Check out this live performance video of “Workin’ For The Man” by Nadir from the 2010 St. Michael’s We Care Telethon in Monroe, Michigan. The video was produced by WUPW – Fox Toledo.

St. Michael’s We Care offers monetary and other assistance to individuals residing in Monroe County, Michigan with a life-threatening illness to be paid after the use of insurance (if any), other organizations, and/or money derived from other sources is exhausted.

This performance happened at the height of the US health care reform debate. We felt it was important to do this benefit in support of a great organization that offers aid to families and individuals in their time of greatest need.

The band is Alesha Brown (keyboards & vocals), Mia Treadwell (drums & vocals), Chris Spooner (bass & vocals), Nadir Omowale (vocals, guitar). “Workin’ For The Man” was written by Daniel Lee (aka The Invisible Kid) and Nadir Omowale. It’s the title track of the Workin’ For The Man album.

Distinctive vocals, creative rhymes, and personality are ingredients that make Detroit’s Maceo Tha GrammarGod one to watch. But truth be told, ‘rapping’ isn’t the hard part. If you have enough soul, a poetic spirit, and can rhyme to a beat, blessing the mic is easy.

His skills as an MC are undoubtedly a result of his longtime devotion to his craft, and he has no intention of putting the mic down.  Back in 2001 he joined the Scribe Tribe Syndicate, a group that started as an online crew in 1999 (in the Throw Down Temple forum of Hip-Hop legend Davey D’s Website).  Throughout this excursion, he’s showcased his skills as one of Hip-Hop’s best-kept secrets. And despite the lack of promotional backing and support upcoming artists receive from Detroit’s media outlets and mainstream music venues, Maceo refuses to give up.

His sophomore album, Return of Tha GrammarGod, is a bit different from most of today’s hip hop because it is a concept record.  Each song relates to a different movie.  “Reflections (Boyz in the Hood)” recalls Maceo’s younger days on the streets of Detroit.  “Primal Instinct (Planet of the Apes)” uses gorilla samples that invokes the mood that Maceo creates as he is stomping other MCs in battle.

But make no mistake.  It’s the lyrical approach that separates Maceo from the multitude of rap artists. He believes in staying true to the roots of hip-hop, when rocking the microphone was more boasting about your skills as an MC, than your materialistic possessions.

When asked about his style of rap, and how it fits into the genre, he simply states, “My style is a style that’s not a style. I’m too versatile to be classified as a certain type of MC.”

Return of tha GrammarGod was mixed and mastered by EAPro’s Nadir Omowale at the 1440 Collective Studio.  Maceo will return to the 1440 for the album’s launch party.

“Yo, I’ve been plugged in with the 1440 Collective for almost three years now…they’re like family,” Maceo says.  “Whenever I have a project or a promotion in mind, the first place I think of using as a resource is the 1440.

“And I’ll tell you this – if you’re an independent artist, the 1440 is your ‘one stop shop’!  There’s nothing that they can’t accommodate.  I mean, I’ve done everything from record release parties to photo shoots there.

“Besides that,” he continues, “I’ve recorded music, completed post production for songs, and I’ve gotten 2 albums mixed and mastered by Nadir, who in my opinion is one of the illest engineers in the game.  If you don’t know, then you better ask somebody…”

Thing is, between the versatility and lyricism, and the self proclaimed title of “Grammar God”, Maceo does come down to earth.  And from time to time he feels the need to exorcise the demons of discourse and contempt, and explain his love/hate relationship with fans, the Detroit Hip-Hop scene, and the music industry.  But regardless of what mood he’s in at any given moment, Maceo’s a cat who’s impossible to ignore.

September 19, 2009
Maceo Tha GrammarGod
Return of Tha GrammarGod Hip-Hop Showcase/Launch Party
The 1440 Collective
1440 Gratiot 1-B
Detroit, Michigan 48207
8pm to 12am
FREE!!

Packed with over 3000 brand new sounds, Beat Thang Virtual integrates fully functioning Digital FX, a 16-track MIDI sequencer, sampling and waveform editing with an intuitive, user-friendly interface.

