Statik Selektah promoting Price's new mixtape No Boundaries

New Video: Price - Dreams To Reality

The visuals for emcee/professional soccer player Price's new single Dreams To Reality off his sophomore mixtape No Boundaries, hosted by Statik Selektah.

Samo's 2012 Toronto Hip-Hop Yearbook



Album: The Closers - Rich Kidd & Son Real

Mixtape: Cakey Pocket$ - Raz Fresco, hosted by DJ Holiday

Single: Syke - Rich Kidd

Anthem: Money Made Me Do It - A-Game x Luu Breeze

Video: Angels - P.Reign

Feature: Mr. Parker - Kardinal Offishall feat. Shi Wisdom

Performer: JellyTooFly

Producer: T-Minus

DJ: Lissa Monet

Host: Trixx

Manager: Addy Papa

Concert: Juicy J @ Opera House

Radio Show: Royalty Radio

Venue: Opera House

Breakout Emcee: C-Flowz

Breakout Producer: Wondagurl

 

Top 10 Memorable Moments in Toronto Hip-Hop This Year (Good, Bad & Ugly)

10. Reema Major signs to Brick Squad Monopoly

9. Lauryn Hill performs intimate concert for OnexOne charity

8. Back to back shootings at Young Jeezy concerts in Toronto/London leave many injured
7. Blake Carrington wears daughter Story around his neck during City on my Back Stylus Cypher
6. Lamar Taylor & Hyghly Alleyne win MMVA’s best hip-hop video for “The Motto”
5. Drake graduates high school and attends Jarvis Collegiate Institute graduation
4. DJ Lissa Monet becomes first female to win Stylus’ Toronto DJ of the Year

3. Raekwon and Ghostface close off NXNE by performing at Dundas Square in front of 25,000 people

2. P Reign releases “Angels” single/video in memory of Shyann Charles & Joshua Yasay killed in the Danzig shooting

1. 15 year old Wondagurl wins Battle of the Beatmakers

Year after year we hear it: "It's MY year!" Get familiar with some of the artists that really put on in 2012.

 Rich Kidd - The OG

Rich Kidd is a staple in the Toronto hip-hop community, a face recognizable to everyone in the city’s music scene, but this year, Rich has definitely outdone himself. Not only has he performed at the majority of Toronto’s 2012 hip-hop shows, festivals and events, but he dropped a mixtape, a beat tape and a collaborative album with Son Real. Don’t let his comedic personality fool you, he is a force that owns the Toronto market right now and is not showing any signs of letting up any time soon.

                                                                       JellyTooFly - The King

This year Toronto emcee JellyTooFly made them respect the female shit after dropping her well-received King mixtape. Jelly is in her own category and cannot be compared to any artist that has ever done it - 100% original and 100% entertaining. She most definitely holds the crown as King of performing in this city as stage after stage, she captivates her audience with an electrifying energy and a demand for the spotlight. She is an undeniable talent that Toronto is blessed to have.
                                                                      Bakers Club - The Crew

 7 artists and 22 projects deep, The Bakers Club have proved that they are impossible to ignore and that the young artists won`t stop until they`re paid their dues. Four of the members, Raz Fresco, The 6^th Letter, BriskInTheHouse and Brandon Chey all hail from the GTA and are putting on big for the city. Right now, there is no young crew that can touch the Club in terms of flow, style and originality and they are consistent with their quality and quantity, bringing the old school vibe to the new school era. Each member brings something unique and special to the mix and no matter what you`re into, they have something for everyone.
                                                                  JD Era - The Golden Child

JD Era, the Prince of Raekwon’s label IceH2O proved he deserved that spot when he released his banging mixtape “No Handouts” earlier this year. The Sauga spitter travelled and performed all over North America with the Wu Tang legend this year but was shown love every time he returned to the T.dot stage when peforming at events such as NXNE and 106 & York. It is undeniable that this was a great year for the young emcee but also obvious that there is more great things to come from him.

