I’m sitting down to eat lunch with my family at this Chinese buffet when the phone rings. It’s the publisher of HipHopDX, Tommy. He’s calling about the interview I did with a rapper out of Chicago named Naledge. I’m way behind on delivering it.
“Where’s the piece… Just Blaze… at least 4 to 5000 people need to read it,” he fires off. We’ve spoken, maybe, four times in the last 2 years. Always the same.
I used to run a site back in the day, so I feel him. However there’s a problem. This kid Naledge has no relationship whatsoever to David Mays, Ray Benzino, Reginald Dennis, the SOURCE, the Game, 50 Cent, G-Unit or Eve’s sex tape. It’s not about Fat Joe jacking “Lean Back,” Cassidy jacking Joe Budden’s track or Jay-Z jacking Biggie’s lyrics.
No… it’s not about any of those things. So you couldn’t possibly want to read this story. This story is about Jabari Evans aka Naledge – a kid from the Windy City who didn’t grow up on the wrong side of the tracks. It’s about a brother that saw the well documented ghetto reality all around him and chose not to fall in the trap.
“People don’t understand Chicago,” explains the twenty-year-old. “Chicago is one of the most racially segregated cities in the country. Middle class black people and poor black people all live together. I grew up, basically, a middle class kid with both parents in the home. Still, [in Chicago] as long as you went outside… as a kid… you seen a lot.”
Shorty didn’t want to be a thug. See… told you wouldn’t be interested.
No… this kid Naledge isn’t a Black P-Stone, Vice Lord, Latin King or a Gangster Disciple. He didn’t attend the school of hard knocks. He went to the University of Pennsylvania. In those Ivy League halls, an impromptu freestyle would lead to a meeting with a New Jersey deejay named Double-O and a group, Kidz in the Hall, was formed.
“School is a hustle,” Naledge points out. “If being intelligent is a hindrance, there’s something wrong with our society and us as a people.”
Blah, blah, blah…
Naledge is not flossy, icy or jiggy. In fact, he openly admits he’s broke. the rocks in his ears are cubic zirconia. He sells blood to keep his account balance up and crashes conventions for a free meal.
NOTE: You can press the back button at any time. There’s bound to be a story about groupies comparing Jay-Z and Nelly’s genitalia posted somewhere. Who wants to hear about some snobbish backpacker talking that conscious mess?
“It’s a touchy subject,” says Naledge of the “conscious” tag. “I’m aware – not conscious. You have to subscribe to a social code when you’re labeled a conscious rapper, but you don’t feel like one thing all the time. People freaked out about Jesse Jackson’s sex scandal. You think Jesse Jackson doesn’t have sex? Martin Luther King was having orgies, but that doesn’t take away from what he did. People put you in the box. Now I’m in the Kanye West box because I’m from Chicago. My box can’t be boxed in.”
He’s right you know? There’s really nothing like Naledge being marketed right now and the Kanye West analogy fits. He’s the “backpacker that still rocks jewels.” Success in the rap game is his main focus in life, but unlike Kanye, he didn’t drop out of college.
The theme of Kidz in the Hall’s debut release The Broke Diaries is loosely based on a book by Angela Nissel of the same name. The disc documents the everyday struggles of a college student moonlighting as an aspiring rapper. Naledge approaches his lyrics with the same openness one would expect to find in a diary, admitting to drinking his way through school on the title track. To be sure, he’s not the first artist to eloquently express the uncommon struggles of the common man.
“[Beats] that’s what’s going to separate me,” Naledge readily admits. “That’s what conscious rappers are missing. Back in the day with Pete Rock and CL Smooth and Tribe Called Quest, the beats were noddable.”
With beats being the main ingredient to cooking up a hot single in today’s (or any day’s) music scene, Kidz in the Hall have tapped into the jazzy sounds of early-90’s rap music. The compositions are a perfect fit for Naledge’s musings on everyday people. With the release of Broke Diaries, the Kidz in the Hall have created a soundtrack for all us out here that are nowhere near big ballin’.
Oddly enough, it’s a producer best known for lacing platinum hits for Jay-Z and Cam’Ron among others that has taken Naledge and partner Double-O under his wing. Just Blaze -- who will be honored with the Impact Award at the 4th Annual Producers Conference later this month -- lends not only his name, but his signature touch to tracks on The Broke Diaries. No ID and Double-O hold down production duties just as effectively. The sound is an eargasmic palette for Naledge to talk about all that stuff you take for granted in your own life as being “real.”
See… me and you are more like Naledge than we are like the people on the covers of most of the magazines we read. So if we think he’s boring, we’re actually saying we’re boring. Most people change something about themselves to be the way you see them on T.V. It takes a lot more courage to be real with all your flaws, fears and fantasies exposed than to hide behind fake thuggery.
Like I told you, this kid has no relationship to David Mays, Ray Benzino, Reginald Dennis, the SOURCE, the Game, 50 Cent, G-Unit or Eve’s sex tape. No… he’s not about any of those things and here’s one writer that hopes he never will be. Industry needs more artists like Jabari Evans aka Naledge. A kid from the right side of the tracks with a message for his brothers “trapped” on the wrong side.
