GOOGLE EARTH vs THE CITY
Kaiju Noodles

Video Composition Jean Poole
Song ‘Giant Idiots’ by Potato Masta vs 2 Pants Rotation Costuming Madeleine King

Common to Kaiju (monster / mysterious creature) culture & hip-hop is the notion of the battle, a contest of wild and unpredictable opposing forces, both hoping to emerge as victor, and all the while providing an irresistible spectacle for their respective audiences. Kaiju & hip-hop also share a love of ridiculing borders, both making much avail of the internet light speed at which pop culture zaps around the globe, rendering taste and affiliation more important than geography.

Kaiju clashes on film may have originated in Japan, but the over-sized costumes and B-grade special effects of Kaiju fans and creators can now be found all over the world. And when it comes to transcending national boundaries, hip hop is often thrust forward as a global language that leaps from nation to nation to imagination – a lifestyle as much as a musical genre, an embraced and flourishing element of urban landscapes on every continent. Which brings us back to Brisbane’s cityscape.

Outlining a tropical triangle of dots between Queensland, Japan and Vietnam are the Brisbane emcees Potato Masta and 2 Pants Rotation, who dreamed up the song, lyrics and music for ‘Giant Idiots’, an MC battle that saw them costumed as ‘Jumbo Plant’ and ‘Squid Boy’ respectively. Beats were provided by long-time documenter of Tokyo graffiti, Potato Masta and the battle lyrics improvised together over time with 2 Pants Rotation until settling into their final configuration.

Lyrically, this was never going to be a typical MC battle, the general hilarity and lateral leaps of the song deliciously reinforced with Madeleine King’s costumes: a giant zippered plant head for Jumbo Plant, a large pink squid head and tentacles for Squid boy. Double-click to Brisbane’s underground : beneath bridges, inside trains, clubs and the virtual terrain of an arcade, and it’s clear the camera loves the combination of global pop-culture meets urban decay. A make-shift blue screen and series of glamorous dance moves for compositing later – and it’s a wrap.

The editing and post-production processes necessarily point out that meaning is constructed, something amplified when animation is involved and deliberate choices about imagery and backgrounds are made. Wrestling then with the global-yet-localised meanings within ‘Giant Idiots’, Google Earth emerged as a possible tool for exploring some of the border-hopping within the song, an easy zoom in and out from the local scale, and tying in nicely with some of the arcade game footage & recreations. That it also allowed for superimposing larger than life emcees above 3D Google Earth buildings sealed the deal. And so the clip unfolded off the internet and into urban space.