Posts Tagged ‘downriver’

The Zone
by Origix

(April 14,2010)

This weekend we have many reason to get out the house and have a blast, From Downriver to the east side to the west side Burbs this Friday there are many hip-hop events going on. The weather nice baseball back in season and for the smoking crowd get out to the bar and Fire it up before the big smoking band goes in place this May.

The Zone
by Origix
(March 3, 2010)

In the Metro Detroit Area, we are fortunate to have a wide variety of places to go out and experience live local and national music.  Being that we have one of the most thriving music scenes in the country, talent is easy to find but sometimes it is hard to find a place to play.  You can find bars on almost any major road, on the other hand finding a quality venue is a lot harder.  Many people have to visit Downtown or go out to Ann Arbor to get that feel, unless you know about the hidden gem downriver; “The Rack-N-Roll” a concert venue with a local bar appeal where you can meet good people and have good times.  Unlike many bars that have to go by an eighteen and older age policy The Rack-N-Roll is able to open their doors to fans of all ages depending on the show, giving the younger generation a chance to witness upcoming music as well as play pool with friends. “We want to be The Machine Shop (well know, metal venue in Flint) of Downriver. We want to be the place everyone wants to play and we are getting there”. Club promoter Tiny states.

What sets The Rack-N-Roll apart from other places?  Tiny answers, “we book everything from rock, metal, hip-hop, rap, country, death metal, acoustic music, whatever. We do not discriminate musically”.  With a nice sized stage and top-notch sound, this place is somewhere you need to see a show.  Artists like Bizarre, Pistol Day Parade, Crackjaw, Ikkurruz, Ray Street Park and so many more have played there. The Rack-N-Roll is involved in doing many community events with upcoming charity shows, A Tribute to the Troops show will have all profits going to The Intrepid Fallen Heroes Fund on March 27th    The “Cancer Sucks” benefit is supporting Tiny’s dad, Tim Cook on April 10th.  This Friday, March 5th see Mo-Town Rage, Origix & D.C. along with Waste Management, The Red Hour and Rtkul8, this will be a show you do not want to miss.  Doors are at 9pm, all ages, more info visit www.myspace.com/racknrollnightclub The Rack N Roll is located at 13634 Sibley Rd in Riverview, MI 48193. MCB

The Zone Radio with Origix & DC airs Mondays 9 p.m.-12 a.m. 89.3 FM, stream at whfr.fm Visit 2raw4fm.com

The Zone
by Origix

(February 17,2010)

Rtkul8 is back with his sophomore release “Rebel8shunz” after making a statement with his debut “”Rtkul8 808″ where his passion for hip-hop would give him the motivation to strive to keep going and record another album. “Rebel8shunz” is based on The Book of Revelations as well as his own research into counter-culture and “esoteric”/ conspiracy movement. Rtkul8 explains, “It is basically my modern re-telling of prophecies that entire cultures have been formed around since the beginning of time. It is told from a narrative and first person perspective in which the main character Tommy/Rtkul8 falls asleep and has a vision of the world the way it was, the way it is, and the way it will be. It is basically the story of my journey over the last few years, including my little brother Chad’s suicide, my family falling apart as well as forced self reflection. That’s where I came up with “Rebel8shunz”; it is my animal instincts and human nature to rebel against these revelations”.

This Downriver resident was born in California and raised in the Detroit area, giving him a different look on music influenced by G-Funk, So-cal punk, and Detroit Techno. All the sounds that came from the West Coast and Mo-town have given him a social awareness of the power of lyrics. “I love all of that music but I would have to say the best sound as far as hip-hop are Detroit MC’s , they are hungrier than most, especially in the Downriver/ Southwest area.” Look for projects he has in the works with producers overseas from U.K. and Australia. Plans are in the work for an April release party at Division Street Art Gallery in the Eastern Market. See him live with Mo-Town Rage, Origix &D C., Waste Management and The Red Hour at the Rack N Roll on Friday, March 5th in Riverview, MI, all Ages. More info at www.myspace.com/rtkul8. |MCB

The Zone Radio with Origix & DC airs Mondays 9 p.m.-12 a.m. 89.3 FM, stream at whfr.fm Visit 2raw4fm.com

The Zone Column appears weekly in The Motor City Blog (MCB)

The Zone
by Origix
(February 3, 2010)

Reppin’ the neighborhoods of Lincoln Park and keeping the streets clean, Waste Management is on the job cleaning up garbage rappers around the area. Group members JRN and Pig Pen go back to middle school where they first met. “We both were into making music a little bit on our own, nothing serious, until we started making tracks together in about 2005,” JRN explains. “Then, we got expelled from school for a track we did and it was on!” Now, both 20-years old and full-time college students, they’re working on overcoming album set backs. For the last two years, Waste Management has been working on their second and most solid album to date, First Things First. They did drop a debut album, My Town, when they where 17 in 2007, but now they are focusing on the best elements of hip-hop from the past and present.

