Today, Hip-Hop #x2019;s unsigned are often achieving more than some of those who already have a major label address. Artist development is a topic which is never taken lightly as obviously the better the packaging, the greater the appeal and the greater the appeal the longer the shelf life. And is more than aware of this.
Raised within the same city limits as Queen Latifah, Ice-T and Redman, this Newark, NJ native is definitely a person who takes state representation as serious as he takes album titles stating Hip-Hop is now deceased. And working alongside the likes of and , Choir Boy is no stranger to the Breeding Ground's aura. So having scored a movie, had his track featured on the NBA2K video game, had a segment on the WB11 news devoted to him about his positive approach to rap and having crafted a song in its entirety as if written by the AIDS virus, Choir Boy is conscientiously and diligently branding himself and his movement.
So whoever said Hip-Hop was dead may have just added wind to this Pope of the streets sails. AllHipHop.com: What is your definition of a rapper?
Choir Boy: Well that #x2019;s one of the things that I am able to do, especially the communicating part. AllHipHop.com: Well your background in music is pretty extensive in other genres of music, so how important has that extensive background been in helping you emerge as an MC?
Choir Boy: It helped, you learn about different types of music. Everything you learn helps the music you do now. I played in orchestras and I produce music too and it helped with all the string arrangements too.
You also learn how to count bars and even when it comes to writing songs, different types of song format that aren #x2019;t being used now, knowing about these help you be more creative. So knowing other types of music is really important and growing up in that type of environment kind of gives me an edge over other artists. AllHipHop.
com: Your parents are both Ministers, you don #x2019;t appear to curse in your rhymes, is this because of your upbringing? Choir Boy: No, not one curse, not one N word. I am probably able to curse just as good as anyone else, but growing up I wasn #x2019;t able to listen to rap music, I had to sneak to listen to Main Source and Black Moon, Nas, OC, but once as I started to get older, my parents wouldn #x2019;t trip that much if the rap had curses in it; I could play it as loud as I wanted it.
I thought about that, you know before, like three of four years ago my raps had more curses in. But I thought about it, if I really want to be big I would have to limit the cursing in it because as soon as you curse, especially a lot of older people when they hear one curse word, or one n word, they turn it off automatically and judge you on that. I know I can just still portray these same images and messages without cursing and reach a lot more people and then when you think about it, you can #x2019;t get that much going on TV and on the radio cursing anyway.
Either you do two versions or one. Choir Boy: Well I had a show the other day at SOBs with Jeru the Damaja and when I came off the stage I realized I hadn #x2019;t cursed. I mean I haven #x2019;t been cursing in my lyrics for about two years now and it was just interesting that you don #x2019;t notice and the thing that is funny about it, when people don #x2019;t notice the curses they actually start listening to the music.
You know too much cursing can turn you off. AllHipHop.com: You are repping New Jersey, how difficult a job is that?
Choir Boy: One of my street names is Benedict XVI, which is the name of the new Pope. The Pope to me from my perspective is the person who everyone goes to for spiritual advice and direction and because I am also a producer who is producing for every hot artist coming out of NJ, or I have my hands on them, that is my street name. A couple of years ago it was very hard to say #x2018;I am from NJ #x2019; because a lot of artists, us being a NY step child, they say we are the underdogs and now I have this movement going on.
You know it #x2019;s not as hard as people think, it #x2019;s all about perspective. Everyone knows that down south is running the music industry now, but people are looking for something new, and they are also looking for a new region to come out of. AllHipHop.
com: So your new movement is going to encourage NJ as the #x2018;in #x2019; region? Choir Boy: Well we just put out a mixtape called #x201C;Clap Muzik #x201D; and I have a lot of different artists, including Chayse McClair, who is from Haiti and I am just going to use him as an example of what I am trying to do. Growing up he was the guy that a lot of people made fun of, especially back in the day because Haitians were made fun of.
You know he was beat up and I tried to turn all this negative around to a positive. You know I told him I wanted him to wear a Haitian flag, every time I see him I want to see the flag, I wanted him to rap about Haiti and I wanted him to mix the English and the Creole together and rep Haiti just as hard as Biggie and Jay-Z repped Brooklyn, his album is the Port-au-Prince LP and he is going really hard and that is what I try to do with every artist that I deal with. That is how I think Jersey is going to come back; because back in the day it was very diverse.
