http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2006/04/11/DDGBEI6RM81.DTL
A son of San Ramon busts a move on the record industry, trying to bring Bay Area rap back into the big time
Inside the Berkeley record store, his latest act, rapper Balance, is shouting out rhymes from a balcony for an in-store celebration of his debut CD release. Outside on the sidewalk, record company talent scout Will Branson was trying to cook up a deal for his next act.
He's talking to two local DJs who manage a couple of acts, each with independent singles starting to show some life on local radio and in clubs. DJ Gary, a compact young man in athletic wear with a thin, razor-cut hint of a beard running along the side of his face, is carrying a sign advertising the in-store appearance, working for the street team Branson's label employs. His partner, another DJ who calls himself Slo Poke, is a large gentleman wearing a shirt that hangs down to his knees with a gem-encrusted crucifix over his chest. Even standing in the gutter, he towers over the pint-sized Branson.
The two entrepreneurs mention they have a connection with former Oakland rap star Too Short, now operating out of Atlanta, but expected in town in days to help promote the acts on radio. Branson wants to know if Too Short is just doing a sort of "Too Short Presents" thing or has he signed a deal for the records. The managers assure him nothing has been signed.
"I'd do it," he says evenly. "I want to do it. I'm serious as f -- . My feelings would be hurt. When you gonna call me? Tomorrow? Friday? OK. I'll be waiting for your call."
Outside the Rasputin record shop on Berkeley's Telegraph Avenue, the circus is in full swing. A couple of guys pass around a joint, while another stands there trying to sell passers-by his homemade hip-hop CDs. Branson buys one. Slo Poke holds his cell phone up to Branson's ear so he can play him some new beats. Inside, wearing a brand-new oversize white T-shirt and a hand-painted baseball cap with the store tags still attached, rapper Balance is laying down his hit single, the sound booming out onto the sidewalk through the store's open doors.
The next morning, Branson, the 24-year-old wunderkind of the Bay Area rap world, is back behind his desk at the bustling Mission District headquarters of SMC Recordings. A handyman is nailing up more gold record awards above the receptionist's desk. On the other side of Branson's glass cubicle, a young lady is calling radio stations around the country, tracking airplay for the label's current projects. Co-workers walk in and out of his open door. He juggles e-mails on his laptop and phone conversations on his Blackberry.
He laughs about his street meeting the day before with the managers. "We need more records," he says. "We want to put out records next year. It doesn't stop, dude."
Branson is partners in SMC Recordings with a couple of record business professionals more than twice his age, Ralph Tashjian and George Nauful. But in young Branson, they see not only somebody who can tell a hit from a stiff, but someone authentic enough to convince hardcore rappers to do business with a bunch of crazy white guys, including seen-it-all's such as the Fillmore's seven-album veteran San Quinn, or Keak Da Sneak, who recorded his major label debut almost 10 years ago, or B-Legit, who founded Vallejo's the Click with his cousin, the estimable E-40.
Currently burning up the charts with his new album, "My Ghetto Report Card," E-40 is the king of hyphy, the new sound in Bay Area rap that Branson and his partners hope will go nationwide. Touted as a California cousin to crunk, the Southern hip-hop rage of last year, hyphy is a high-energy, intense beat that serves as the soundtrack to the street culture motor sport called sideshow. On his new black-and-white video for "Tell Me When To Go," E-40 is taking sideshow from East Oakland to MTV.
Denounced by police and politicians, sideshow auto antics thrive in Oakland and the East Bay. Cars will swarm over an intersection, spinning doughnuts and figure eights, leaving rubbery residue on the pavement, with people dancing on car hoods and crowds gathering to watch. "I know it's retarded, but it's what we do," Branson says.
Sometimes drivers will slow their cars, get out from behind the wheel, stereo blasting, and dance alongside as their cars roll along without them -- "ghost ride the whip" in E-40's street speak. DVDs of these displays have become underground best-sellers. Out of this crucible is born hyphy; first, as slang for intoxication -- as in "everybody was going dumb, getting hyphy" -- but, now, as another recalibration of hip-hop dance music.
While crunk producers in the South such as Lil Jon like to test their new tracks in Atlanta strip clubs, Bay Area rappers need to reach a more mobile audience. "There's more room out here," Branson says. "We listen in our cars. If it doesn't sound good in your car, what the f -- are you listening for?"