On First Things First, Pig Pen handles production while JRN kills mics. Only a few collaborations appear, one being with C.Reid and the other with downriver natives Aztek the Barfly as well as Da Bash Brotherz. “It took two years, but both of us are on a much higher level, talent-wise. Besides getting better, nothing’s changed — same mindset, just hungrier,” JRN concludes. The album is available now on I-Tunes and at myspace.com/wastemanagement313.  | RDW

The Zone Radio with Origix & DC airs Mondays 9 p.m.-12 a.m. 89.3 FM, stream at whfr.fm • Visit 2raw4fm.com

The Zone
by Origix
(January 13, 2010)

Downriver’s own Pig Pen got into producing after becoming a DJ seven years ago when he got his first pair of turntables. Then, with a growing obsession for the Beastie Boys in their Hello Nasty days, he wanted to be like Mix Master Mike. The first step towards following in his footsteps would be doing his own thing. After he got the Roland Sp 303 a year later it was on, and he was learning production. Now strapped with an Akai MPC 2500 and beat battle credentials from the Red Bull Battles to the Lager House, he’s on the path to good things. Pig Pen is already making a name in the Detroit scene with his group Waste Management and by doing the bulk of the group’s production as well as beat placement on The Regiments, Bash Bros and many other 2010 releases.

What does Pig Pen want out of producing?  “Honestly my goal is just to be a respected producer from this area.” Now that Waste Management’s album First Things First is finished you will soon hear more of him.  Look for an instrumental album, Beaties, of all his favorite beats made throughout last year and see him spin live Friday, January 15 at The Bullfrog. Visit myspace.com/pigpen313.  | RDW

Pig Pen • 1/15 • The Bullfrog
The Zone Radio with Origix & DC airs Monday’s 9 p.m.-12 a.m. 89.3 FM, stream at whfr.fm Visit myspace.com/thezoneradio

The Loop (May 5-11, 2004)
Real Detroit Weekly
By Kelly “K-Fresh” Frazier

IN THE ZONE

When it comes to radio these day’s, stations that offer local support are few and far between. Corporate-owned commercial radio is dominated with music backed by major label money and power. Luckily, college radio has become a savior to underground hip-hop. Radio show like “The Zone” on Henry Ford community College’s 89.3-FM WHFR have become an avenue for local and underground artists to get some shine on the FM dial. The shows hosts, Origix and D.C., Recently celebrated their second year on the air with live in-studio guests Bareda and J-Hill,. During its two-year reign, “The Zone” include Phat Kat, Athletic Mic League, King Gordy, Bizzy Bone, Mastamind , Slum Village and many more in addition to the regular show, the pair has also helped throw many live events, such as the First Annual WHFR Hip-Hop Basketball game ,The Downriver Hip-Hop Jam and the Green Halloween show. In a game dominated by corporate machined, “The Zone” gives us an outlet to hear new music from some of the illest local and underground talent. “The Zone” airs every Saturday night in Detroit on 89.3 FM From 8p.m.-12a.m.., and for those outside the station’s range, the web cast can be heard at www.whfr.fm.

Left end of the dial (September,24.2003)
Metro Times
By Ronit Feldman

On a warm September night, Origix and D.C. are holed up inside the Henry Ford Community College student center in Dearborn, “making waves” — as the WHFR-FM 89.3 slogan attests — during their recently expanded four-hour time slot. Origix commands the main mic, silver chain and Lions hat bobbing to the beat as he thanks Allen from Garden City for his request for Flint’s Artful Dodgers. D.C., the quieter of the two, enters the song into the online playlist, as listeners from across the country tune in on the Web to the Motor City.

So Artful Dodgers doesn’t ring a bell? “We don’t play nuthin’ commercial,” Origix says of their hip-hop show “The Zone.” “We don’t play none of those artists that you hear on those [mainstream] radio stations.” What Origix and D.C. do play is a heavy dose of homegrown hip-hop. About 90 percent of what they spin comes from local groups like Esham, Twiztid, the Outfit, Grim Reality and Lawless Element. The other 10 percent is comprised of out-of-staters like Tech 9, Dirty, Aseop Rock, Atmosphere, and Haystack.

Since “The Zone” premiered on April 20, 2001 the show has garnered quite a following, and the reason is clear. Detroit is a city that has hip hop embedded into its very soul — it’s an extension of every dark alley, every defaced building, and every mural spray-painted over its bleak concrete walls. But most of Detroit’s major radio stations are broadcasting a different tune: one that emanates not from the urban depths of our fair town, but from the corporate boardrooms of America. Hence, Origix and D.C. see their show as more than just a passion; in the age of corporate takeover, it’s a duty.

When looked at through history’s lens, the pair’s manifesto assumes an even greater significance.

Back in the 1980s hip-hop fans could flip on their boom boxes every day with the expectation of hearing something new. It was around this time, long after Motown, disco and punk had been pronounced dead, that radio homed in on the sound of the streets. What had begun as an experiment in the 1970s Bronx began to descend upon the ears of the American public. By 1986, hip hop had reached its golden age and the radio broadcast the music in all of its divergent forms — gangster, party, b-boy, black nationalist. The age-old tradition of the griot — or African storyteller — had persevered, even amidst the melting pot of American pop culture.

