Whats Buzzing in the Streets – Page 79

Octavia Victoria Rogers Albert

Octavia Victoria Rogers Albert (December 24, 1853 – c. 1890) was an African-American author and biographer. She documented slavery in the United States through a collection of interviews with ex-slaves in her book The House of Bondage, or Charlotte Brooks and Other Slaves. She was a Black teacher and writer.

Octavia Victoria Rogers was born in Oglethorpe, Georgia, where she lived in slavery until the Emancipation. Like millions of freed blacks, she had a deep yearning for learning and eventually she studied to be a teacher at Atlanta University. This steady young woman was as serious about being a stalwart Christian as she was about being a sterling teacher. While still living in Oglethorpe, she joined the African Methodist Episcopal Church, which was led by the legendary Bishop Henry McNeal Turner.

Like many of her contemporaries, Rogers saw teaching as a form of worship and Christian service. Her first teaching job was in Montezuma, Georgia. There, in 1874, she married another teacher at this school, A.E.P. Albert, who later became an ordained minister in the Methodist Episcopal Church. Soon after their marriage, the Alberts moved to Houma, Louisiana, where she began conducting interviews with men and women who were once enslaved. These interviews were the raw material for what became her gifted collection of narratives, “The House of Bondage,” or “Charlotte Brooks and Other Slaves.” Octavia Victoria Rogers Albert did not live to see “The House of Bondage” reach the public.

It was shortly after her death in 1890 that the New Orleans-based Methodist Episcopal Church newspaper, the “Southwestern Christian Advocate” serialized the work from January to December 1890.

Written by Dianne Washington

Jabbo Smith

Jabbo Smith, born as Cladys Smith (December 24, 1908 – January 16, 1991) was an American jazz musician, known for his virtuoso playing on the trumpet.

Jabbo Smith was born in Pembroke, Georgia. He was the son of a barber and a church organist. After his father died, Smith and his mother moved to Savannah when he was four. His mother found it increasingly difficult to care for him and at age six he was placed into the Jenkins Orphanage Home in Charleston, but she found employment in the Home in order to be near to him.

The Jenkins Home placed heavy emphasis on music education and it was in this setting that Smith took up trumpet and trombone at the age of eight and began touring the country with a student band at the age of ten.

Smith left The Jenkins Home at the age of 16 and headed north to make his mark on music. He kept a promise to his mother never to work for less than $100 dollars a week. Smith found employment in a number of top bands, the most important of which were Charlie Johnson’s Paradise Ten. This group included arranger Benny Carter on alto and Duke Ellington. Smith played on the 1927 recording of Black and Tan Fantasy. He turned down an offer to join the Ellington Orchestra that same year because of money.

Smith was stranded in Chicago in 1929 while on the road with “Keep Shufflin'” following the gangland killing of Arnold Rothstein, the financier of the show. Smith then formed his Rhythm Aces, a quintet with whom he recorded nineteen songs in 1929. These works attracted the attention of Roy Eldridge, who adopted some of Smith’s speed into his own playing. Toward the end of the 1930s, Smith gradually withdrew from serious music activity. He led a group for a while at the 1939 World’s Fair in New York and gigged in a Newark club called the Alcazar.

It was there that he encouraged a 17-year-old Newark singer who sat in at the Alcazar from time to time to enter a talent show at the Apollo Theater in Harlem. She won and got her start. The Singer, The Divine One, was Sarah Vaughn.

From there Smith moved to Milwaukee where he married, did some local playing, and enjoyed the security of a steady job with a car rental agency, fading away into quiet oblivion for 20 years. Around 1960, Smith recorded two albums, and in 1979, was a guest artist in the musical One Mo’ Time.

He also made appearances at several jazz festivals, toured Europe, and performed at the West End Cafe, the Bottom Line, and the Village Vanguard, all in New York. One of his last public performances was in Berlin in 1986.

Jabbo Smith died in January of 1991 at age 82.