E-40's current chart success and the emergence of hyphy bring new hope to the forlorn Bay Area rap scene. Once the proud home ground to towering progenitors such as MC Hammer and Tupac Shakur, the Bay Area has not produced a Top Ten hit since "I Got 5 on It" by the Luniz in 1995. Branson figures his label's 2003 hit with Keak Da Sneak, "T-Shirt Blue Jeans & Nike's" -- which also featured a guest appearance by E-40 -- was the beginning of Bay Area rap returning to the radio.
"That was the first real record to get back-added at a San Francisco radio station and do some damage," Branson says, "because for a long time there was no Bay Area rap on the radio. It was more or less shut out, partially due to the records not being good enough and whatever else -- we'll leave that open. It was the first record to get back on radio and that was what kicked off this hyphy movement was 'T-Shirt Blue Jeans & Nike's' by Keek Da Sneak."
According to Branson, 70 percent of rap music buyers are white -- "So I'm the target demo," he says. He still lives in suburban San Ramon, where he grew up, and takes BART into work every morning. He and his two-years-younger brother were latchkey kids whose divorced mother worked 12-hour days to keep her family in the suburbs after their father split when Branson was in sixth grade. His father, a sometimes musician, gave him a drum machine for his 16th birthday and before long, he had made a record with a neighborhood rapper.
"We started making records and, as horrible as they were, they needed artwork," says Branson, who began designing and making his own labels and packages. He ran tape duplicators in his bedroom all through the night, made his packages the next day at Kinko's, put on his corduroys and Polo and took everything straight to the mall.
His next effort to enter the record business -- applying for a job at the Wherehouse retail record chain -- went down in flames after he flunked the personality part of the job application. But Branson went on to become the record reviewer for a fledgling urban music magazine called Showcase. "All I wanted was free f -- CDs at the time," he says.
At Showcase, he came to know many of the musicians whose records he reviewed, often offering advice on the side. He was, in fact, representing one of these musician associates three and a half years ago when he met Tashjian, a well-known record promoter, who long ago stopped working downstairs at the family flower shop, a fixture for decades on a Mission Street corner, now gone like so much of the rest of the old-time Mission District.
"I started seeing that the artist's side is not where I need to be," Branson says. "I need to be on this side, making the moves, making the decisions, seeing things get done. Honestly I really don't trust anyone else to f -- do it."
While Balance was going the next day for another in-store in Sacramento, the little label is simultaneously pushing the San Quinn record, "The Rock: Pressure Makes Diamonds." Branson is looking to spread the record. Quinn already has 21,000 friends signed up on his My Space site and Bay Area urban radio has adopted the record.
"I think right now it's crucial that we get Los Angeles on that record," he says. "I think getting Los Angeles on that record would wake a lot of people up -- like this isn't just a record that's going to stay in Northern California. To get them to embrace the record and really work and have it research -- not force it on them, but have them accept the record and like the record. Majors have the power to force records upon people. We don't. It's just not possible for us. So we do what we do with our records. And it comes back like this is a real record. They do the research, it's retailing, it's getting requests, it's coming back in the call out research. OK, we feel comfortable to put it out there because it's worth the while. What's the point of putting out all that money and our artists being in debt to us? We don't want that strained relationship. We want everybody to be profitable and be happy. We've found that artists -- people -- do the dumbest s -- when they're just trying to get money."
Meanwhile there are those gentlemen Branson was working on the sidewalk in front of Rasputin's. Both the Wolfpack and the A'z have tracks they released on their own bubbling up on local radio. Major labels like to wait for independent rap records to break out on their own, rather than spending corporate funds developing acts. Branson wants to get there first.
"Supposedly we have a hookup on Friday," he says the next morning in his office. "I've already reached out to both people and left messages to let them know I was very, very serious."
Branson is a very serious young record executive. He is hoping the Bay Area all-star remix of the current E-40 hit, which will feature SMC acts Quinn and Balance, will put some more wind in his records' sails. He thinks both have what it takes to become national hits, especially if the hyphy thing catches on.
"I always felt like I have the answer, I just haven't found it yet," Branson says. "Like I know. I'm confident that I have the answer, I just got to unlock it. And that's what I walk around thinking about most of the day. That's what I stay up at night thinking about -- I have the answer; I just gotta find it. And I think we're slowly and surely unlocking it. Or maybe it's not that simple as I thought it was, 'cause I thought it was going to be real easy. But we got it. I think so. We're just going to keep doing what we're doing, dude, signing acts that we love and fighting for them."
