back in your body… which is now left with something resembling a post orgasmic high.  They leave you wanting more.

If you quickly become an addict like myself, between both artists there is plenty of music to satisfy.  Together they’ve released two albums, the most recent being, Leave It All Behind.  (Both are also available as instrumentals)  Nicolay has four solo albums including City Lights Volumes 1.5 and 2.0, and in 2008 he teamed up with Dallas rapper Kay (of The Foundation) on Time:Line.  And of course, be sure to check out Phonte’s roots with Little Brother.

View two of The Foreign Exchange’s music videos below.  “House of Cards” featuring Muhsinah and “I Wanna Know”, both directed by Matt Koza.  Next, sample The Foreign Exchange and other dope artists such as J-Dilla and Pete Rock on Pandora.  You will not be disappointed.  Unless you’re into auto-tune.

….as if the entire Foreign Exchange Album ‘Leave It All Behind’ isn’t dope..but, the all too talented squad is also dropping DOPE videos as well…check out ‘I Wanna Know’

Imagine this. One day, you’re cruising through your favorite hip-hop community website and you come across this jazzy, funky, dreamy track by some dude from the Netherlands. You say “hey, this is dope. I think Im going to rap over it.” You send your track back to this guy, and over the course of one year you produce an entire, critically-acclaimed hip-hop album…without ever meeting each other! Welcome to The Foreign Exchange.

Made up of Phonte from Little Brother and producer Nicolay, The Foreign Exchange is one of the very few groups that manages to bring together hip-hop, jazz, r&b, blues, and downtempo electronic in a way that is nothing short of sublime. Their debut album, Connected, was produced entirely from exchanging tracks over the internet and has much more of a hip-hop influence. Standout tracks include “Nic’s Groove”, “Come Around”, and “The Answer”. Leave it all Behind, their most recent release, is much jazzier showcasing Phonte’s diverse vocal ability with tracks like “Take Off the Blues”, “House of Cards”, and “Sweeter Than You”. I highly recommend this group for anybody looking for some laid-back hip-hop to chill out to.

Enjoy :]

Stop, leave your troubles at the door
Don’t walk into my space and try to bring me down
You know I am doing this because
Your lifeline is exposed and I won’t be the one to fault because

You don’t believe
In mystery
You’ve gotta have it all in front of you
You don’t believe
In mystery
You’ve gotta have it all in front of you

Just leave
It all behind, why can’t you
Leave
It all behind, why can’t you

Just leave
It all behind, why can’t you
Leave
It all behind, why can’t you

Just leave
It all behind, why can’t you
Leave
It all behind, why can’t you leave
It all behind, why can’t you

Yesterday on Twitter, Big Dho said:

“TOTB ['Take Off The Blues'] told how it began. Valediction showed how it ends. Find out why it all came apart at noon tomorrow: I Wanna Know dir. by @mattkoza…”

Matt Koza and His Crew

     A few weeks ago, I got a phone call from Matt Koza asking me if I’d be interested in doing behind the scenes interviews for the latest Foreign Exchange dual video that he was directing. “Of course.” I replied, but I think he already figured as much. We’d forged a friendship our first year at Drexel over the usual partying and bullshit, but so many conversations led us to a group that would ultimately be a vital part of his career: Little Brother.
     Crazy to think how much has changed since freshman year. But if you’d balled up and thrown the passion our group of friends had about their respective dreams, Koza found ways to be the first one to go get it.
     His start with the Hall Of Justus stemmed from a chance message he sent via MySpace. “I was going to North Carolina to see a friend for Spring Break and I went on at midnight and was like, fuck it. I might as well try it, since they’re based out of there. I sent Big Dho [HOJ's manager] a message and he sent me back an email the same night. Coincidentally, him and Big Pooh were talking about how they were going to pick up their visual game.”
     At this point, Koza’s work only included a few short films and some work he had done for school, but Dho saw that Koza had an uncanny ability to make something interesting out of nothing. A meeting was arranged.
     ”That was probably the greatest moment of my life,” he laughs, “I was this random white kid, waiting in Barnes and Noble like an idiot and Dho rolls up in his Escalade, his son Cory sitting in the passengers seat. I could tell Cory was judging me the entire time, looking me up and down and looking back at Dho like, “You serious, dad? This white boy?”
     Being the white boy was something HOJ made him come to terms with immediately while he accompanied them on tour. “They actually told me, “You know what we like best about you? We thought you were going to act like somebody else but you’re yourself.” I mean, I talk white, I act white, I guess I dress stereotypically white and they appreciated that I didn’t try to pretend to be someone else. I think the only thing that helps is being myself.”

