Lola Maxwell, a female emcee out of DC's Southeast, has something to say in her rhymes. Her new mixtape, "Basik Edukation" drops March 24.
"As a native of one of the most violent and badly influenced areas, Southeast D.C., this young and gorgeous, but hard-core emcee has crept into the music airwaves and is dulcifying ears with hip hop tunes that make you nod along. So what, everyone samples and no one said it was the correct way, but critics from all over are eating up these 90s bass-bumping beats like candy. Lola Maxwell is the name and it may not get worn out. Looking back to MC Lyte and Queen Latifah, being a female rapper, especially with something intriguing and effective to spit, was not appreciated. So why does Lola think she can place her feet into the musically raunchy atmosphere, so-called ruled by men? Because she is fresh, experienced and ready to check the rhyme, something many other emcees fail to do."
Check out the new Dana Coppafeel video for "I See Now" featuring Michael Mic Check and shot by Darren Cole. "I See Now" is available on both MKE's Best and Coppa's Welfare Foods. Enjoy.
So last Tuesday, my partner Q got a chance to be interviewed by The Mad Kids (coincidental, we swear, haha) on Milwaukee's only Hip-Hop radio show in the state about our "Journey to Hip-Hop ... Milwaukee" series. DJ Kid Cut Up, whom we've featured on the blog here and here, and DJ Bizzon bring you numerous amounts of good Hip-Hop music you could only beg and dream your radio stations to play. A format I myself wish I got to experience more in my home state. But....that's neither here nor there. Haha.
These guys did a great job, not only with providing you great music to nod your head to but they also gave a great interview with Q asking him what seemed like every possible question about our project on Milwaukee Hip-Hop. It's great to get love from them as we show love for their music few outside their state lines have gotten the privilege to hear. Happy to collaborate with these guys on the MKE's BEST compilation they helped us promote and push.
Anyways....let's get to it. Here's the rundown of what was on their show and check the download at the bottom!
WSME 91.7 - THE MAD KIDS (DJ Kid Cut Up - DJ Bizzon) - 03-02-10
B. Dolan - 50 Ways To Bleed Your Customer
B. Dolan - Earth Movers
POS ft Cadence Weapon - The Fall of Troy -Mad Kids
Awol One & Factor - Glamorous Drunk
Awol One & Factor - Stand Up ft Myka 9 and Aesop Rock
Awol One & Factor - Up Downtown -Mad Kids -The Mad Bloggers Mention
Gorillaz - Super Fast Jelly Fish ft De La Soul
Kaydee - Right Here
Frankie Flowers - Koolness
Lupe Fiasco - Lean
Lab Partners - Reach Out
Zion I - Coastin’
Statik Selektah - Do What I Believe ft Bahamadia
Kice Of Course - My iPod -Mad Kids -The Mad Bloggers Mention The Mad Bloggers (Q’s Interview) - [1:06:37 - 1:23:00]
Salt-N-Pepa - Push It (Kid Cut Up Remix off TMB)
Method Man & Redman - City Lights ft Bun B. (UGK?)
After weeks of featuring and spotlighting Milwaukee emcees and producers, we are proud to present, "MKE's Best", a compilation of Milwaukee Hip-Hop in partnership w/Milwaukee's own WMSE 91.7.
We are very pleased with this final product.
A sincere thanks to the talented emcees and producers who lent their tracks for this compilation. Milwaukee has amazing talent and we're happy we could be a part of spotlighting it.
We know we may have missed some people but this was our humble attempt to spotlight as much of Milwaukee's Hip-Hop as we could find.
A special shout out to @EgyptoKnuckles and @ladyblogga for helping us put together the "The Journey to Hip-Hop... Milwaukee" series! And WMSE, thanks for your support!
JC-TRAX, a producer out of Milwaukee hit me with this track he produced for ANTHAMATIC, an emcee also out of Milwaukee. Check the joint out on another Journey to Hip-Hop late pass.
We did a piece on Kid Cut Up a few days back but didn't have a track to share. Recently I did an interview with Kid Cut Up for his The Mad Kids Show on Milwaukee's WMSE and we exchanged emails. He hit me with these two tracks. I felt the need to share with a late pass. Enjoy!
I caught this in the email from the homie MaGestiK LeGenD. Dope track. Check it.
"Hey! Its been a minute! Hope everyone has been great and paid! Here is a new MaGestiK LeGenD track. Amongst other projects, ML and Astronote have formed a powerhouse crew called ((CLASSIC STEREO)). Much more to come."