A son of San Ramon busts a move on the record industry, trying to bring Bay Area rap back into the big time
Inside the Berkeley record store, his latest act, rapper Balance, is shouting out rhymes from a balcony for an in-store celebration of his debut CD release. Outside on the sidewalk, record company talent scout Will Branson was trying to cook up a deal for his next act.
He's talking to two local DJs who manage a couple of acts, each with independent singles starting to show some life on local radio and in clubs. DJ Gary, a compact young man in athletic wear with a thin, razor-cut hint of a beard running along the side of his face, is carrying a sign advertising the in-store appearance, working for the street team Branson's label employs. His partner, another DJ who calls himself Slo Poke, is a large gentleman wearing a shirt that hangs down to his knees with a gem-encrusted crucifix over his chest. Even standing in the gutter, he towers over the pint-sized Branson.
The two entrepreneurs mention they have a connection with former Oakland rap star Too Short, now operating out of Atlanta, but expected in town in days to help promote the acts on radio. Branson wants to know if Too Short is just doing a sort of "Too Short Presents" thing or has he signed a deal for the records. The managers assure him nothing has been signed.
"I'd do it," he says evenly. "I want to do it. I'm serious as f -- . My feelings would be hurt. When you gonna call me? Tomorrow? Friday? OK. I'll be waiting for your call."
Outside the Rasputin record shop on Berkeley's Telegraph Avenue, the circus is in full swing. A couple of guys pass around a joint, while another stands there trying to sell passers-by his homemade hip-hop CDs. Branson buys one. Slo Poke holds his cell phone up to Branson's ear so he can play him some new beats. Inside, wearing a brand-new oversize white T-shirt and a hand-painted baseball cap with the store tags still attached, rapper Balance is laying down his hit single, the sound booming out onto the sidewalk through the store's open doors.
The next morning, Branson, the 24-year-old wunderkind of the Bay Area rap world, is back behind his desk at the bustling Mission District headquarters of SMC Recordings. A handyman is nailing up more gold record awards above the receptionist's desk. On the other side of Branson's glass cubicle, a young lady is calling radio stations around the country, tracking airplay for the label's current projects. Co-workers walk in and out of his open door. He juggles e-mails on his laptop and phone conversations on his Blackberry.
He laughs about his street meeting the day before with the managers. "We need more records," he says. "We want to put out records next year. It doesn't stop, dude."
Branson is partners in SMC Recordings with a couple of record business professionals more than twice his age, Ralph Tashjian and George Nauful. But in young Branson, they see not only somebody who can tell a hit from a stiff, but someone authentic enough to convince hardcore rappers to do business with a bunch of crazy white guys, including seen-it-all's such as the Fillmore's seven-album veteran San Quinn, or Keak Da Sneak, who recorded his major label debut almost 10 years ago, or B-Legit, who founded Vallejo's the Click with his cousin, the estimable E-40.
Currently burning up the charts with his new album, "My Ghetto Report Card," E-40 is the king of hyphy, the new sound in Bay Area rap that Branson and his partners hope will go nationwide. Touted as a California cousin to crunk, the Southern hip-hop rage of last year, hyphy is a high-energy, intense beat that serves as the soundtrack to the street culture motor sport called sideshow. On his new black-and-white video for "Tell Me When To Go," E-40 is taking sideshow from East Oakland to MTV.
Denounced by police and politicians, sideshow auto antics thrive in Oakland and the East Bay. Cars will swarm over an intersection, spinning doughnuts and figure eights, leaving rubbery residue on the pavement, with people dancing on car hoods and crowds gathering to watch. "I know it's retarded, but it's what we do," Branson says.
Sometimes drivers will slow their cars, get out from behind the wheel, stereo blasting, and dance alongside as their cars roll along without them -- "ghost ride the whip" in E-40's street speak. DVDs of these displays have become underground best-sellers. Out of this crucible is born hyphy; first, as slang for intoxication -- as in "everybody was going dumb, getting hyphy" -- but, now, as another recalibration of hip-hop dance music.
While crunk producers in the South such as Lil Jon like to test their new tracks in Atlanta strip clubs, Bay Area rappers need to reach a more mobile audience. "There's more room out here," Branson says. "We listen in our cars. If it doesn't sound good in your car, what the f -- are you listening for?"