Written by Dianne Washington

Cab Calloway

Cabell “Cab” Calloway III (December 25, 1907 – November 18, 1994) was a jazz singer and bandleader. He was strongly associated with the Cotton Club in Harlem, New York City, where he was a regular performer.
Calloway was a master of energetic scat singing and led one of the United States’ most popular big bands from the start of the 1930s through to the late 1940s. Calloway’s band featured performers including trumpeters Dizzy Gillespie and Adolphus “Doc” Cheatham, saxophonists Ben Webster and Leon “Chu” Berry, New Orleans guitar ace Danny Barker, and bassist Milt Hinton. Calloway continued to perform until his death in 1994 at the age of 86.

Calloway was born in Rochester, New York, on Christmas Day in 1907. The family relocated to Baltimore, Maryland, his parents’ hometown, in 1918. His mother, Martha Eulalia Reed, was a Morgan State College graduate, teacher and church organist. His father, Cabell Calloway, Jr., was a graduate of Lincoln University of Pennsylvania in 1898 and worked as a lawyer and in real estate.

Cab Calloway spent his adolescent years growing up in West Baltimore’s Sugar Hill, considered the political, cultural and business hub of black society. There he grew up comfortably in a middle-class household. Early on, his parents recognized their son’s musical talent and he began private voice lessons in 1922. He continued to study music and voice throughout his formal schooling. Despite his parents’ and teachers’ disapproval of jazz, Calloway began frequenting and performing in many of Baltimore’s nightclubs. As a result he came into contact with many of the local jazz luminaries of the time. He counted among his early mentors drummer Chick Webb and pianist Johnny Jones.

After his graduation from Frederick Douglass High School, Calloway joined his older sister, Blanche, in a touring production of the popular black musical revue, Plantation Days. (Blanche Calloway became an accomplished bandleader before her brother did, and he would often credit her as his inspiration for entering show business.) His parents had hopes of their son becoming an attorney following after his father, so Calloway enrolled in Crane College. His main interest, however, was in singing and entertaining, and he spent most of his nights at the Dreamland Ballroom, the Sunset Cafe, and the Club Berlin, performing as a drummer, singer, and MC. At the Sunset Café, Cab cut his teeth as an understudy for singer Adelaide Hall and it was here that he met and performed with Louis Armstrong who taught him to sing in the “scat” style. He eventually left school to sing with a band called the Alabamians.

The Cotton Club was the premier jazz venue in the country, and Calloway and his orchestra (he had taken over a brilliant, but failing band called “The Missourians” in 1930; later on, the band changed its name to Cab Calloway and His Orchestra) were hired as a replacement for the Duke Ellington Orchestra while they were touring (he joined Duke Ellington and Mills Blue Rhythm Band as another of the jazz groups handled by Irving Mills). Calloway quickly proved so popular that his band became the “co-house” band with Ellington’s, and his group began touring nationwide when not playing the Cotton Club. Their popularity was greatly enhanced by the twice-weekly live national radio broadcasts on NBC at the Cotton Club. Calloway also appeared on Walter Winchell’s radio program and with Bing Crosby in his show at New York’s Paramount Theatre. As a result of these appearances, Calloway, together with Ellington, broke the major broadcast network color barrier.

Like other bands fronted by a singing bandleader, Calloway initially gave ample soloist space to its lead members and, through the varied arrangements of Walter “Foots” Thomas, provided much more in the way of musical interest. Many of his records were “vocal specialities” with Calloway’s vocal taking up the majority of the record.

In 1931 he recorded his most famous song, “Minnie the Moocher”. That song, along with “St. James Infirmary Blues” and “The Old Man of the Mountain”, were performed for the Betty Boop animated shorts Minnie the Moocher (1932), Snow White (1933), and The Old Man of the Mountain (1933), respectively. Through rotoscoping, Calloway not only gave his voice to these cartoons, but his dance steps as well. He took advantage of this and timed his concerts in some communities with the release of the films in order to make the most of the attention. As a result of the success of “Minnie the Moocher,” he became identified with its chorus, gaining the nickname “The Hi De Ho Man”. He also performed in a series of short films for Paramount in the 1930s. (Calloway and Ellington were featured on film more than any other jazz orchestras of the era.)