Dana Coppafeel was among the first Milwaukee heads that we featured on the blog. He was surely the first interview. At the time it was Dana's video for the track "88" that caught my attention. His rhymes and style were fresh, with that old school Hip-Hop feel to it. That his music contains that old school feel shouldn't be a surprise from the self proclaimed "old head" who is in his second childhood.
There was something cool about his lyrical flow and it’s not just on one track. It carried. Coppafeel has been blessing my inbox since we first exchanged emails online and is among the cool heads from Milwaukee that I've never met outside of the matrix. He's my connection to the House of M, KingsHellBastard, Uni-Fi Records and more.
But now Coppafeel is in the midst of his first project, "Coppa's Welfare Foods", and the timing couldn't be better considering our spotlight on Milwaukee this month. He hit me with the advance copy a few weeks ago and I'm very pleased with the new joint (which is available for purchase on CD Baby and preview on Bandcamp.com).
"Coppa's Welfare Foods" is dope from beginning to end. I sat through two solid listens after I unzipped the file. Joints like "Another One", "Chemistry" and "I See Now" speak to the smoothed out side of Dana. Then there are joints like "Damage", "Keep the Motor Runnin'" and "Welfare Foods" that bring that hard-hitting side.
It's all dope Hip-Hop.
Whether it's the smooth side or the hard-hitting side of Dana Coppafeel , it's all lyrical and he has a great handle of word play, plus his features compliment many tracks. As with other joints, "Coppa's Welfare Foods" boasts solid production too.
I reached out to Dana for a Q&A. Here's what he had to say about making music, the new project and what's been going on since the last time we spoke.
The Mad Bloggers: It's been a while since we spoke, what's new?
Dana Coppafeel: To tell the truth, a lot... right now I'm gearing up to push my first ever solo project called "Coppa's Welfare Foods", which is dropping March 13th but you can get it right now on CD baby. I just got done shooting a video for "I SEE NOW" which is what I'm trying to lead off with. I try to stay away from calling it a single. ya know, its Milwaukee, so here it's just some music. My friend D Woods of Alpha Bang Productions is putting it together for me.
At the same time, one of the groups I'm in, KingHellBastard, is currently working to wrap up a vinyl EP with some dope features. We've got Sadat X of Brand Nubians, White Shadow of Norway, Arkobatic, Raashan Ahmed of Crown City Rocker and Strick of EMC. We are on the brink of finishing that... as well as an album called WarRoom, which we are knee deep in already.
The House of M, my other group, we just launched our website www.houseofmutants.com. Everybody in the M is working on solo or other inner group projects at the time.
Last but not least I'm working on another joint project with my homie Da Ricanstruckta. We got a nice size chunk of songs done, we just need to polish them off. So, that's pretty much everything in a nut shell for the most part.
TMB: How do you find time for all your projects?
Dana: [Hahaha] I don't even know. I ask myself that sometimes.. maybe super powers. I guess its just being focused and mainly that I will things to happen. I just feel right now is the time for me to let the me that knows what I'm capable of doing take control. I've been doing this for years in Milwaukee, like 93... so, the knowledge of following something through is quit relevant right now. It gives me perspective on ideal time frames for projects. So, time is nothing but the catalyst. We don't got forever just right now...
TMB: "Coppa's Welfare Foods" is your first solo project, how did it feel putting it together?
Dana: It's a good feeling... this collection of songs, I never really meant them to be an album. Maybe, a free online mixtape or something like that. When I first started this project it was '07 and I was just recording. I wasn't recording for anything, I just wanted to get better at recording and see how other people did their thing. I really just had the Royallton booked every Wednesday night to record. I got a lot of features from all over on the album. Germany to the UK, I got heads from Jacksonville, Savannah, Phoenix, Rockford, Pittsburg, Milwaukee, Madison and New York. I want to connect people with different heads. So, at one point I had like 27 songs all recorded, my friend Dima thought I should turn those songs into an album. I was like NO, lets just do it as a mixtape or something like that. I just thought it was too random a collection of songs but, once we got them mixed a few of them turned out real good and had a great vibe together.
I caught this a few days ago from *hitmayng, a young producer and DJ out of Milwaukee. As we begin to bring things to a close for our Journey to Hip-Hop series featuring Milwaukee, I felt the need to share. He's been DJ'ing since '04 and as he said, over time he got into producing. Last summer he released a compilation of remixes featuring acapellas from Lupe Fiasco, Common, De La Soul and others. He's got an ear. Check out "Mighty Healthy."