     It’s hard not to grow fond of him, in all honesty. Koza’s unforgivably himself at all times, which means he’s forever with a smile on his face and a sweetheart’s aim in his intention. All gimmicky facades aside, Koza’s biggest selling point is his personality: easy-going yet very polite, goofy yet completely determined when it comes to his career. The relationships he has and continues to secure will undeniably be maintained on his journey to the top.
     Since his addition to the team, Koza’s been able to add to his resume a number of HOJ videos, including tour blogs, two Rapper Big Pooh videos, two double Foreign Exchange videos and a Chaundon video, among others.
     ”Artists come to you and give you a song and for the most part, they don’t know what they want. They trust my opinion and what I’m thinking, which is cool. But the best is the payoff afterwards– if you execute the same idea you had in the beginning, if you can see your idea come to life and share it with other people, that’s the greatest feeling.”
He’s not so omnipotent yet, though. He’s had a few instances where things haven’t gone according to plan– or even the vision in his head.
     ”For Pooh’s Comeback, I write this 9 page treatment, like invested my heart and soul into it. Pooh’s getting rushed into this hospital and they have to cut him up with a chainsaw and they start pulling things out of him, like an MPC and Khrysis’s hand snatching someone…” He laughs, “They looked at me and were like, “Nah. We’re not having things come out of Pooh.”

     After he writes an approved treatment and shoots the video, he comes out with a first draft in about two weeks, three at most. Koza does all his editing, partially because it saves money, but probably more because he’s such a control freak. He goes through it all frame by frame, making sure the artist hasn’t missed a word, and pairs the cuts in the beat to his editing. It’s safe to say the white boy has rhythm.
     Koza was enrolled in Drexel University’s film program until he dropped out earlier this year, which would have been his last. “There was school and there was my career, and I wasn’t doing either one fully. Actually, I wasn’t even doing school half, it was more like 20% and my career was 80%. I left because at the end of the day, people aren’t going to ask me what my GPA was in college or whether I have a degree. It’s about the work i’ve done.”
     Koza has had his hands full since then. On top of the videos that have been released, he’s working on videos for RJD2’s new album, Chaundon’s new album, and a few projects for Kam Moye aka Supastition, as well as a short film based off the movie Reservoir Dogs (to parallel HOJ’s mixtape of the same name). He’s also working on a Little Brother documentary, which has him digging in crates of archived footage from concerts and previous interviews. The release is set for hopefully the end of this year.

     He credits the work to his team, who he made sure to mention at least ten times during the interview. His gratitude only solidifies his relationships with them, as evident on set and through the work he’s cranked out in the past year.
     ”Artists congratulate my team because they network so well. But it’s like, if they don’t like you, why would they work with you?”
     As for plans for his career, Koza hopes to get out of directing and more into producing. Ultimately, he hopes to make a transition from music videos to commercials or documentaries. He plans to start a media company with Big Dho and his roommate/best friend Milosz, which will be called HOJMedia. Dho will handle the managerial aspects, Milosz will take care of still images and Koza will do directing. Although his past work shows performance videos and concept pieces, his partiality is more towards storytelling, something he hopes will be evident in his work (look out in the next month for Koza’s work on the Foreign Exchange’s latest video “I Wanna Know” as part of the trilogy with “Take Off The Blues”/”Valediction”).

Words by SamSun
Pictures by Nakeya B.

Check out some of Matt Koza’s work here:

These were my two favorite cuts from Leave It All Behind. i highly HIGHLY recommend this album. The duo consists of Phonte whom you may recognize as one-half of hip-hop group Little Brother, and Dutch producer Nicolay. This is what R&B should sound like. Well worth the eight dollars it costs on iTunes.

Leave It All Behind available on iTunes Stores now

Talk about an amazing group. The Foreign Exchange has been one of my favorite groups over the past few years, and it’s because not many people mesh as well as Phonte & Nicolay. I had given the album Leave it all Behind some rough comments, but since then I have learned to love the album a great deal. The video for “House of Cards” (Feat. Muhsinah) is nothing short of incredible, everything is pristine from the production to the concept. It just might be up there with “House of Flying Daggers” for one of the top videos of the year.

Spotted @ Hip Hop Official

Wow, Foreign Exchange just upped the ante for music videos.  The content of Leave It All Behind is very much about the peaks and valleys of relationships.  This song in particular plays the role of valley, when lies, facades and uncertainty come crashing down.  It’s strange to see Phonte so straight-faced, but his role as a mourning narrator fits perfectly.

Love this video. This is actually one of my favorite tracks of Foreign Exchange’s 2008 album Leave It All Behind. Directed by Matt Koza right in the heart of Philly, it plays out more like a short film than a music video– LOVE when directors do that, especially with such a powerful song. Translates really well.

-SamSun

I don’t give a flying f***… Foreign Exchange’s Leave It All Behind album is a classic and this track is just one of the reasons why.  If you ain’t up on them you should get a clue and do some research.   However if you are… good job!!!

I’ve been listening to The Foreign Exchange “Leave It All Behind” album since last winter, and they’re still releasing music videos. The sign of a good album: I’m still excited when they’re released. View The Foreign Exchange’s music video “House of Cards” featuring Muhsinah, which came out today.

I’m SO excited for this show. If you are still blankly staring, this is Phonte (of Little Brother) & Nicolay’s project that has produced two near-classic efforts: Connected (2004) and Leave It All Behind (2008).

On top of that, former Indy resident alpha.live is opening, plus appearances from DJ Limelight & Allen Imagery. Ironically (given the cover of Leave It All Behind), I’ll be leaving a wedding reception early to make the show.  Can’t wait to see them in an intimate venue like the Athaneum. Get your tickets at www.procircuit.com!!

The Foreign Exchange does it again with a new track, “Purple flip”.  Got this email today and it is a great way to start off the weekend.  Listen to it here: CLICK HERE TO LISTEN

LD -9.9.09