In these films, Calloway can be seen performing a gliding backstep dance move, the precursor to Michael Jackson’s “moonwalk”—Calloway said 50 years later, “it was called The Buzz back then.” The 1933 film International House featured Calloway performing his classic song, “Reefer Man,” a tune about a man who favors marijuana cigarettes.

Calloway made his “first proper Hollywood movie appearance” opposite Al Jolson in The Singing Kid in 1936. He sang a number of duets with Jolson, and the film included Calloway’s band and cast of 22 Cotton Club dancers from New York. According to music historian Arthur Knight, the film aimed in part “to both erase and celebrate boundaries and differences, including most emphatically the color line.” He also notes that “when Calloway begins singing in his characteristic style – in which the words are tools for exploring rhythm and stretching melody – it becomes clear that American culture is changing around Jolson and with (and through) Calloway….”

Calloway’s was one of the most popular American jazz bands of the 1930s, recording prolifically for Brunswick and the ARC dime store labels (Banner, Cameo, Conqueror, Perfect, Melotone, Banner, Oriole, etc.) from 1930 to 1932, when he signed with RCA Victor for a year. He was back on Brunswick in late 1934 through 1936, when he signed with manager Irving Mills’s short-lived Variety in 1937, and stayed with Mills when the label collapsed and the sessions were continued on Vocalion through 1939, and then OKeh Records through 1942. After a recording ban due to the 1942-44 musicians’ strike ended, he continued to record prolifically.

Calloway’s vocal style is a blend of hot scat singing and improvisation coupled with a very traditional vaudeville-like singing style. Many of his ballads are devoid of tone bending jazz styling.

In 1941 Calloway fired Dizzy Gillespie from his orchestra after an onstage fracas erupted when Calloway was hit with spitballs. He wrongly accused Gillespie, who stabbed Calloway in the leg with a small knife.

In 1943 Calloway appeared in the high-profile 20th Century Fox musical film Stormy Weather. Stormy Weather was one of the first films that featured an all-star black cast.

In 1944 The New Cab Calloway’s Hepsters Dictionary: Language of Jive was published, an update of an earlier book in which Calloway set about translating jive for fans who might not know, for example, that “kicking the gong around” was a reference to smoking opium.

Calloway and his band starred in Hi-De-Ho (1947), an all-black full-length film directed by Josh Binney. Caricatures of Calloway appeared in the Porky Pig cartoons Porky at the Trocadero and Swooner Crooner.

The band also formed its own barnstorming baseball and basketball teams during the 1930s, starring Calloway, Milt Hinton, Chu Berry, Benny Payne and Dizzy Gillespie.

In the late 1940s, Calloway wrote a regular humorous pseudo-gossip column called “Coastin’ With Cab” for Song Hits Magazine. It was a collection of celebrity snippets such as this one, in the May 1946 issue: “Benny Goodman was dining at Ciro’s steak house in New York when a very homely girl entered. ‘If her face is her fortune,’ Benny quipped, ‘she’d be tax-free’.” In the late 1940s, however, Cab Calloway’s bad financial decisions as well as his gambling caused his band to break up.

In the 1950s Calloway moved his family from Long Island, New York, in order to raise the three youngest of his five daughters in Greenburgh, New York.

In his later career Calloway appeared in a number of films and stage productions that used both his acting and singing talents. In 1952 he played the prominent role of “Sportin’ Life” in a production of the Gershwin opera, Porgy and Bess, with William Warfield and Leontyne Price as the title characters. Another notable role was “Yeller” in The Cincinnati Kid (1965), with Steve McQueen, Ann-Margret, and Edward G. Robinson.