C - Flowz - The Grinder

C-Flowz wasn’t boosting when he named his latest mixtape, `Found My Lane`. The young emcee has done just that this past year as he opened up for artists such as Juicy J, Styles P, Jadakiss, Machine Gun Kelly and Smokers Club Tour. C-Flowz isn’t afraid to put in the promotional work himself as he and his Highway Gang make sure they are out at events personally handing out flyers and selling tickets to his shows. And the young emcee is quite the entertainer, who has his signature bounce and smirk while he performs, obviously happy to be in the moment. Him and his team know what they are doing and are making all the right moves.

                                                            Blake Carrington - The Personality

This was a great year for Blake Carrington and he hasn’t even released his Failure album yet. Carrington garnered attention from his `Colour Her 2` video and tour with Sneaker Pimps this year but it is the little details that make him forever relevant. In this year`s City on my Back Stylus Award cypher, he wore his young daughter Story to his chest while spitting his verse and received positive feedback for the bold move. When asked about it though, Carrington humbly stated that he did it for no other reason than the fact that he had his daughter that day. Also this summer, Rich Kidd`s NXNE was cancelled by the Toronto Police and Blake invited Rich to join him at this showcase. It is moves like this that make Carrington such a respected artist in the city.

Smash Brovaz

It was another live year for Toronto's most esteemed hip-hop duo as the Smash Brovaz released their digital debut album, Think It's A Game? with singles such as "The Kitchen" and "Paper Planes". Junia-T and Crooklin are staples in the Toronto hip-hop community, bringing us refreshing smooth and lyrical hits. They didn't stop all year, with constant traveling, collaborating and video shoots, but always made time to come out and support their local peers, proving that they truly are the brothers of our hip-hop community.

Click Photo For Highlights

Thank you to everyone interested in pushing our culture forward. It was a proper 2012 and I'm anticipating what is to come for the Toronto hip-hop community.

Q&A with Haley Small

Toronto’s 19-year-old R&B singer/songwriter Haley Small, who recently joined forces with Disturbing Tha Peace’s Ebony Son Management has finally found her voice and is ready to share herself with her city at her upcoming showcase at Revival on December 29.
HOW HAS IT BEEN FOR YOU AFTER RECENTLY SIGNING TO EBONY SON MANAGEMENT? It’s been awesome! I met Jay Dixon, who is my manager now, two years ago, and we were working together on and off and eventually we decided to unofficially partner up and try and get things going for my career so that worked really well. We recorded a lot of music. He came down to Toronto and I went to LA, we took a bunch of different trips and then after a certain period of time we felt like having more of a team on board would have been great. His brothers are Chaka Zulu and Jeff Dixon from Disturbing Tha Peace and Ebony Son is obviously owned by DTP so he showed them the music and I went down to Atlanta and met them and they were down to come on to the project. We decided to join forces and it’s been great because it’s another bunch of people working towards the same goal. Ever since then, I’ve just been going back and forth to Atlanta and recording with different producers.
HOW ARE YOU USING THIS NEW DEVELOPMENT TO PROPEL YOUR CAREER? Ebony Sons, obviously being owned by DTP and having the success of Ludacris, they have a lot of connections, so using it to get heard and have the right people hear what I’m doing and get to know me. The advice from people that have been a success story already has been great, letting me know what I need to be doing and working with different people that can shed insight on different things vocally, musically, business wise and promotion wise.
WHAT WAS SOME OF THE ADVICE YOU WERE GIVEN? The last time I went down to Atlanta, I felt like I really found myself, which is something that I feel artists have to take time to do. For me, I grew up mimicking people and not really knowing what I want to sound like. Eventually, I realized I needed to find my own sound. I worked with a guy named J-Rel in the studio for about a week and he helped me define my sound and really pushed my limits in the studio, which helped me, grow vocally. When I got back to Toronto, I felt different, that my voice was defined and I knew more where I was going.
WHAT CAN PEOPLE EXPECT FROM YOUR UPCOMING SHOW AT REVIVAL ON DECEMBER 29? I know a lot of people haven’t heard a lot of my original music, because over the years, I’ve created so much, but I never put anything out, for a lot of different reasons. I was always scared to put music out, because I didn’t really know my sound, but over the past year and a half, I’ve really found that sound so I really want to share that with everyone and put on a good show and have fun. I want people to get a sense of who I am, through the show.

