Dos Monos
Dos Monos | |
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| Origin | Tokyo, Japan |
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Dos Monos is a Japanese experimental hip hop group based in Tokyo. The group consists of rappers Zo Zhit, Taitan, and NGS, who is also referred to as Botsu. All three members provide vocals while Zo Zhit produces as well. Dos Monos lyrics are characterized by switching between English and Japanese in a bilingual manner.
The group released their debut album Dos City in 2019, under the independent American record label Deathbomb Arc.
Career
Before founding Dos Monos, the future members attended the same junior and senior high school in Tokyo. In high school they all played in different bands, ranging from grunge to punk rock.[1] In 2015 they officially formed Dos Monos and started making music together after taking an interest in hip-hop music. Early influences included J Dilla, Flying Lotus and Madlib with samples taken from jazz and progressive rock such as Frank Zappa.[1]
Although they were temporarily suspended due to Botsu's study abroad, they succeeded in their first overseas concert at Henz Club in Seoul in 2017. After that, they won the audition project "We Won!? Summer Sonic !?" and defeat other 3600 participants, and appeared in rock festival Summer Sonic. In 2018, they signed with the American label Deathbomb Arc and performed at the French music festival "La Magnifique Society" and the Shanghai music festival "SH △ MP".
Dos Monos' debut album Dos City was released March 20, 2019. It quickly gained some online traction, most notably being favorably reviewed by American music critic Anthony Fantano.[1] The album was released by American independent record label Deathbomb Arc. A review by Paste points out the sonic influence from Madlib and comments on the abrasiveness of the 13-track album as well as the lyrics' political content.[2]
2020 In March, the first tour in US including appearances at music festival SXSW was scheduled, but it was canceled due to the corona epidemic.
In May 2020, they released the official collaboration song "Civil Rap Song ft. Audrey Tang who is Taiwan's IT minister, which attracted a great deal of attention as an unusual collaboration between hip-hop and the politician.
In July, an outdoor advertisement was posted in Shibuya, Tokyo, which greatly projected the sound source production screen of Ableton Live. Other musicians are planning to freely create the unreleased song "The Rite of Spring Monkey" with this screen as the only hint. This announced the release of the new album "Dos Siki".
In September 2021, they released a new album "Larderello" in the video work "Cover（蓋）" that was aired on TV Tokyo at early dawn. The content of the work was that the image of zapping the surveillance cameras in the town in real time, and it gradually projected another world spreading underground. This video work attracted attention as a complex mockumentary which connected to blogs, videos, report material-like documents, etc. posted on the net.
In 2022 they released a 20-minute collaborative track together with Japanese novelist Yasutaka Tsutsui. In the same year the trio performed at the experimental Dutch music festival Le Guess Who? as part of the program curated by American hip-hop trio clipping.[3]
Members
- Zo Zhit – vocals, production
- Taitan – vocals
- Botsu aka NGS – vocals, DJ
Discography
Studio Albums
- 2019 – Dos City
- 2021 – Larderello
- 2024 – Dos Atomos
EPs
- 2020 – Dos Siki
- 2021 – Dos Siki 2nd Season
- 2023 – DMAN [excerpt]
- 2024 – Dos Moons EP
References
- ^ a b c St. Michel, Patrick (September 20, 2019). "Dos Monos". Metropolis. Retrieved December 9, 2025.
- ^ Todd, Harry (December 11, 2019). "No Album Left Behind: Dos Monos' Dos City". Paste. Retrieved December 11, 2025.
- ^ "Tokyo-based hip-hop trio Dos Monos share epic collaborative track with Japanese novelist Yasutaka Tsutsui". Le Guess Who?. July 29, 2022. Retrieved December 11, 2025.