Calloway appeared on The Ed Sullivan Show on March 19, 1967, with Chris Calloway. In 1967, Calloway co-starred opposite Pearl Bailey as Horace Vandergelder in an all-black cast change of Hello, Dolly! on Broadway during its original run. It revived the flagging business for the show and RCA released a new cast recording, rare for the time. In 1973–74, Calloway was featured in an unsuccessful Broadway revival of The Pajama Game alongside Hal Linden and Barbara McNair. 1976 saw the release of his autobiography, Of Minnie the Moocher and Me (Crowell). It included his complete Hepsters Dictionary as an appendix.

Calloway attracted renewed interest in 1980 when he appeared as a supporting character in the film The Blues Brothers, performing “Minnie the Moocher”, and again when he sang “The Jumpin’ Jive” with the Two-Headed Monster on Sesame Street. This also was the year the cult movie Forbidden Zone was released, which included rearrangements of, and homages to, Calloway songs written by Calloway fan Danny Elfman, performed by Elfman and his band, The Mystic Knights of the Oingo Boingo.

Calloway helped establish the Cab Calloway Museum at Coppin State College (Baltimore, Maryland) in the 1980s, and Bill Cosby helped establish a scholarship in Calloway’s name at the New School for Social Research in Manhattan.

In 1985, Cab and his Orchestra appeared at The Ritz London Hotel where he was filmed for a 60-minute BBC TV show called The Cotton Club comes to the Ritz that also had Adelaide Hall, Doc Cheatham, Max Roach, and the Nicholas Brothers appearing on the bill.

In 1986, Calloway appeared at World Wrestling Entertainment (WWE)’s WrestleMania 2 as a guest judge for a boxing match between Rowdy Roddy Piper and Mr. T that took place at the Nassau Coliseum. Also in 1986, Calloway headlined to great success a gala ball for 4,000 celebrating the grand opening of one of the top hotels in the U.S. at the time, the Dallas-based Rosewood Hotel Co.’s Hotel Crescent Court in Dallas, Texas.

In 1990, he was the focus of Janet Jackson’s 1930s-themed music video “Alright”, and he made a cameo appearance at the end playing himself. In the United Kingdom, he also appeared in several commercials for the Hula Hoops snack, both as himself and as a voice for a cartoon (in one of these commercials he sang his hit “Minnie The Moocher”). He also made an appearance at the Apollo Theatre.

Cab enjoyed his final years as a celebrated and well loved member of a retirement community in northern Delaware (between, and short train rides from, his beloved Baltimore and New York City), such that, in 1994, a creative and performing arts school, the Cab Calloway School of the Arts, was dedicated in his name in Wilmington, Delaware.

On June 12, 1994, Calloway suffered a severe stroke. He died five months later on November 18, 1994. His body was cremated and his ashes were given to his family. Upon the death of his wife Zulme “Nuffie” Calloway on October 13, 2008, his ashes were interred next to her at Ferncliff Cemetery in Hartsdale, New York.

A profile of Calloway, Cab Calloway: Sketches, aired on the PBS program American Masters in February 2012.

Written Dianne Washington

O’Kelly “Kelly” Isley Jr.

O’Kelly “Kelly” Isley Jr. (December 25, 1937 – March 31, 1986) was an American singer and one of the founding members of the family group The Isley Brothers.

The eldest of the Isley Brothers, Kelly Isley started singing with his brothers at church. When he was 16, he and his three younger brothers (Rudy, Ronnie and Vernon) formed The Isley Brothers and toured the gospel circuit. Following the death of Vernon Isley from a road accident, the brothers decided to try their hand at doo-wop and moved to New York to find a recording deal. Between 1957 and 1959, the Isleys would record for labels such as Teenage and Mark X. In 1959, they signed with RCA Records after a scout spotted the trio’s energetic live performance.

O’Kelly and his brothers co-wrote their first significant hit, “Shout”. While the original version only peaked at the top 50 of the Hot 100, subsequent versions helped the song sell over a million copies. Later moving on to other labels including Scepter and Motown, the brothers would have hits with “Twist & Shout” in 1962 and “This Old Heart of Mine (Is Weak for You)”. In 1959, the Isley family had relocated to Englewood, New Jersey where Kelly stayed with his mother and younger siblings.