The Closers finale and launch of The Music Biz App

The music business really is a game, but now everyone can play it courtesy of Hungry Eyes Film & Television and XMG Studio’s new IOS app, The Mu$ic Biz. Last Saturday’s launch party featured, The Closers duo, Rich Kidd and Son Real, who performed the finale of a National tour to a packed Rivoli venue in Toronto.
Jen Holness, owner of Hungry Eyes Film & Television, who produced The Mu$ic Biz as the company’s first app ever, explained that the game is a simulation of the music industry from production to management to music. “You are a music mogul. You can create music. You run your label. You manage your artists,” she stated. The app will officially be available December 12.
Rich Kidd, who put on an incredibly energetic show with his Closers comrade Son Real, is featured in The Mu$ic Biz, which is why Hungry Eyes and XMG chose to launch the app at the tour finale of the two emcees, explained Holness.

“We wanted the game to have a unique feature. As a music biz, we thought, how cool would it be if you could actually make music within the game? … What if we had another segment in the game with premium beats? Why don’t we reach out to up and coming really solid producers, guys like Rich Kidd. Their music is in the game and you can use and play their beats as premium beats in the game. When it came to a launch event now, what we thought was, these guys are performing, so we’ll do an event where they perform, we launch the game and it’s this cool synergy of game and music. Essentially, what the game is meant to be.”
The wall-to-wall supporters at the venue welcomed Rich Kidd home with an incredible amount of support, providing energy that is usually unheard of for a Toronto crowd, but was well deserved for the pair who had hit up 12 cities on their tour together.

“They approached me earlier on in the year to do beats for the app,” Rich said. “It’s a good opportunity to fuse my music with some other stuff [rather] than just giving it to artists. I jumped on board. They also wanted to do a launch party when we were doing our last show in Toronto so we thought it would be a good idea to mix our shows together, release their app and celebrate the closing of The Closers tour.”
Rich Kidd and Son Real have both contributed to the Canadian hip-hop industry and garnered a name for them independently, but as a pair, The Closers reached the number three spot on iTunes for hip-hop sales. Son says they have accomplished what they planned to when they decided to unite for the joint album. “We did something that was innovative and definitely worth it. I don’t regret anything about it,” he said.

Interview with Miles Jones

The vastly talented DJ/Producer/emcee/songwriter/CEO of Mojo Records and Publishing, known as Miles Jones, has stepped outside of himself with his latest project The Jones Act Part III by creating a character through his music to deal with an emotional time in his life. Through struggle and reinvention, The Jones Act emerged as something beyond the boom bap hip-hop that Jones was previously known for as the emcee created a new sound for himself and a new lane with his new release, which includes not just his music, but the art of comics.
HOW DO YOU FEEL THAT YOU HAVE GROWN SINCE YOUR LAST ALBUM RUNAWAY JONES IN 2009? I think my taste for music as a fan has changed a lot since 2009. That has created a new bar for me as a creator as far as challenging myself and not staying in that hip-hop bubble, which is so easy to do, for any genre really. I started experimenting and listening a little bit more to song arrangements and structure in other music and try and apply that to what I was doing when I was creating and writing.
WHAT WAS THE VISION BEHIND YOUR LATEST PROJECT THE JONES ACT PART III? It kick-started with the single that I recorded about a year after I dropped my Runaway Jones project in 2009 and it was a song called “All Lies” and I was singing on the hook instead of getting someone else to come and sing the hook and you can say it created the blueprint to the theory and concept that I had for this record where I wanted to be able to kind of step out of myself. I find that it is a lot easier for me as an artist and as a creator to not only have to be necessarily myself in the way that, the way a writer writes a script, or the way a director directs a movie, it is sort of creating this character or imaginative space where you can allow yourself to express all these different sides. I was going through a lot… My mom was diagnosed with breast cancer and I was dealing with that and a few things career wise that were changing and I felt that music was my outlet during that time and I was able to use The Jones Act as an escape and you can hear that in the record.
WHAT CHALLENGES DID YOU FACE WHEN PUTTING OUT THE NEW ALBUM? A challenge is always picking which songs that the industry wants to hear as your “single” or your hit and when you’re so close to a project and you’re so attached to something, it’s really hard to be objective and really feel what’s right for yourself and also what is right for your audience or for what the media is going to write about. I think that’s a constant ongoing challenge. For this project, we did something a little bit different. I had a comic book writer create an issue of a comic to a song called “Catch Me in the Rye”, which is track four on the record and it turned into an actual comic that we showcased at this comic convention and it spawned into this comic series. There is going to be other comic books written to go with each song on the record so it’s cool having the hit song and the music video, but I think for this record, I wanted to do something different and do something to make the listener think a little bit more and dig a little bit deeper than the traditional ways that we are told that we are supposed to consume music… It’s still a challenge to really push some of these ideas… My team and I are trying to figure out how to get these ideas to the forefront and inspire other artists to try these things as well.