“My style is like juice,” he says. “It’s good for you, but it goes down
smooth.”
“Where’s the piece… Just Blaze… at least 4 to 5000 people need to read it,” he fires off. We’ve spoken, maybe, four times in the last 2 years. Always the same.
I used to run a site back in the day, so I feel him. However there’s a problem. This kid Naledge has no relationship whatsoever to David Mays, Ray Benzino, Reginald Dennis, the SOURCE, the Game, 50 Cent, G-Unit or Eve’s sex tape. It’s not about Fat Joe jacking “Lean Back,” Cassidy jacking Joe Budden’s track or Jay-Z jacking Biggie’s lyrics.
No… it’s not about any of those things. So you couldn’t possibly want to read this story. This story is about Jabari Evans aka Naledge – a kid from the Windy City who didn’t grow up on the wrong side of the tracks. It’s about a brother that saw the well documented ghetto reality all around him and chose not to fall in the trap.
“People don’t understand Chicago,” explains the twenty-year-old. “Chicago is one of the most racially segregated cities in the country. Middle class black people and poor black people all live together. I grew up, basically, a middle class kid with both parents in the home. Still, [in Chicago] as long as you went outside… as a kid… you seen a lot.”
Shorty didn’t want to be a thug. See… told you wouldn’t be interested.
No… this kid Naledge isn’t a Black P-Stone, Vice Lord, Latin King or a Gangster Disciple. He didn’t attend the school of hard knocks. He went to the University of Pennsylvania. In those Ivy League halls, an impromptu freestyle would lead to a meeting with a New Jersey deejay named Double-O and a group, Kidz in the Hall, was formed.
“School is a hustle,” Naledge points out. “If being intelligent is a hindrance, there’s something wrong with our society and us as a people.”
Blah, blah, blah…
Naledge is not flossy, icy or jiggy. In fact, he openly admits he’s broke. the rocks in his ears are cubic zirconia. He sells blood to keep his account balance up and crashes conventions for a free meal.
NOTE: You can press the back button at any time. There’s bound to be a story about groupies comparing Jay-Z and Nelly’s genitalia posted somewhere. Who wants to hear about some snobbish backpacker talking that conscious mess?
“It’s a touchy subject,” says Naledge of the “conscious” tag. “I’m aware – not conscious. You have to subscribe to a social code when you’re labeled a conscious rapper, but you don’t feel like one thing all the time. People freaked out about Jesse Jackson’s sex scandal. You think Jesse Jackson doesn’t have sex? Martin Luther King was having orgies, but that doesn’t take away from what he did. People put you in the box. Now I’m in the Kanye West box because I’m from Chicago. My box can’t be boxed in.”
He’s right you know? There’s really nothing like Naledge being marketed right now and the Kanye West analogy fits. He’s the “backpacker that still rocks jewels.” Success in the rap game is his main focus in life, but unlike Kanye, he didn’t drop out of college.
The theme of Kidz in the Hall’s debut release The Broke Diaries is loosely based on a book by Angela Nissel of the same name. The disc documents the everyday struggles of a college student moonlighting as an aspiring rapper. Naledge approaches his lyrics with the same openness one would expect to find in a diary, admitting to drinking his way through school on the title track. To be sure, he’s not the first artist to eloquently express the uncommon struggles of the common man.
“[Beats] that’s what’s going to separate me,” Naledge readily admits. “That’s what conscious rappers are missing. Back in the day with Pete Rock and CL Smooth and Tribe Called Quest, the beats were noddable.”
With beats being the main ingredient to cooking up a hot single in today’s (or any day’s) music scene, Kidz in the Hall have tapped into the jazzy sounds of early-90’s rap music. The compositions are a perfect fit for Naledge’s musings on everyday people. With the release of Broke Diaries, the Kidz in the Hall have created a soundtrack for all us out here that are nowhere near big ballin’.
Oddly enough, it’s a producer best known for lacing platinum hits for Jay-Z and Cam’Ron among others that has taken Naledge and partner Double-O under his wing. Just Blaze -- who will be honored with the Impact Award at the 4th Annual Producers Conference later this month -- lends not only his name, but his signature touch to tracks on The Broke Diaries. No ID and Double-O hold down production duties just as effectively. The sound is an eargasmic palette for Naledge to talk about all that stuff you take for granted in your own life as being “real.”
See… me and you are more like Naledge than we are like the people on the covers of most of the magazines we read. So if we think he’s boring, we’re actually saying we’re boring. Most people change something about themselves to be the way you see them on T.V. It takes a lot more courage to be real with all your flaws, fears and fantasies exposed than to hide behind fake thuggery.
Like I told you, this kid has no relationship to David Mays, Ray Benzino, Reginald Dennis, the SOURCE, the Game, 50 Cent, G-Unit or Eve’s sex tape. No… he’s not about any of those things and here’s one writer that hopes he never will be. Industry needs more artists like Jabari Evans aka Naledge. A kid from the right side of the tracks with a message for his brothers “trapped” on the wrong side.
“My style is like juice,” he says. “It’s good for you, but it goes down
smooth.”