Then President Clinton signed the Telecommunications Act of 1996, which eased ownership restrictions on radio. As radio stations consolidated, playlists became more homogenized and fledgling artists found it more and more difficult to hear their songs played on the air.

In a series of articles published by salon.com in 2001, Eric Boehlert exposes one of the most harrowing phenomena in the new age of radio, a method of buying and selling airtime he calls “pay-for-play.”

The system works like this: An independent record promoter, or “indie,” aligns himself with a radio station by promising to give the station “promotional payments” as high as six figures. In exchange, the station makes the indie the sole point man for every song it adds to its playlist. Every time the indie dictates a song to be added, he sends an invoice to the record company that produced it. The money the indie collects is then shelled out to the radio station in the form of a “promotional payment.”

Pay-for-play’s indiscreet brand of bribery is a cunning way to get around the payola laws of the 1960s, but remains perfectly legal nonetheless. And the result is crippling: While mega-sized record companies buy up airtime for their stars, independently produced artists are simply never heard. And it’s nearly impossible for a band or artist to break without the exposure of the airwaves.

Origix and D.C. found this out the hard way. After meeting at Taylor’s West Junior High in 1993, the two (then known as Shawn Featherston and Tim Patterson) performed everywhere from the Wired Frog to St. Andrew’s and even released their own CDs under the names Reformed Illuzionz (1998) and Fi Staarz (2001). But it didn’t take long to realize that the most valuable tool for promoting their work — the radio — would always be off limits.

Then one night, Origix and D.C. heard some “real underground hip-hop” oozing from their stereo. The station they discovered was WHFR-FM, a nonprofit, noncommercial campus radio station that gives its DJs the freedom to play whatever they like.

With renewed faith, Origix and D.C. decided to enroll in classes at HFCC and start a hip-hop show of their own. “We already knew how to do, like, all the production-type work,” Origix says. “We knew how to work the mixing board, and a lot of that stuff was pretty much, like, second nature to us.”

They also knew a lot of groups that could use the promotion. “When we were doing music, we never had the outlet to go and promote our stuff on radio stations and whatever,” says D.C. “So, basically, what we wanted to do was get into radio and give groups the opportunity to be heard.”

Susan McGraw, WHFR-FM’s general manager, says that based on the phone calls, letters, and e-mails the station receives for The Zone, the listenership is tremendous. She calls Origix and D.C. “two of the most passionate DJs we have on staff. They have an incredible knowledge of the music they play and the culture they represent.”

McGraw says, “One of the most important aspects of WHFR is supporting the local, independent, nonmainstream artists. They’re willing to look for those artists.”

Back in the studio, Origix and D.C. gear up for this week’s live in-studio set: a performance by Six Deep, one of Pontiac’s oldest hip-hop camps. At 11 p.m., the group of 10 shuffles into the studio, trying to negotiate space. The station assistant quickly sees that it will be standing room only and carries out the chairs she had pulled for the occasion.

Once settled, the rappers take off. House Massive, the obvious leader, dominates the mic, busting out rhymes a mile a minute. His eyes are on fire, his hands waving up and down as his voice pounds over the synthesized beat. The others accentuate the rhythm underneath, trading off headphones and mics as they maneuver themselves around the tiny space. Eventually, the group breaks into their “National Anthem,” a high-energy rap done in unison. The sound is thunderous. When the beat dies down, a few members break out into impromptu, freestyle rhymes. A young guy called Total Kaos whips out a fast lyric about not being able to swear on the radio and drops his voice out just in time to censor the choice, anticipated rhyme.

It’s hip hop at its height — and it’s being aired live.

Origix dreamed of moments like these, but shows like “The Zone” are not so easy to come by. Lack of diverse programming makes him wonder where the future of the music is headed. “It’s gonna grow, but a lot of it’s gonna kill itself too, by all this music that’s just being monotonous, played. It’s running itself into the ground when it comes to the image, style. I think people are really getting sick of hearing about what people have and what they got.”

Underground music, Origix says, has a grittier, more realistic appeal than its mainstream counterpart. It’s about “what’s going on in [the artists’] neighborhood, what’s going on in their life, what’s going on in their family. … That’s why we like the local stuff more, because we know they’re from the same background as us, we know they’re going through the same thing, we know it’s the same struggle out here.”

By day, Origix is a parts driver for a car dealership and D.C. is an auto mechanic. Their positions at WHFR-FM are unpaid, but money, they say, is not what it’s all about.

After Saturday’s show, D.C. pauses to reflect on his DJ gig. “The only disadvantage of doing the radio show is, [I] can’t listen to it,” he says. Then Origix reminds the staff that it’s still a Saturday evening, and the crew is off into the night.

“The Zone” airs every Saturday 8 p.m.-midnight on WHFR-FM 89.3. Listen live on the Web at whfr.fm.