In 1969, the brothers left Motown and started their own label, T-Neck Records, where they would write the majority of their recordings, including “It’s Your Thing”. Kelly and his brother Rudy began to take some lead spots on the group’s albums starting with the It’s Our Thing album in 1969. The track, “Black Berries”, from their The Brothers: Isley album, was dedicated to Kelly, who Ron would always quote him as saying “the blacker the berry, the sweeter the juice”. That saying had been originated by Harlem Renaissance novelist Wallace Thurman in the 1929 novel, The Blacker the Berry. After the inclusion of younger brothers Ernie and Marvin and brother-in-law Chris Jasper, Kelly, Rudy and Ron didn’t write as much as they did in the past but in an agreement shared parts of the composition credits as they owned the songs’ publishing.

Kelly Isley during the Isleys’ 1970s heyday was usually photographed wearing a cowboy hat and Western type of clothing. According to his brother Ernie, it was Kelly who discovered a homeless Jimi Hendrix after hearing of Hendrix’s talents as a guitarist and helped him get a job with the brothers’ band and allowed to live in his mother’s house. In 1985 the brothers released the Masterpiece album. It is Kelly who sings most of the lead of the Phil Collins ballad, “If Leaving Me Is Easy”, on the album with Ron backing him up. Kelly’s last appearance as member of the Isley Brothers was in 1986 on the song “Good Hands” from the Wildcats soundtrack.

A heavyset man, Kelly contracted cancer and lost weight, which was shown on the group’s album cover of Masterpiece. In March 1986, Kelly suddenly died of a heart attack at the age of 48 in his Alpine, New Jersey home leaving behind two sons, Frank and Doug. He is buried in George Washington Memorial Park in Paramus, New Jersey.

The Isley Brothers’ follow-up record following Kelly’s death, Smooth Sailin’, was dedicated to him and featured their tribute song, “Send a Message”.

Written by Dianne Washington

Joseph Bologne

Joseph Bologne, Chevalier de Saint-Georges (December 25, 1745 – June 10, 1799) was a champion fencer, virtuoso violinist, and conductor of the leading symphony orchestra in Paris. Born in Guadeloupe, he was the son of George Bologne de Saint-Georges, a wealthy planter, and Nanon, his African slave. During the French Revolution, Saint-Georges was colonel of the Légion St.-Georges, the first all-black regiment in Europe, fighting on the side of the Republic. Today the Chevalier de Saint-Georges is best remembered as the first classical composer of African ancestry.

Boulogne was born on the West Indies island of Guadeloupe, where his mother Nanon was a slave. Boulogne’s father was a Frenchman, George de Bologne Saint-Georges. He owned the plantation on which Joseph spent his early childhood. The word “Chevalier” means “Knight” in French. It was a title of nobility in the Kingdom of France. Joseph could not inherit his father’s status as a member of the nobility because his mother was an African.

Even so, he was called “Chevalier de Saint-Georges” from a young age. At age 10, Saint-Georges moved to France with his parents. There he continued his studies in classical music. He was tutored in violin by Jean-Marie Leclair, and studied composition with Francois-Joseph Gossec. Saint-Georges also spent six years at the boarding school of Texier de La Boessiere, a master of arms. Athletics and fencing brought him a reputation at an early age. He swam across the River Seine in winter with one arm tied behind his back. As an adult he signed his surname “Saint-George” and that became the normal spelling in French. Saint-George’s’ military career began in 1761 as an officer in the King’s Guard.

In his music career, the conductor of the prestigious Le Concert des Amateurs orchestra chose Saint-Georges as First Violin in 1769. Saint-Georges made his public debut as a violin soloist during the 1772-73 concert season, performing his own violin concertos. Many say that Saint-Georges demonstrated the influence of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart. He has even been called “Le Mozart Noir” or “The Black Mozart.” History shows that Mozart came to Paris in 1778 to study the ”Paris School” of composition while Saint-Georges was a member.

