We are proud to present Vann Clayton in our first webisode featuring a producer. He's behind many of the Spliff alumni's hits and we used his beat "Get Large" for our intro directed by Phil Davis. I've been a fan since. You can usually catch him at the bi-monthly BANANAS event organized by VerBS where he's produces mean beats live. Vann talks us through some of his collaborations with H.O.P.E, Kail, VerBS and CP. He also tells us about his relationship with acclaimed producer Warryn Cambell and his school years with Nipsey Hussle. A big shout out to Stephanie Rennie who did a great job editing the webisode.
It's been a while since we uploaded some new webisodes. There's a few more coming up down the line. This is kinda special... it's the first EVA interview we shot. Shout out to everyone who helped us. Intuition is dropping his new album "Girls Like Me" in a week, his album release party is on Wednesday at Low End Theory. GO! We were told at last Spliff that VerBS & Intuition were making new material for their fruitful collab. You can always check them out here for VerBS and here for Intuition. Go download The Buzz, one of the best projects to come out of 2009.
VerBS & Intuition rocked The Spliff. I have tons of stuff of them coming up, namely a webisode. Don't ask me why it hasn't been out yet. Maybe cause it was the first interview ever that we did and yall gonna laugh at us. Thanks to The Takeover blog that provided me with the name of the song. It's sweet and short & worth checking out.
Here's all the info THE SPLIFF LA is setting the new year off right! The livest performers since the early days. The "GREEN" environment that you used to. FREE DRANKS thanks to the good folks over at Sharkwater Liqueur & Roaring Lion Energy Drink! THIS WILL DEFINITELY BE A NIGHT TO REMEMBER
*****THE SPLIFF LA***** Friday January 1st 2010 9PM - 3AM ALL AGES $5 BEFORE 1030 $10 AFTER 1030
***AT OUR NEW LOCATION*** Freak City 6613 Sunset Blvd. (few blocks EAST of Sunset / Highland) Hollywood, CA
The SPLIFF LA DJ's Groweyez Printz Spintelect Val the Vandle COMPLIMENTARY DRINKS PROVIDED BY: SHARKWATER LIQUEUR & ROARING LION ENERGY DRINK "The SPLIFF is BACK - How YOU Remembered it!!!"
be sure and catch us at the spliff this friday!!!!! @ freak cityy 6613 sunset blvd ( all ages i believe) help bring in 2010. VerBs the homie will be our host, Val the Vandle our dj .. come out to support tho!
VerBS is dressed for winter. He greets me on the street in front of his mom's house in Culver City in his usual layers and wool cap. "I love Portland," he tells me in my car later, wiping invisible perspiration from his brow and cracking his window. "If I moved anywhere, it'd be there." Considering the city's dreary, drippy reputation, and the glimmering blue skies quality of his music, the statement strikes me as ironic. Then again, the day we meet is not "just another day out in sunny L.A."- a temperamental gray sky is moodily spitting drizzle.
"I need to get my own place again," he says as he leads me into a living room stuffed to the ceiling with Mos Def movies, books, and knickknacks, "but I don't have a job." As if to further highlight his innate sunniness, he had a job hustling- American Apparel clothing, not drugs- but his supervisor grew suspicious and VerBS quit before he could get fired. Besides, he had something a little brighter on the horizon. Murs had asked him to go on tour.
"One of my homegirls from high school...had a friend who worked at a studio [Murs] used to record at, and she was a big fan...her screen name was 'mursismybff.' He started talkin' to her...they just became friends. Then she introduced me to him at a Christmas show he had at the end of 2006. He's like, 'Oh, you rap? Why??' He had a weird, like, kinda condescending vibe, but it was a playful vibe. Then I'd see him around...I gave him my cd, 'The Progress,' and then hit him up for advice. 'You don't need my advice; your cd's really tight,' he told me. Then he'd come to my event, The Spliff. He randomly hit me up: 'I might have a job for you...you wanna go on tour?'"
Touring with Murs was a lesson in discipline, one VerBS didn't always take. "He would tell me, 'Yeah, don't drink before the show,' but sometimes I would do it anyway. Sometimes he could tell, and then he'd be like, 'I told you not to drink!' He doesn't smoke cigarettes, doesn't smoke weed, doesn't drink, runs two miles a day...if there's somebody I could model my career after, it would definitely be Murs. That fool's independent hustle game is legit. He goes hard for himself. He even told me, 'If you don't invest in yourself, who will?' He puts up the money for all his videos, he takes himself on tour...he'll stay til every fan's gone, just shakin' hands and kissin' babies."