We had Naughty, Queen Latifah, Lords of the Underground, we had all types of artists and everyone was different and that is the way of what I am trying to do with this Jersey movement. I also have an artist called Phenom that is just crazy, he has been at the Fight Klub a couple of times and won. He is like a Ludacris, Eminem, Twista and Chamillionaire; all wrapped up in one and his album is crazy.
I also have another artist called Chink Showtime, he is a Young Jeezy, 50 Cent and Styles P all mixed up. AllHipHop.com: All these artists are part of your company?
Choir Boy: These are artists that I am associated with and, that is how it came back to the Benedict XVI thing, a lot of people that are around me want to be like me. They want to turn around and stop cursing in their rhymes and it is like I tell them, if everyone was the same this world would be very boring. I do this because this is what I am called to do.
Just how I like Kanye West, I like MOP too, there has to be positive Hip-Hop, there has to be Down South Hip-Hop, and there has to be hardcore Hip-Hop. AllHipHop.com: Your track about AIDS, getting the message out about this disease was obviously of great importance to you?
Choir Boy: Definitely, I live in Newark, NJ which is one of the cities with the highest number of AIDS sufferers. What happened was I was dating this girl and she asked me if I had had an AIDS test. I told her no and I thought about it and then I made up my mind that I would take the test and I was sitting thinking about this idea as a friend of mine was talking about me doing a song, talking about aids from the perspective of bragging to the hoods and the communities about how ill I am and how I am really terrorizing all y #x2019;all communities and you don #x2019;t even know it.
So I thought it was important to get the message across. But after writing the song and recording it, I thought it was important that I took the test myself. At my shows I show my test results.
Choir Boy: I performed it once at a church and it was weird for me as I don #x2019;t really like performing at churches, because even though I am a positive artist, I respect ministers and preachers so much that I wouldn #x2019;t want to dare step into their pulpit and do what I do. You know even though it is positive it definitely isn #x2019;t gospel. So the Pastor, he had a Community Day outside, so I did it.
There was kids and they were expecting I guess to do a song where they could dance, but I didn #x2019;t, I did the AIDS song [ ] and when I walked out I said #x201C;How many people know that the truth hurts? #x201D; and I stared at the crowd for about thirty seconds and when I went into the song, the look on peoples faces. When I thought about it, maybe it was the wrong song, but then I thought, the AIDS virus doesn #x2019;t care if there are kids, it just goes for the kill, so that was why I thought that was important.
AllHipHop.com: Do you feel like consciousness is becoming more prevalent again in Hip-Hop? You know we spent a while where music was dominated with a kind of #x2018;feel-good #x2019; attitude, rhymes about jewelry, cars and clothes, with no real message.
Choir Boy: I think so. I think artists are getting a lot older and a lot more mature, you know even Ludacris, his song Runaway Love, he is saying something that matters and what everyone can relate to and I think a couple of years ago when Kanye West came out and Jadakiss made the Why song, it started to be like a gimmick to be conscious. But now people are saying stuff that makes sense and everyone comes from some type of struggle.
If you listen to Young Jeezy #x2019;s album, there are a lot of things on there that make a lot of sense. I like Young Jeezy a lot and people look at him as being the hardcore Down South rapper that always talks about drugs, but to me if he wasn #x2019;t a rapper he would be a motivational speaker, the type of things that he says. He has a track called Hypnotize talking about #x2018;I command you to get money #x2019; that is motivational stuff.
That is what corporate companies do, they sit you down. Consciousness is growing in a real way, not in a gimmicky type of way. AllHipHop.
com: Now your government name is Mic Jones, which you started out using when you were rapping. Now you are Choir Boy, was this because of the presence of the other Mike Jones? Choir Boy: I had the name and had been using it for a long time.