In 1775, Queen Marie-Antoniette appointed Saint-Georges as her music director, and King Louis XVI named him director of the Paris Opera. Saint-Georges was also the first person of African descent to join a Masonic Lodge in France. He was initiated in Paris to “Les 9 Soeurs,” a Lodge belonging to the Grand Orient of France.

As a conductor, he later traveled to Vienna and commissioned Franz Joseph Haydn to compose the Paris Symphonies, Nos. 82-87, which premiered in 1787. No. 85, called The Queen, was a favorite of Marie-Antoniette.

Saint-Georges joined the pro-Revolution National Guard in 1789. That same year the Declaration of the Rights of Man was issued by the National Assembly. On Sept. 7, 1792, a delegation of men of color asked the National Assembly to allow them to fight in defense of the Revolution and its egalitarian ideals. On the next day the Assembly, authorized the Légion des Hussards Américains [Legion of American Soldiers], which had 1,000 volunteers of color, with Saint-Georges as their colonel. One of its squadron leaders was Alexandre Dumas Davy de La Pailleterie (1762-1806). Like his colonel, he was the son of a French aristocrat and an African slave. He later had a son, Alexander Dumas, who wrote “The Three Musketeers.”

On September 25, 1793, Saint-Georges lost his command due to false charges of misusing public funds. He spent 18 months in the house of detention at Houdainville before being acquitted. After his release Saint-Georges took part in the Haitian Revolution.

Saint-Georges produced 14 violin concertos and 9 symphonies between 1773 and 1785. He wrote 2 solo violins, 2 symphonies, 3 sonatas for violin and harpsichord, and 18 string quartets divided into 3 collections of 6 quartets in each. Saint-Georges also composed several operas for the Comedie-Italienne, beginning in 1777.

Saint-Georges lived alone in a small apartment in Paris during the final two years of his life. He died of gangrene in a leg wound on June 12, 1799.

Written by Dianne Washington

The Predator: The 25th Anniversary!

After having two successful albums that touched on more political topics like police brutality and injustice, Ice Cube returns with his third album “The Predator” on November 17th, 1992. 25 years later, it’s an album that’s still relevant and still timeless. With only three singles released, “it Was a Good Day”, “Wicked” and “Check Yo Self”, Cube still comes raw and unfiltered, unapologetic and truthful, in your face and knowledgeable about the realities of where he comes from and taking those experiences on another level to connect it to more worldly events that are similar. It’s not a personal favorite of mine from Cube but the lyrics are full of aggression and the production is still hardcore, street and heavy hitting. There’s no smiling or happy things about this man or his words. It’s frustration and demanding. Demanding enough to catch the hip hop fan’s attention and can easily piss of anyone whose ignorant. Not too many artists’ today have albums that’s just as powerful and raw like this. Everybody wants the truth but handle the truth. So who’s the real “predator” I ask?

Introducing… 2Dope4KidzClothing

For the first time ever, I’ll be talking about something different. Something that is hip hop related but not so much about hip hop. I’m always on my Instagram coming across something dope or it comes across me. LOL! Clothing brands often come up on my feed, especially those that are closely related to what my account and posts are about and I came across this clothing brand that really blew me away. There’s so many different types of clothing brands all over social media these days. They’re either similar to what’s trending and popular or it gives you a sense of nostalgia. I’ve seen so many but there is one particular name brand that caught my attention and I was fortunate enough to even gain a friendship with the owner of the brand. We got to know one another and even spoke about a few things we have in common and we both eventually came to an agreement that I do this article. I personally feel like everyone needs to get up on this brand right here. Had to ask my homegirl a couple of questions so that people can get a better idea of who she is and what she’s about. My homegirl is definitely one dope individual and of course, I only deal with dope things and dope people only. Miesha Swain is her name. She’s a 30 year old Alabama native with a clothing company named 2Dope4KidzClothing.

What sparked the idea?
Well, I think as for me I would have to say when I was undeveloped like in my teens was not sure it was called an entrepreneur, but I was quite a teen from my other peers.