Growing up, Kyle "VerBS" Guy's mother played jazz and Michael Jackson records ("one song, on repeat"). She says Kyle used to hum constantly as a toddler. Enrolled in piano lessons, his teacher said they were unnecessary due to his uncanny ability to play by ear, and he later went to Hamilton High School, a magnet school for the musically gifted (serendipitously, so did Murs). "I used to play with Legos for hours on end. I read comic books for hours on end. When we were on tour, [Murs and I] would stop in comic book stores and buy a gang of [them]...I just got a big imagination, and they feed that," VerBS says. I glance up and spot a certificate awarded him from Santa Monica College. He's not currently attending, but he wants to go back and spend more time developing his penchant for photography.
These snatches of his background snap together like pieces of a puzzle. He designs each of his solo cd covers individually, drawing and using his own photos to craft unique works of art. He hosts The Spliff LA, usually jumping into the cipher that wraps every show ("When I'm in the zone, my freestyles blow my writtens out of the water. It's like when Neo sees the Matrix- I can see rhyme patterns sentences ahead," he tells me). He collaborates with a list that reads like a "Who's Who" of underground L.A. artists- his crew, Swim Team, Dibiase, Equalibrium, Gumshoe, and Intuition.
His project with Intuition, the six-track EP "Buzz," is actually what first caught my attention. Though both rappers focus on their solo careers, as a duo they performed at the Paid Dues Festival this past spring alongside Atmosphere, Brother Ali, and Tech N9ne; they also opened for Murs at a sold-out House of Blues Anaheim show. When they appeared at LA Stereo.TV's launch party, VerBS' irrepressible grin and puppy-like ebullience were contagious. It's his personal spin on the old adage that says you catch more flies with honey than vinegar. "I just act the same all the time...you can easily get caught up in your own ego. I don't really think I'm the 'greatest rapper in the world.' I feel like humble kings rule forever...I'm tryna live like Michael Jackson and Jesus," he says.
Like them, he's a man in demand. Suddenly, eagerly, he asks me, "Wanna hear a new song?" He starts playing tracks he hasn't released and occasionally rapping over beats producers have sent him. One producer out of Canada, who found VerBS over the internet, sent him a handful of lushly layered tracks reminiscent of Foreign Exchange's Nicolay. VerBS is a big fan of the other half of FE, Phonte ("He and Murs and Mos Def are probably my three favorite rappers on the known tip," he says), and thoughts like dominoes start tumbling through my head. VerBS wants to start singing more; Phonte is a rapper-turned-singer! North Carolinian Phonte and Netherlander Nicolay composed their first album by exchanging beats and rhymes back and forth online! VerBS and this Canadian cat could model a working relationship on FE's! But the last thought falls with a thud: Nicolay eventually relocated to North Carolina. VerBS likes cold weather; what if he moved? For L.A.'s sake, I'm hoping VerBS stays "sweat(ing) a lot."
VerBS' next drop will be a free download entitled, "Fuck Yeah, Man." You can catch him live hosting The Spliff Friday, January 1st, at Freak City, 6613 Sunset Blvd, and online at www.myspace.verbsisthehomie.
Ft. VerBS (it's about time we feature him since our intro), Nerd (Spliff alumni), Alpha MC (The Swim Team) and Val the Vandle. Kiiling it at The Spliff, On the Rox, Sept 09. Enjoy this unique hip hop moment... only in LA!
This is the first installment of our web series, soon to grace your computer screens. Before we released the crunchy stuff, we wanted to highlight the animation introduction that everyone worked so hard to achieve. Phil Davis in particular, our editor came up with this brilliant masterpiece. He was immediately inspired by producer Vann Clayton's track 'Get Large' which was largely approved by Val. I was very excited to feature some dope photos by some of the photographers (Briana, Rob, Kasey) who regularly document the LA hip hop scene. Otherwise, LA Stereo started as a simple conversation between Kristin and myself, two hours later Val was on board as our host, and three days after we were shooting at the Ponoma Glasshouse.. Next thing you know we have a great website powered by our friends Eqal, and we are plowering on... Don't forget to register so we can feature some of your content, peace yall Marguerite