Seasoned musician and burgeoning TV star Briggs has officially joined the presenting team for The Weekly, making his debut appearance as a permanent fixture last night.
Briggs — who has previously been a featured guest on the show — joined the crew in a relatively low-key manner, foregoing too much pre-hype to instead quietly pop up as a delightful punctuation point for the episode's introductory parody of the recent off-air "all-white" wardrobe stoush leaked out of Channel Nine.
The rapper's intro is funny and understated — two qualities that Briggs encapsulates nicely — to welcome himself aboard with the simple stinger: "Sup, white devils? Sorry I'm late. We ready to go?"
Briggs reappeared later in the episode to discuss the controversy surrounding the 26 January public holiday in typically dry and humorous yet insightful fashion, discussing his successful track January 26 — which he co-wrote as part of A.B. Original, with fellow rapper Trials — and the wider movement to change the date of the holiday.
"I don't know if you know this, Charlie, but another name for January 26 is 'Ask An Aboriginal Person For A Quote' Day," Briggs says in the bit. "Every single year, the phone rings, some journo wants my opinion about the date. So I decided to put that opinion in a song, and now you can download that opinion for cash on iTunes."
He also equates celebrating on the day to being like "throwing a party to celebrate the day the bank repossessed your home — and then the bank gave you diabetes", before quashing the idea that flimsy tradition (Australia Day wasn't a unified national holiday until 1994) or inaccurate history (the First Fleet arrived days before 26 January) should be dictating factors in the holiday's endurance.
Check out the full segment below (Briggs appears from about 2:20).
The Weekly screens on ABC, Wednesdays at 8.30pm, and is available for catch-up on iview.
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