What's New
BY Sarah Patterson April 26, 2024
What's New April 8, 2022
Mason Dane on CADA: “I’m humbled to be part of it”
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“The reaction has been sick so far. I’ve already had heaps of people sending me dms and videos of them listening so it’s great to be embraced by CADA.”
Newcastle-born artist Mason Dane talks to Radio Today about the response to Never Miss A Beat, the track that launched CADA, Australia’s home of Hip Hop and R&B.
Since returning from the US where he worked on a collab alongside rapper T-Pain, 22 year old Mason’s feet have barely touched the ground.
Reflecting on the creative process, Mason reveals to Radio Today he and producer Liam Thomas (aka Rora) created the initial idea for the track in just ten minutes.
“We instantly caught the vibe. Once the hook was laid down and the main piece of the beat was solid we sent it off to Ryan Svendson for some horns and he killed it.”
“From there we started getting artists in for their verses, first A.GIRL (pictured below) pulled up to the studio and snapped on it then we ran a session where Day1 and Reyanna wrote their parts.”
“Everyone has their own sauce and their own shine in their sections and it’s dope to have different cities represented.”
Mason describes the finished product as clean and super funky, combining the sounds and talents of a range of different artists.
Just over a week on from CADA’s launch, Mason feels a great sense of pride that the track he worked so hard on was front and centre on the day.
“I’m humbled to be a part of the launch of a national station. Really shows me all my hard work is paying off and to be represented with a station like 96.1 who have always put young artists on is even more fulfilling.”
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What's New
BY Sarah Patterson April 26, 2024
What I was really hoping for with CADA, was a LOT more vaping. So its good that I got loads of that!
I work for a different network, I’m not in the target demo AT ALL, and I REALLY fucking like CADA.
It feels like the first ‘brand’ in so long produced from one of the radio networks that actually has half a chance of connecting with a younger demo. I questioned blowing up The Edge brand but in hindsight it was absolutely right the call. This feels current, it feels fresh. The Edge was right for the time but the times moved on.
From the outside looking in, one of the major strengths is that they’ve hired people who are in the demo, love the music, and make the music. No middle-aged music directors turned content directors who’ve been with the company for 20 years calling the shots it would seem.
Hip hop/R&B is the new pop/rock, and has been for ages, but even on the CHR we keep treating it like it’s a novelty and like it’s somehow too scary for our audiences? And I feel it’s a huge contributing factor to why our industry feels like it’s getting left behind (one of many). R&B Fridays was a great call from SCA a few years back in using R&B gold music that we’d never really given a lot of spins (but our demo grew up listening to), but it didnt evolve, and now we’re still spinning the same safe 30 R&B tunes every Friday.
Nova’s brilliance at launch was that it played the edgy stuff that people were actually listening to – I hear so many similarities with CADA. Well done CADA team you have nailed it.
“I’m not in the demo, I work in radio, but i really like CADA” Are the 3 exact reasons it wont work. Old people listen to the radio. It appeals to people sick of “radio” (but that aint kids coz they don’t have one) and of course you like it. YOU FEEL YOUNG AND IN TOUCH. Radio is for 40 year olds. the edge was pretending to be young just enough to make the people who buy at JB hi fi feel cool. And it did it on a shoe string. if you can see that dude on the train listening to the “radio” on his um…. whatever he has… and filling out a paper “diary” then you have cracked the code here. Well done. “Hi CADA, Sony here… you can have this brand new rap song before spotify, because you and your relevant penrith spectrum are everywhere we want to be” Words fail me!