What’s the inspiration?
The next part of the question is relatively intriguing because growing up in my family they were all great individuals, and always was taught to always have your own and work hard for it.

Who inspired you?
The inspiration was my BIGMAMA (the backbone of our family) She is fairly a strong black woman that I speak highly of. The 90s culture, music, actresses and actors, and the clothing brands such as Stussy, Cross Colours, Nike, Supreme, and many more.

Did you get any help or did you do it all alone?
Honestly, I have been doing this on my own financially, but my fiancé has make incredible designs for me and has taught me a little about the software, if push ever come to shove. I can design my next T-shirt, hats, or whatever we plan to create in the future.

If you want to get into contact with Miesha, you can add her on Facebook at Miesha Gray. Follow her brand on Instagram @2dope4kidz_clothing. Check her out, support dope fashion.

Harlem World: The 20th Anniversary

20 years ago, there was this skinny, fly guy from Harlem. His style was laid back and he always smiled. Growing up in the streets of New York, nobody likes a person whose always smiling because it didn’t reflect the lifestyle of the streets. The streets are rough and nothing to play with but this guy made it okay for rappers to come from that lifestyle, be fresh, dance a little in your music videos, especially if you’re signed to Diddy and the Bad Boy family, and still smile. This guy was close friends with Cam’ron, Damon Dash was his manager until Big L came into the picture but it wasn’t until his sister got him to meet a guy named Cudda Love. Cudda Love was a road manager for The Notorious B.I.G. and in 1996, Cudda took this guy with him to Atlanta to meet Jermaine Dupri and Diddy. After meeting with Diddy, he was signed to Bad Boy. This guy we speaking of here is Mason Betha aka Ma$e. On October 28th, 1997, Ma$e released his debut album “Harlem World.” A hip hop album that only focused on life in Harlem, the streets, partying, having a good time, looking good, and getting with every pretty woman who walks by with a cute face and a fat ass. With only three singles released and an appearance on the remix of 112’s “Only You”, Ma$e quickly became a superstar overnight and took hip hop to its “bling bling” and shiny suit era. True hip hop fans weren’t pleased with the extravagance of things being in hip hop. It’s supposed to strictly be about the hard knock life but Ma$e definitely had his fair share of telling those hood tales too. Who’s to say that hip hop didn’t already get a taste of that bling bling life when LL put out “Walking With a Panther”? The only difference is that LL got flack for it, Ma$e didn’t get the same flack LL got but let’s keep it on topic. That’s a whole ‘nother story. After the success of “Harlem World”, nothing after that was as successful. Mase did appear on other songs and eventually put out more music but nothing had the same magic as “Harlem World.” Mase is one of those guys where people would debate whether or not he’s a legend. He may have not had a long lasting career but his debut is definitely something to still enjoy from start to finish. It’s a classic only from it’s time when hip hop when fully “bling bling.”

Living Large: The 30th Anniversary

There was once an energetic MC from Mount Vernon. He called himself the “overweight lover.” His name was Dwight Myers aka Heavy D. Heavy D formed a group with Glen Parrish aka “G-Whiz”, Troy Dixon aka “Trouble T-Roy”, and the infamous Edward Ferrell aka DJ Eddie F. Together they were Heavy D & The Boyz. They were the first act to be signed to Uptown Records and on October 27th, 1987, they released their debut album “Living Large.” It was definitely a dope album but it wasn’t a classic. The singles “The Overweight Lover’s In The House” and the remix of “Mr. Big Stuff” were the only singles released from the album. This thirteen track had that 80’s new jack sound and sing along hooks and choruses with the block party energy that got things started and jumping. Although this album is personally dope to me, it doesn’t leave a lasting impression like the upcoming Heavy D projects that followed after this one. The production sounds too similar to each other too. Besides the singles, “Dedicated”, “Moneyearnin’ Mount Vernon”, “On The Dance Floor”, and “Overweighter” to me are the best songs on the album. The rest are just fillers. Sounds more like demos to me. For a debut album, it’s most definitely a good start. A good way to get your foot into the door. Come back harder with on the next few albums and with that, Heavy sure did. Reminds me of his appearance on “A Different World” as well. He was definitely living large. Rest in peace to the overweight lover himself.

