“RnB with a Tiwi twist” is how B2M (Bathurst to Melville) band member Jeffrey ‘Yello’ Simon describes the Indigenous Australian RnB group’s sound. Unlike anything you’ve ever heard before, B2M uniquely blends the rhythms of RnB with chants from the Tiwi Islands, north of Darwin. It’s not just their sound, however, that makes B2M unique. B2M have sought to shine a light on drug and alcohol abuse within the Tiwi islander community but from a place of hope and pride in their Indigenous culture. Taking their sound to a national audience for the tour, Mamanta B2M aim to nourishing a positive racial dialogue between black and white Australia.

In B2M’s first major national tour, the group will subvert their traditional political passivity and engage in a powerful conversation about Indigenous Australian history. Simon describes, “Being a part of B2M we have never been political at all, but we have been fortunate enough to travel around places in Australia and abroad and come in contact with different Indigenous tribes to hear their story, and it gave us a feeling that maybe we need to sit at one table and have this conversation.”

Dialogue about changing the date, invasion day, treaty recognition, reconciliation and closing the gap, are some of the pressing Indigenous Australian issues which Jeffrey and his band members hope to address in their upcoming shows. Discussing alcohol and drug abuse within Indigenous communities, Jeffrey said, “we use music as a vehicle to deliver these messages, but most importantly to encourage change. We understand that some of us get caught up in the cycle, but there’s always light at the end of the tunnel, so we like to encourage change and to stay positive during the dark times.”

This infectious social consciousness is what makes B2M so refreshing amid an often shallow commercial music landscape. Acknowledging how few RnB tunes engage with such issues, Jeffrey said, “More songs addressing these things should be on commercial radio, instead of songs about love and partying and getting drunk.”

B2M aim to weave a local story into a genre that is immensely popular genre for young Indigenous Australians. Describing young Indigenous Australians’ music consumption, Jeffrey said, “They really like all this American RnB stuff that comes out every year, so what better way to deliver messages than to do it in RnB style and in a way that they are used to?”

B2M’s messages blend traditional Tiwi chants with RnB, and powerfully preserve Tiwi Islander traditions in a contemporary form. Describing the benefit of combining traditional Tiwi chants with RnB style, Jeffrey said, “In the early days we spoke about how we keep our culture alive in the new generation, and a part of that is recording our song and passing it down to our new generation, but passing it down in a way that is more attractive to them, whilst still culturally accurate.”

Jeffrey’s recognition of the similarities between RnB and Tiwi traditional music explains how this combination creates B2M’s effortlessly catchy sound. “We found a lot of connections between RnB and our traditional culture, which both have an inner rhythm that you don’t hear but feel, and that makes you want to get up and dance,” Jeffrey said.

Ultimately, B2M’s Mamanta tour is about spreading a message of united humanity and Indigenous Australian pride, through an infectiously unique take on RnB. “What we want to do is create this conversation where we acknowledge that Australia has a dark history, but that throughout history there has also been positive collaboration between black and white, and that there are hundreds of stories throughout history where black and white have worked together,” Jeffrey expressed.

B2M’s national tour of Mamanta comes to Sydney’s Riverside Theatres on September 2. For more information and tickets to their show, visit https://riversideparramatta.com.au/show/b2m-mamanta