WA rapper pays tribute to family's land rights battle, defends lyrics

When Western Australian rapper Kurrungaya Bieundurry stumbled across a photo of his grandfather standing proudly as part of a landmark land rights protest, inspiration struck hard.

WARNING: Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people are advised the images in this article contain people who are deceased.

He knew immediately he wanted it as the cover of what would become his debut album, Bunuba Baby.

That album reached number 2 on the Australian hip hop charts within a week of its August release and has since been nominated for a major Australian music award.

It draws on his family's fight for land rights which he hopes will encourage younger mob to connect with their culture.

Bieundurry, known professionally as Kayps, had already written two songs for the album when he found the photo of his grandfather, who helped organise a blockade against an oil company wanting to drill a sacred site.

That moment, known as the historic 1979 Noonkanbah protest, galvanised the Kimberley land rights movement.

"The mob up there — including my grandfather who is in that photo and a lot of my uncles and great-uncles as well — stood and locked arms and refused to let these big drilling trucks come in,” he said.

Ultimately the company broke the blockade but as Kayps notes, "they found nothing after they tore up all that land." 

The album's artwork represents three generations of his family.

"My dad painted the Pirlirr — the Indigenous symbol — on the cover art. That's his design, that's our family symbol," he said.

Now he's exploring his own identity and uncovering his political voice.

Community music roots

Born in Broome and raised in Wangkatjungka, a remote Kimberley town of around 200 residents, Kayps remembers his upbringing as the "perfect community environment".

"Every Friday, all the family would catch up at maybe one of the 20 houses in Wangkatjungka, just sitting around, everybody's singing," he said.

"You're looking at over 50 to 75 people meeting somewhere on this rundown basketball court in the middle of Wangkatjungka."

That sense of community and its shared love of singing country, blues and gospel music has driven him ever since.

Kayps and his family moved to Perth when he was about five, but it wasn't until he was 13 that he discovered the world of hip-hop.

Rising rapper

To afford music production software, he busked at the Kalamunda farmers market, playing the didgeridoo.

Rapping on his own beats, he performed to a live crowd in Fremantle for the first time later that year.

"I got the loudest cheer of the night and that was the coolest thing for me ever," he said.

But during high school he found himself struggling as the only black student in his year.

"I wanted to get braids to express myself ... and they were like 'oh that's too extreme', which is like the nice way of saying it's too black," he said.

"Being so far away from home — it's really hard, especially when you have no other representation for yourself."

Changing his tune

Kayps, 21, said the lyrics on Bunuba Baby have evolved and are more politically charged than his previous work.

He acknowledged earlier projects like 'Nuisance' and 'Mimosa' were "abrasive", featuring misogynistic and violent lyrics, and reflected his young age.

"I can't stand listening to them," he said, describing them as "disrespectful" and "awful".

He said other songs like 'Blackfella', which he made aged 13, were a product of the music he was consuming at the time.

Late night conversations with his uncle and father — discussing issues in the community, his culture and responsibilities — shape his newer work.

Kayps doesn't shy away from controversy on Bunuba Baby, especially his lyrics about police.

"A lot of the lyrics of police are intentional because that is a sub-branch of the systemic oppression that First Nations people face," he said.

"Indigenous deaths in custody as well, the statistics are there."

Connecting with culture

He hopes Bunuba Baby inspires younger people to explore connecting with culture, particularly those who have grown up away from country.

"I hope mob will walk away from it [the album] feeling like it's not too late to go on that journey," he said.

"If you feel disconnected and want to reconnect, do it at your own pace."

Back home, Kayps hopes to conduct workshops in Fitzroy Crossing's Night Place, with one strong message for community.

"You are your own person at the end of the day and how you choose to represent that is purely up to you," he said.

Kayps has been nominated as triple j's unearthed artist of the year, with Bunuba Baby up for Australian album of the year at the J Awards.