Saturday, March 30, 2024

Dal Jones – The hip hop artist putting life into rap

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Serena Kirby, ARR.News
Serena Kirby, ARR.Newshttps://www.instagram.com/serenakirbywa/
Serena Kirby is a freelance reporter, writer and photographer based in regional Western Australia. With a background in public relations, education and tourism she’s had 30 years experience writing and photographing for local, national and international publications. Her current focus is on sharing stories from the sticks; its people, places and products and the life that lies beyond the city limits. She enjoys living in a small town while raising a tall teenager.

Dal Jones grew up surrounded by music. Country, rock, R&B and jazz – he loved it all. He enjoyed rap music too and he’d often take part in freestyling rap battles when he was in high school. Music was important to Dal, but a greater love of sport kept him focused on physical goals that included wanting to play for the AFL. Unfortunately Dal’s body had other plans.

“My body kept braking with constant serious injuries,” Dal recalls. “I soon realised I just wouldn’t make it to the elite level so I had to give up that ambition.”

While life moved on and gathered him up, Dal – a proud Noongar man, found a growing appreciation for the storytelling that comes with the hip-hop genre and the clever wordplay techniques its creators employ.

“I was a B grade English student at high school and I now wish I’d paid more attention in class. But hey, I wasn’t that good at maths either and I ended up working in a bank for four years,” Dal laughs.

Now working FIFO from his home town of Albany in WA’s Great Southern region Dal started to reignite his love of hip hop a few years ago. He also made the decision to adopt the pseudonym ‘Dal Jones’ as his stage name. Dal’s real name is Dallas Coyne.

“A lot of hip-hop artists portray the image of big egos, big gold jewellery, expensive cars and underdressed girls. I’m not like that and neither is my music. I thought my surname was too close to a reference to ‘coin’ and cash. In keeping with my love of wordplay and wanting to keep some link to my real name, I opted for ‘Dal Jones’ as a reference to the Dow Jones stock exchange instead.”

Since returning to music, Dal has released nearly a dozen tracks via social media and downloadable music platforms. These tracks are a far cry from being fake and flashy; they’re works of street poetry, told by a storyteller who exposes his feelings and shares his life through his lyrics.

“My whole life journey is in my music and music is my way of letting things out. We cover up too many things and I’m not into sugar coating serious topics. My track ‘Don’t Give Up’ is about depression and like many people I’ve suffered dark times but the best way to deal with it is to talk about it, not bottle it up.

“I’ve had messages from people all over the world telling me my words touched or resonated with them.  Even if you’re not into hip-hop, the message and the story have their own value.  It’s not that I have all the answers and I’m certainly not preaching, but opening up these discussions is important.”

‘Kaya’ (the Noongar word for hello) is Dal’s latest song and with its deliberately catchy beat and easy to follow lyrics it includes a message for children. 

“I want kids to know that sometimes doing something as simple as saying hello and waving to another person creates a step in the right direction to us all respecting and accepting one another and all being one.”

With a digital education pack created to support the song Dal has been busy performing at schools. He’s also building relationships with teachers and educators and seeing a whole raft of opportunities opening up for his music to be heard. 

And, while Dal is keen to share his work, he’s actually not interested in record deals. He’s in his late thirties now and says he’s far more interested in making music with messages than money or fame.

There’s also no avoiding the impact of Dal’s current circumstances on his music. Dal has cancer and this is the second time he’s confronted the disease – literally head on – as he had his first facial surgery in 2020 and has since undergone a second operation.

“There are a lot of people worse off than me and this cancer doesn’t define me. It’s just another page in the book that is the story of my life.”

You can find Dal Jones on facebook and his tracks are on music platforms such as Spotify and Apple Music.

https://www.facebook.com/DalJones29

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