Day 05 – Craig G, Rob, Edo G
The first record that made me fall in love with hip-hop was “Me Against The World” by Tupac. The first song I learned by heart was “Gangsta’s Paradise” by Coolio. From Nas to the Fugees, from the Wu-Tang Clan to Dr. Dre and Snoop Dogg, from LL Cool J to De La Soul, like most who grew up in the 90’s, I fell in love with hip-hop during its “golden-age”. Therefore, despite the evolution of the culture to what it’s become today, I always remained a fan of the “true-school”, forever a fan of the “old-school”. When making this record I definitely wanted to pay tribute to some of the heroes of my childhood, and I reached out to legendary Emcees Craig G and Edo G. Especially in the case of Edo G, being from Boston was a very important aspect of the collaboration for me. Having spent 6 years in Boston, I definitely wanted to reach back to my network out there.
Rob and I are both signed to Ryan Leslie’s label and are members of his producer team. Needless to say, we work a lot together. He was one of the first rappers to do a show with me when I moved out to Switzerland, at the African Festival in Zürich, Switzerland. That was back in 2007. Rob is an amazing MC and Producer. His work ethic is also incredible. He is currently working on his own project, an LP called “Destined To Win”. That project will feature guest appearances with some of Italy’s best rappers, a member of Shady Records and an already confirmed guest, Lenny Harold of Blackstreet, on his first single “Destined To Win”. Rob was in New York with me when I recorded the Papoose video, and also appears as a guest in the studio scenes of that video.
Therefore, it was important to me to make Rob a part of the #RealDreams project. For the second verse, he comes in on an old school Boom-Bap beat, rapping his verse in Italian, between two legendary rappers of the Old Guard, who rap in English. The combination is unusual and it adds some “spice” to the overall track. Craig G says my name on his verse, and Edo G raps about Swiss Francs and makes a lot of references to Switzerland. Sometimes I really can’t believe what my ears are hearing, simply international hip-hop taken to a whole new level, and all these great Emcees showing me love and paying their respects to my project. And most importantly representing where they’re from and putting my home-country of Switzerland on the map. I’m really pleased to have my brother Rob on my album, and this is a tribute to true hip-hop heads. You can preview the song on the snippets of the album.
I’ve worked as a DJ for the past 14 years, having performed all over the world, from Japan to L.A. to Zürich to the Ivory Coast. After over a decade of hard work and network-building, the time has finally come to put out my own project. And I look forward to sharing it with you on March 6th 2015. Pre-Order #realdreams here