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Beat Thang Virtual is on sale July 17 at BeatKangz.com

The damage?  $149.00 (plus shipping)

The software ships in a handsome reusable Beat Kangz Electronics flash drive.

Order now and receive a coupon for $149.00 off when you purchase The Beat Thang.

Watch Beat Thang Virtual in action.

Nadir’s First Time: This video shows Kang Boom Bap walking BKE marketing director Nadir through Beat Thang Virtual for the very first time.  So simple a funk musician can play it!

THE BEAT THANG & BEAT THANG VIRTUAL
ARE ON SALE NOW AT BEATKANGZ.COM

The Beat Thang is available for pre-order for $999.00

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Bringin THANGZ to the BLOCK!

There couldn’t be a better way to celebrate this moment than to throw a BLOCK PARTY fit for a KANG.
If you are in NASHVILLE for the SUMMER NAMM 2009 you won’t miss this party!

From 12 noon to 12 midnight the corner of 5th and Commerce right across the street from the Nashville Convention Center will be ablaze with the spirit of HIP HOP.

We’ve got the whole BLOCK on LOCK!

Breakerz, Writerz, MCs, DJs, Loverz of music, and PLAYAZ of the GAME are guaranteed to make this Nashville’s party of the year.

Are YOU up on THANGZ?

Visit BeatKangz.com for fresh updates….

(pssst NEW WEBSITE)

Nadir is an award winning Funk and Soul musician with one heck of a live show.

He’s a champion for the entertainment industry, and the best part is, he calls Detroit home. Learn more in CW50Detroit.com’s Q&A with Nadir.

Click HERE to Read the Interview

“Evolution Is Revolution”, a dramatic track created by EAPro’s Nadir and Iayaalis, is featured in the new trailer for TheBlackPaper.com and The Black Mastery Success Program both by success coach Veronica Conway.

Veronica is a successful entrepreneur and founder of three coaching companies, including the Black Professional Coaches Alliance, the only coaching organization dedicated to the transformation of people of African descent.  She is also the co-founder of Phenom Consulting International, a company that provides life and media strategy for the entertainment and athletic industries.  She has coached everyone from truck drivers to CEO’s, athletes, artists and celebrities.

Black Mastery Is The Master Blend Of Success Strategies and It Is Your GIANT First Step Toward A Better Tomorrow.

• Do you want to live in joy and abundance?

• Do you want to face challenges with more confidence and poise?

• How wonderful would it be for you to experience life – without limits?

• Can you imagine beginning to heal, – and creating a new legacy?

The evolution will NOT be televised.  The (r)evolution is internal.

Begin your (r)evolution at TheBlackPaper.com today.

“Giving a different meaning to hip-hop, Frazier is using the musical genre to bring attention to issues affecting young people.”

Congratulations, WAE!

Click HERE for more info about the Silent Heroes Night Awards

Nadir & Distorted Soul earned two trophies at the 2009 Detroit Music Awards on Friday, April 17.

Workin’ For The Man was named Outstanding Urban/Funk/Hip Hop Recording, and Nadir was honored as Outstanding Urban/Funk Vocalist.

Thanks to Akanke Rashad-Omowale, Nancy Schoenheide-Phares, all the members of the Distorted Soul band, all the musicians and producers who contributed their talents to the Workin’ For The Man project, all the djs and press who have given us so much love, and all the family and friends who helped make this project possible.

Oh… and a special shout out to George W. Bush, Dick Cheney and the entire Dubya administration for screwing up the world and inspiring much of the political material that appears on this record.  Thanks A LOT!

From The Detroit Free Press:

Local Artist Spotlight: Nadir

WHO HE IS: Jonah Nadir Omowale records as Nadir Distorted Soul and makes waves with poignant, politically minded funk music. He’s celebrating his new album, “Workin’ for the Man,” which is ripe with political commentary, with a CD-release party Saturday [Nov. 15, 2008] at the Jazz Café at Music Hall Center for the Performing Arts.

HOME: Westland.