I was using the name when I was recording in Baltimore, I had a song called Stay Together which was in rotation on 92 Q and I was doing very well and then about a year and a half ago I became familiar with the other Mike Jones and the first thing I thought about, being from the Tristate was that we were going to have to battle for this name. But then I thought about the type of artist he is and the type of artist I am, Mike Jones is an artist that, I wont say isn #x2019;t the most talented artist, but he knows how to use what he has and market himself. Me, I am a true artist, I studied people like Stevie Wonder, Coldplay and Marvin Gaye and I thought #x2018;do I want to go through this?
#x2019; or do I want to change up? So I changed up my name to Choir Boy because I didn #x2019;t want every time you heard my name or my music to be compared to this other guy. I want people to get to feel my music, its not about the name, I can be MC Cardboard as the music and the integrity is going to draw people to what I do.
It was more of a choice; I didn #x2019;t have to change my name. AllHipHop.com: Is Mike Jones aware that there was another rapper with the same name?
Choir Boy: I am sure he did, but Mike Jones made it hot and that #x2019;s one of the things, people come up to me and say #x2018;I got my name copy written #x2019; and I mean that #x2019;s great, but I don #x2019;t care if its copy written or not, if a person goes out and makes that name hot, he is Mike Jones, no matter what. When you think Mike Jones, you think of the guy from Houston, Mike Jones who, that #x2019;s who you think of. AllHipHop.
com: You had a segment on the WB11 news, how did that come about, is that down to a good team on your part? Choir Boy: Well it was definitely a good team. My manager Frank Mesa is associates with Jim Watkins and he played him some of my music and he liked it and it happened.
It was a beautiful thing for them to come all the way to my neighborhood to do that and even come to my day job and walk through my job with me, take the time out. I had a lot of press over the last two years. AllHipHop.
com: Was that segment the start of the press run for you? I mean that #x2019;s a great way to start. Choir Boy: Yeah, that was probably the start of it.
I had interviews and then one of my songs was placed on the NBA2k and a ringtone deal and everything started moving from there. AllHipHop.com: On the WB11 segment they literally put you up against 50 Cent.
Did you look at that as the positives and negatives which was how it appeared? Choir Boy: That was something they did. A lot of people think that because I am a positive artist it is a case of good versus evil, but I like the hardest Hip-Hop you hear, I love it.
It is like #x2018;different strokes for different folks. #x2019; Some people like 50 Cent, some people like Nas, some people like Kanye West and some people like 8Ball and MJG. I thought it was funny.
At the time [of the segment] I felt really funny about a lot of the hardcore Hip-Hop because of gang activity because a close friend of mine, Sean Bush was shot in the head and murdered because of gang activity and right after that another friend of mine died. So whenever I heard anything in a rap about blood I would really feel some kind of way. But over time when I seen the 50 Cent versus me it was funny because I love 50 Cent.
AllHipHop.com: Well it is the majority of gangsta rappers that have taken Hip-Hop to the extended markets really isn #x2019;t it? Choir Boy: 50 Cent and even Mike Jones, when they learn to market themselves; in an artistic level they may not have taken it to the place it should be but in a business sense they have made it the multi-billion dollar industry it is and they are trendsetters in their own rights.
AllHipHop.com: You seem to play on words a lot, your company is called Be-U-Tiful Music and your second album was Good Mourning America. Why the play on the words with the album?
Choir Boy: Basically what I did around that time I was listening to Marvin Gayes #x201C;What #x2019;s Going On #x201D; everyday. I studied it and how it was put together. Both of my brothers are marines and one of them was in Iraq and right after I dropped the album, the other went to Afghanistan and I was just looking at Marvin Gaye #x2019;s story and his story and mine are basically the same.
He grew up in the church like me, his Dad was a minister and at the time he wrote that song his brother was just getting back from the Vietnam War. His brother told him everything that was happening in the war and he took that and the other events that were going on at the time and made #x201C;What #x2019;s Going On, #x201D; kind of like the same thing that was happening with me. Good Mourning is like Good Morning, everybody wake up, but also a lot of things were going on in the world, the murder rate was increasing, the AIDS rate was rising, all types of wars and it was just like mourning, death.