It’s About Time: The 25th Anniversary

25 years ago, three friends from The Bronx and Brooklyn came together to form as a singing group and then released their debut album. The three girls names are Cheryl, Leanne, and Tamara also known as Coko, Lelee and Taj, better known as SWV or Sisters With Voices. On October 27th, 1992, the group released their album “It’s About Time.” A 15 track album that’s filled with new jack swing, raw hip hop and R&B tracks. Every song from start to finish is a banger. Songs about relationships, love, and two playful but rapping tracks that perfectly gave the world a glimpse of what these around-the-way girls were all about. SWV was the first girl group in the 90’s to come out with the around-the-way girl image and still able to achieve mainstream success, while others had an image that was more colorful and baggy or the typical high heels and dresses and makeup, SWV kept it hood. Coko’s extremely long fingernails, to 5411 Reeboks and Doc Marten boots to oversized baseball jerseys and jeans, they had an image that regular girls back in the hood of the NYC had. I wasn’t even born when this classic was released but it’s an album that I’m super familiar with and love so much. It’s my favorite album from SWV. This album also had the most hits released. As I sit up at 3 in the morning, looking at and holding the album in my hand, I see the girls on the cover just chillin’ in their element. The SWV logo in a lime green diamond with the letters SWV in dark pink on the top right side on the corner. This means that this is the original 1992 release. This release doesn’t have the “Human Nature” remix version of “Right Here”, instead it’s the Vibe Mix but an instrumental. The April 1993 release has the logo on the opposite side on the cover and has the “Human Nature” remix. It’s 3:14am and for the past almost half an hour, I had “Anything” on a loop. It’s the perfect opening for an album like this. Something soulful, smooth, and gets you ready for the upbeat tracks that follow after. The next song “I’m So Into You” is one of the singles released from the album and then followed by “Right Here.” “Right Here” is SWV’s debut single. The song that put them on in the first place. The song with the video our parents saw back in the summer of 1992. They were bopping and pointing and dancing all over the place. Taj’s rap is unforgettable. Love hearing her rap. Then it’s their signature hit “Weak.” This is the SWV song that everybody knows. Even our little cousins heard it and they don’t know nothing about no SWV. LOL! This is the song you hear girls singing in talent shows all the time. “You’re Always On My Mind” was another smooth joint and “Downtown” was on another level. “You’re Always On My Mind”‘was the phone call to your lover and you told them how much you thought about them but “Downtown” was the invite over to theirs or your place to what we call nowadays a little “Netflix and chill.” The lyrics were very clear about what they meant by “downtown.” Real grown folk music at the moment. “Coming Home” took it back upbeat after you come back “uptown”, “Give It to Me” was also another upbeat banger. This is the new jack swing/hip hop part of the album. “Blak Pudd’n” is my second favorite after “Anything.” The track basically could’ve been a remix to “Downtown” but with a beat. The rapping of course is dope and it hits hard with the beat. Taj holds her own as a MC. The title track itself is just as beautiful as “Anything” to me. The song gives me that classic girl group vibe and Coko reminds me of Stephanie Mills on this song. The harmonies, the hook, the chorus, everything about it makes it such a perfect song. “Think You’re Gonna Like It” is the heaviest new jack joint on the album and “That’s What I Need” is a mix of both new jack and soul. The album ends off with “SWV (In The House)”, my third favorite, an a Capella version of “Weak” and then the Vibe Mix of “Right Here.” Definitely a no wrong doer album. A classic. Very nostalgic for me. Another joint I grew up listening to without my mom’s permission but she played this in that Sony 5 disc changer radio that I loved so much as a kid. The good old days. SWV will be celebrated for their reaching 25 years in the game at the Soul Train Awards in November. It’s the perfect time. It’s about time.