Q&A with After The Smoke frontman Rob Coin

Florida collective, After The Smoke, prides itself on posting up outside of the box of cookie cutter mainstream music by bridging the gap between contemporary and futurism through songs such as “One In A Million” and “Typical Weekend”. With a recent project Microwaves garnering a lot of attention from new and old fans alike, front man Rob Coin explains the group’s goal and what fans can expect.
HOW WOULD YOU DESCRIBE THE PROCESS OF COLLABORATING IDEAS IN A GROUP DYNAMIC? I think we all bring something to the table since we are all open-minded when it comes to music and art so usually the process starts when one of us has a spark and someone contributes to that idea in their own way. It is just finding that balance between the different ideas that come up with something new. Usually I handle the songwriting and the producer takes over in terms of the beat direction… It’s a progressive idea and I think we all strive for each song to be extremely different from the previous work.
WHAT IS THE MOTIVE BEHIND AFTER THE SMOKE’S WORK? Destroy and rebuild. Everything we do is about deconstructing the visuals or deconstructing the sound and seeing how we can build it back into something new. We are not afraid of failing, we’re not afraid of falling and we take that motivation by doing something outside of the box without fearing if it will be a pop song or hit single versus building something that we like. With that as the spinal cord for our entire movement is how we’ve been building so instead of having a shotgun effect and going after everyone, we just been pinpointing our own sound and hopefully people have been gravitating towards that sound.
WHAT IS THE INSPIRATION BEHIND YOUR UPCOMING PROJECT MICROWAVES? Right now, it’s really an out of body experience type of vibe that I’m going for right now. It’s about being under the influence, whether it be drugs or under the influence of where you come from, who you hang around, or the society that you’re developing in. We are taking people on a journey sonically and visually so if you listen to our music or watch our videos, it puts you in a different place and a different state of mind. You can see what we see through our vision and that’s where we’re trying to take people.
WHAT WAS THE JOURNEY LIKE IN PUTTING THE MOST RECENT PROJECT TOGETHER? I wanted it to reflect something completely different from White Girls and Red Velvet Cake, our previous EP, and I think where the previous project was disjointed, I think this one is definitely an adventure. It’s less lyrically driven and more instrumentally driven. Microwaves is frying your brain. As soon as you pop in the album or take a listen, it’s going to take you on a trip. It’s highly influential.
WHAT IS A MAJOR LESSON YOU’VE LEARNED FROM THE INDUSTRY ON YOUR JOURNEY THUS FAR? Fuck everybody, except your home team. I’ve been able to meet a lot of people that I looked up to since I was younger as far as getting into the music and trying to strive to be within the music industry and I realized that there are a lot of smoke and mirrors and people aren’t how they seem. You can do a lot of your stuff on your own, granted there are a lot of advantages being a part of a major label when it comes to promoting, but if you want to take the extra step and go the extra step as far as marketing… then you can actually make a lot of things happen for yourself. It’s a very self-motivating experience if you’re able to take on that extra task.