AGE: 40. (40 is the new 20 – Nadir)

ON HIS ROOTS: Nadir grew up Elizabethton, Tenn., where he was a member of the church choir and played in the school marching band. He graduated from Middle Tennessee State University with a degree in recording industry management. Nadir played in various bands around Nashville and toured with rapper Me Phi Me in the ’90s, opening for Public Enemy and Arrested Development.

ON DETROIT: He moved to Detroit in 1999 to focus on his personal music — largely based in classic funk. “Detroit ended up being the perfect market with the history of funk and with the great stock of musicians,” he says. Nadir’s band Distorted Soul includes Yaminah Brock on vocals, Kamau on bass, Brandon Holland on keyboards, Rudy Washington on drums and guitarists Kris Kurzawa and Chris Sego. His debut album, “Distored Soul 2.0,” won a Detroit Music Award for outstanding urban funk/hip-hop recording in 2005.

POLITICS: Nadir is an avid (and liberal) political blogger (distortedsoul.com), which resulted in a blog for MTV that led up to the presidential election. Read it at: http://think.mtv.com/profile/Nadir. “If you don’t like what I’m writing about, then you probably won’t like my music either,” he says.

He combines his music with activism on the song “Guantanamo.” “I played it outside the White House protesting,” he says. “I think that every American and should go to Washington, D.C., and lobby for a cause they believe in to get an understanding of how laws are made in the country.”

ON HIS STYLE: Funk, layered with hip-hop flair, and lyrical composition. “Everything that I play has a lot of different influences. Funk is the one music that allows you to use the influences, a combination of R&B and soul and gospel,” he says, adding that politics is paramount to his current material. “I’ve been involved in the political movement to impeach George Bush and Dick Cheney.” One up-tempo song, “Impeach the President,” explores this theme.

UPCOMING PROJECTS: Nadir is recording a new album for 2009 release that will show a more intimate side of his musical persona, focusing on love songs.

“You can think about what’s going on the world and you can still have fun and dance while you’re doing those things,” he says. He is also working with 1440 Studio Collective and is helping to launch Detroitmusic.tv, a site featuring video performances by Detroit-area bands.

By Tamara Warren, Free Press special writer

“Working at Excellence” once defined the initials in Khary “WAE” Frazier’s name. He used to tell folks this meaning more often back when he simply called himself “WAE.” And even though this worldview could be called “inspirational,” he admits that, in the world of hip-hop, it can get corny.

Nowadays, he just lives the philosophy. It describes the way Frazier approaches his song lyrics and music. And the acronym, he now says, connotes his tendency to approach his music “eight ways.” Get it? WAE? “Way”?

All puns aside, Frazier — Detroit’s answer to a ’90s-era Ice Cube — is raw enough for the streets but thoughtful enough for fans of substantive hip-hop music. His is a forward-thinking steeze but with a very contemporary feel. It’s not as much pulpit-preachy as it is corner-store concentric. And he does it all by design.

“I always think that I’ve thought more in the past about where I wanna be,” Frazier says when asked about the inspiration for the songs that comprise his fine new album, Preaching to the Choir. “But now I’m thinking about what I’m doing and saying in the present. I wanna combine the music and the message to get people to start questioning everything. Through music, I believe we can change the way we think about life.”

And Preaching to the Choir is a direct testament to Frazier’s unconventional influences. Whereas most rap artists claim other rappers as their primary influences, Frazier includes artists like late reggae superstar Peter Tosh. It was a book, Up From Slavery, by Booker T. Washington that inspired the emcee to write Preaching. He can go deeper than that when naming inspirations, to his upbringing, in fact, at Detroit’s African-centered Aisha Shule Academy. His parents, both staunch activists, sent him there. And although he admits he “was not tryin’ to hear all that shit” about black history and kings and queens of antiquity at the time, somewhere in his maturation process, it all still sank in. He internalized it, along with a worldview that enables him to disagree with some of his heroes without being disrespectful of their accomplishments.