E-40's current chart success and the emergence of hyphy bring new hope to the forlorn Bay Area rap scene. Once the proud home ground to towering progenitors such as MC Hammer and Tupac Shakur, the Bay Area has not produced a Top Ten hit since "I Got 5 on It" by the Luniz in 1995. Branson figures his label's 2003 hit with Keak Da Sneak, "T-Shirt Blue Jeans & Nike's" -- which also featured a guest appearance by E-40 -- was the beginning of Bay Area rap returning to the radio.
"That was the first real record to get back-added at a San Francisco radio station and do some damage," Branson says, "because for a long time there was no Bay Area rap on the radio. It was more or less shut out, partially due to the records not being good enough and whatever else -- we'll leave that open. It was the first record to get back on radio and that was what kicked off this hyphy movement was 'T-Shirt Blue Jeans & Nike's' by Keek Da Sneak."
According to Branson, 70 percent of rap music buyers are white -- "So I'm the target demo," he says. He still lives in suburban San Ramon, where he grew up, and takes BART into work every morning. He and his two-years-younger brother were latchkey kids whose divorced mother worked 12-hour days to keep her family in the suburbs after their father split when Branson was in sixth grade. His father, a sometimes musician, gave him a drum machine for his 16th birthday and before long, he had made a record with a neighborhood rapper.
"We started making records and, as horrible as they were, they needed artwork," says Branson, who began designing and making his own labels and packages. He ran tape duplicators in his bedroom all through the night, made his packages the next day at Kinko's, put on his corduroys and Polo and took everything straight to the mall.
His next effort to enter the record business -- applying for a job at the Wherehouse retail record chain -- went down in flames after he flunked the personality part of the job application. But Branson went on to become the record reviewer for a fledgling urban music magazine called Showcase. "All I wanted was free f -- CDs at the time," he says.
At Showcase, he came to know many of the musicians whose records he reviewed, often offering advice on the side. He was, in fact, representing one of these musician associates three and a half years ago when he met Tashjian, a well-known record promoter, who long ago stopped working downstairs at the family flower shop, a fixture for decades on a Mission Street corner, now gone like so much of the rest of the old-time Mission District.
"I started seeing that the artist's side is not where I need to be," Branson says. "I need to be on this side, making the moves, making the decisions, seeing things get done. Honestly I really don't trust anyone else to f -- do it."
While Balance was going the next day for another in-store in Sacramento, the little label is simultaneously pushing the San Quinn record, "The Rock: Pressure Makes Diamonds." Branson is looking to spread the record. Quinn already has 21,000 friends signed up on his My Space site and Bay Area urban radio has adopted the record.
"I think right now it's crucial that we get Los Angeles on that record," he says. "I think getting Los Angeles on that record would wake a lot of people up -- like this isn't just a record that's going to stay in Northern California. To get them to embrace the record and really work and have it research -- not force it on them, but have them accept the record and like the record. Majors have the power to force records upon people. We don't. It's just not possible for us. So we do what we do with our records. And it comes back like this is a real record. They do the research, it's retailing, it's getting requests, it's coming back in the call out research. OK, we feel comfortable to put it out there because it's worth the while. What's the point of putting out all that money and our artists being in debt to us? We don't want that strained relationship. We want everybody to be profitable and be happy. We've found that artists -- people -- do the dumbest s -- when they're just trying to get money."
Meanwhile there are those gentlemen Branson was working on the sidewalk in front of Rasputin's. Both the Wolfpack and the A'z have tracks they released on their own bubbling up on local radio. Major labels like to wait for independent rap records to break out on their own, rather than spending corporate funds developing acts. Branson wants to get there first.
"Supposedly we have a hookup on Friday," he says the next morning in his office. "I've already reached out to both people and left messages to let them know I was very, very serious."
Branson is a very serious young record executive. He is hoping the Bay Area all-star remix of the current E-40 hit, which will feature SMC acts Quinn and Balance, will put some more wind in his records' sails. He thinks both have what it takes to become national hits, especially if the hyphy thing catches on.
"I always felt like I have the answer, I just haven't found it yet," Branson says. "Like I know. I'm confident that I have the answer, I just got to unlock it. And that's what I walk around thinking about most of the day. That's what I stay up at night thinking about -- I have the answer; I just gotta find it. And I think we're slowly and surely unlocking it. Or maybe it's not that simple as I thought it was, 'cause I thought it was going to be real easy. But we got it. I think so. We're just going to keep doing what we're doing, dude, signing acts that we love and fighting for them."