It was just to put mourning in a place where people could really see it. My friend had passed away; a lot of people were in mourning because of 9-11 and then the hurricanes and everything. AllHipHop.
com: Are you looking to sign a major label deal, as so many people are taking the indie route and with you being a producer I am sure it #x2019;s not easy getting the right situation for you? Choir Boy: I am looking for a couple of situations; as a producer I am able to do so much and not in a bragging, cocky way. I am able to, as a producer, take an artist and turn it into a polished diamond and really try to see where they are coming from to ensure the finished product is hot.
Having a regular deal probably wouldn #x2019;t benefit me. I see a publishing deal here, a production deal there and I already have a ring tone deal and I just scored a movie, something I want to get more into. You know the independent route is beautiful now.
You know people talk about how record sales are down and Hip-Hop is dead but, they don #x2019;t say whose are down. Jim Jones record came out and he is getting $7-8 a record, I am sure he isn #x2019;t mad at record sales. Then at the same time you have ring tones where now you can go platinum off a ring tone.
There is a category in the Billboard charts now for ring tones. The industry is turning around for the independent artist if you are aware of promotions. AllHipHop.
com: What is the movie about that you did the score for? Choir Boy: It is kinda funny. It is about this guy Jay Brookes who is a black guy who never dates black women, he just isn #x2019;t attracted to them or maybe he is intimidated by them or whatever.
But he dates a lot of different types of women, but when he gets to the point where he thinks it isn #x2019;t going anywhere, he leaves them a note and then he leaves. This guy even though he was kind of nerdy, he wasn #x2019;t afraid to be himself and that is what I got out of it. He was him all the way to the bone.
AllHipHop.com: How did you land that gig? Choir Boy: I headlined a music expo in LA last year and I guess I did a pretty good job as when it came to doing time to do the music for the movie, they had a lot of samples that they couldn #x2019;t clear and because I am able to do music without sampling, I mean I do sample from time to time, but I was able to do that.
AllHipHop.com: The process of scoring the movie is quite different to say working with someone in the studio isn #x2019;t it? Choir Boy: The type of movie this is, it isn #x2019;t like a Steven Spielberg, you know the big dramas which is what I really want to get into.
This is more or a comedy and placing music with the scene and a lot of times when I produce music I produce using pictures anyway. I look at a picture and try to fill in from there, what I was feeling from that scene. It took me about a day to do that.
AllHipHop.com: This is something you will be pursuing then? Choir Boy: Yeah I mean when I was younger, my goal wasn #x2019;t even to be a rapper or producer I wanted to conduct an orchestra, sit in front of a full piece orchestra with my baton.
Scoring movies is something that I do want to get into. AllHipHop.com: As an upcoming artist who has yet to be received on a national level, when you hear people say that Hip-Hop is dead, how does that make you feel?
Choir Boy: Me, growing up, my brother used to rap when I was growing up and what he did for me is what all these artists need to do for the younger artists. He sat me down and made me listen to everything; De La Soul, Slick Rick, Biz Markie, Kwame, everybody and when you have been doing this for twenty years you are going to be good. They need to sit down and tutor us.
These older artists have so much wisdom and so much know how when it comes to us and the younger generation they don #x2019;t really teach us about the Golden age of Hip-Hop. You know some younger fans don #x2019;t even know who Big Daddy Kane is; it #x2019;s not their fault they just weren #x2019;t born then. When I was on stage the other night I was on stage with people from all over the world, Haiti, Sierra Leone, Cuba and doing what we call Hip-Hop and I was like #x2018;Is this dead?
#x2019; It is more alive than it ever was. The problem is that a lot of the older artists aren #x2019;t teaching the younger artists. We took what we learned from the streets and created the rap game and we have taken it and ran with it and a lot of the artists are mad with us for that but some don #x2019;t know better.
Hip-Hop is going into this new digital age and a lot of artists don #x2019;t know how to take advantage of that. I love Nas and I feel like we have a lot in common and he is in my top three of all time, all the lyrics, but he put fire in a lot of artists and when he said Hip-Hop was dead you have everybody putting out these great albums. I mean this has been one of the best fourth quarters in a long time.
It put fire in me.
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