And he doesn’t necessarily completely agree with the overall ethos of figures like the aforementioned Cube, Tosh and Washington. But he is nevertheless driven by their content and their willingness to speak their minds unabashedly. He adapts their drive to his style — a simple, dressed-down guise typical of a clean-cut hood dude. Adaptable, yes, but also clear.

“When I listen to hip-hop, it can drown me out,” he says. “No offense to a lot of the guys, but if I was influenced by Shawty Lo or something like that, there’s no tellin’ what my feeling would be. I would cut off a lot of the instruments, a lot of the subject matter. I wouldn’t challenge myself.”

Preaching to the Choir certainly ought to distinguish itself from the current hip-hop crop because it is a true concept album, a rarity in today’s single-driven music environment. It underscores Detroit’s traditionalist musical landscape, an enclave where many hip-hop fans still appreciate full, completed albums as much they do downloads and mixtapes. It’s here that philosophically charged emcees like One.Be.Lo, Invincible, Finale and now Frazier are buoyed by waves of respect that earn them heightened levels of loyalty from their fans.

“He’s definitely an artist-activist,” says Nadir, one of this area’s foremost funkateers and producer of “Runnin’ Rebel,” a Public Enemy throwback that is one of the new album’s highlights. “He prefers the term ‘artist advocate.’ The thing I appreciate about him is how hard he works and how much he is about business.”

Frazier’s business has always been an endeavor to combine art and community work. His General Population organization is a band, a web community and a platform. He’s put his skills behind local movements like Buy Black Weekend and a successful Juneteenth celebration earlier this summer at The Woodward restaurant in downtown Detroit. Juneteenth celebrates the emancipation of African-Americans from slavery.

Frazier will cop to his involvement in activities for and about black people. He might even tout songs like “Black Fist Up” as some of his best work. But don’t single his music out as being simply “pro-black.”

“I would hope that anybody who’s black is pro-black,” he says. To understand his message, he says, you’ve got to listen to his lyrics. There are life lessons inherent in them, although not always overstated. And he’s right. His voice is a strong tenor that connects to the angst-driven, intense areas of the psyche. And if you’re not careful, you may take him for an angry black man with a greater need to vent than plan.

Frazier will bring his live show to Black Star Community Bookstore on Sept. 26. Black Star’s known for bringing musicians into the store to conduct hybrid programs that are edutainment-driven. Frazier plans to share some of his favorite books with audience members during his presentation and may even attempt to spark conversation about contemporary politics. The topic fascinates him, especially when it’s about the connection between politics and technology.

“In all seriousness, the cameras was supposed to be off,” he says, moving into a tangent about Jesse Jackson who, in July, was infamously caught by Fox News cameras expressing a desire to, er, cut off Barack Obama’s nuts. Jackson felt that Obama’s campaign strategies too often “dis” would-be supporters.

“Barack Obama is not a black politician,” Frazier explains. “He’s a politician. And he’s running a campaign better than anybody ever has. The way he’s using the Internet to raise money is just new and unique. And it’s harder for people that are used to the old structure that once was to accept what he’s doing. It challenges Jesse Jackson to think that this is the way a black man can win a campaign.”

Just as Obama has revolutionized the way campaigns are run, Frazier wants to challenge fans of contemporary hip hop to think that an emcee with a conscience and a personal politic can be just as normal as T.I. It’s not a “sexy” plan. But it can work, if fans understand his balance the way he does theirs. In other words, where’s there’s water, Frazier visualizes bridges.

“A Heavy D. or Biz Markie may not have considered as heavily things like marketing strategies back in the day,” he says. But he adds that it’s now OK for young artists to think about promotion and marketing as a part of hip hop. “That guy listening to Young Jeezy, one day he’s gonna be a manager of 300 people. And he’s learning and taking lessons from his life and lifestyle. And he’s gonna apply that someday.”

A song on the Preaching album, “Block to the Boardroom,” perfectly captures this take on record. It sums up Frazier’s vision. Try it! It might make similar sense to you.

Article by Khary Kimani Turner

For more information about Khary WAE Frazier please visit GeneralPopulation.org