Interview: Dawgy Baggz of Paper Route Gangstaz

Dawgy Baggz

If you haven’t heard of Paper Route Gangstaz yet, you obviously have been ignoring the independent music press as well as the content on [cardboard living] over the last eight months. As a collection of four guys from the streets of Huntsville, Alabama, Paper Route Gangstaz are emphatic about the deep-south lifestyle that they lead, which is one reliant (if not dependent) on money, drugs, alcohol, women and whips. Seeing that Atlanta, Georgia is currently the hip-hop capital of the country, it’s easy to understand how PRGz have flown under the radar for over eight years now.

The flight path changed once Diplo and Benzi, two producers that the music industry have become acquainted with through their work on M.I.A.’s “Paper Planes”, decided to remix original PRGz tracks in 2008 for a mixtape called Fear and Loathing in Huntsvegas. The mixtape received critical attention from Pitchfork in addition to other music publications, both physical and digital. So, when I sat down at home to call Dawgy Baggz, the de facto leader of the Paper Route clan, I could hardly stop the questions concerning the formation and direction of the group from rolling off my tongue.

Amp Dawkins has gone by Dawgy Baggz ever since he can remember. As is what usually occurs, Dawkins can’t remember where the nickname came from but what he can remember is that it is a street name. Huntsville is a city most notable for a notoriously high crime rate, strings of fast food establishments and a horizon that features rocket launches on almost a bi-weekly basis. Those who live in Huntsville are aware that the city has a culture unto itself, one not notable for its musical identity. Thus, one must wonder how Baggz ended up generating enough buzz for his label and his group to be featured onPitchfork, a site that caters to the ears of thousands of ‘indie kids’. Dawgy’s explanation of the group’s name made the answer clear:

Its something that I earned the right to do. Paper Route is just like that paper route that the paper boy take every morning, throwing out them newspapers to come back and collect his money. I took that exact same route throwing out my inventory to collect my money. Gangsta is just a lifestyle…its fighting for what you believe in and never…Never…backing down. Its willing to take those life altering chances in order to support you and yours and always making your own way in any…Any…situation. I earned my right to be called a Paper Route Gangsta.

As for the Diplo and Benzi collaboration, Dawgy insists that luck had more to do with that collaboration than anything. However, talent knows no boundaries and the Major Lazer team certainly holds that concept close to heart. Baggz insists that Diplo is a “genius in the studio” and that opinion shines through as truthful in the Huntsvegas mixtape as Diplo samples George Michael on “Bama Gettin Money”, Underworld on “Stuntastic” and Weezer for “Grind Baby”. Dawgy just wishes “they weren’t so damn expensive”. However, the Diplo ‘collabos’ caught the ears of both rap fanatics and hipsters across the country as they saw the genius behind mixing ‘country boy’ hip-hop with highly intelligent production.

 

Clockwise from top left: Mata, Gunt, Dawgy Baggz, Jhi-Ali

The mixtape features all four members of the group: Mata, Jhi-Ali, Gunt and Dawgy Baggz himself as well as associates of the group X.O., Mali Boi (the main producer for PRGz), Amp G, Wale, Blaqstarr and Jackie Chain (an Asian dude who has served time for drug trafficking and a fantastic lyricist). Most of those featured on Fear and Loathing in Huntsvegas are from Huntsvegas and have known either Dawgy or one of the other PRGz members for quite some time, a factor that gives the mixtape Southern legitimacy that will attract fans drawn to Southern hip-hop.

PRGz have untainted street credibility that should help them attract a loyal Southern fan base that will include fans of harder hip-hop from the region. Dawgy mentioned to me that at the start of Paper Route Recordz a couple of the members caught murder and drug cases and were sentenced to fifteen years to life sentences, amounting to a series of setbacks in the development of the brand.

The upcoming EP Rocket Fuel will be released on iTunes soon, a deal helped along by the addition of PRGz to the Elite Taste roster, a small agency that also reps Mike Posner and Wale. “Keyshia Cole“, the lead-off single, is a song about ganja, called “‘Keyshia Cole’ because you don’t wanna be talkin’ reckless on the phone”, according to Dawgy. We’re sure to hear much, much more about PRGz in the coming months, make sure to check [cl] if that interests you.

Notables:

Bama Gettin Money (Dipo Remix)

9.2/10. This Diplo remix is the best on the mixtape as we find PRGz at their best.

Soul Glo (The Knocks Remix)

7.5/10. Another indie-oriented remix that features a sample from a hair-care product and a looping violin riff. One of the more genius samples that we’ve heard in a while.

Alabama

7.4/10. A PRGz original track (one of the few on the mixtape) that features the incredible point that “Alabama” backwards sounds like “I’m-A-Balla”.

Rollin’ (Diplo Remix)

8.8/10. A very druggy remix of a song that is even more hallucinogenic.

Grind Baby

7.2/10. “Grind Baby” features a sample of Weezer’s “Say It Ain’t So.” More Diplo genius.

Stuntastic

9.0/10. The truest Southern anthem on the PRGz’s CV.

Lewis Corson

Interview: Mike Posner

Mike Posner wants everyone to know that he will not be pigeonholed, cannot be categorized and refuses to fit any existing archetype. By the end of my interview, I came to realize that Posner is who Posner is. He’s a white college kid entering his senior year at Duke that has recorded songs with up-and-coming (and established) rappers KiD CuDi, Big Sean, and Wale, has covered and remixed songs from Electric Light Orchestra, The Fray and Beyoncé and has already been featured on Kanye West’s blog.  Did I mention that he has a record deal? Not too shabby for a guy who claims to be your average twenty-one year old college kid.

Just the opposite is certain for Mike Posner – he is not your average college kid. While he told me that “[he has] a job but he balance[s] fun” into his life when I asked him what he likes to do for fun at Duke, he said, in the same breath, that “people are gonna cry when they hear” his 2010 LP. Benny Blanco, the twenty-one year-old producer behind Katy Perry’s “I Kissed A Girl” and Britney Spears’s “Circus”, is working on the currently untitled 2010 LP with Posner at Downtown studios in New York City, where the album should be close to completion before the Blue Devil has to go back to Durham, North Carolina for his diploma.

Posner has become a sensation at Duke since he began performing there last year. His performances have become recurring events on campus with his revolving backing band, The Brain Trust, playing behind him. The shows have occasionally featured guests such as G.O.O.D. music protégé Big Sean and mutual friend Pat Piff, two up-and-comers that Posner has known since he interned at an urban radio station in Detroit a few years ago. The audiences for his first campus shows were built on word of mouth hype from his close friends on campus through social networking sites and after no time at all, it started to permeate throughout the music business resulting in a record deal with J Records, a Sony/BMG record label with a solid roster of both urban and pop artists.

Even though Posner had only been singing for a year and a half by the time he was signed, Posner says that he was “blessed with the opportunity to be the position to choose a label” and chose Sony because the label “understands who [he is] and where [he’s coming from] and that [he does] appeal to a few different crowds and is gonna have [his] hand in all those cookie jars at the same time.” He believes that his music has the ability to connect with everyone from the older white housewife to hardcore hip-hop producers, as it already has with legendary Atlanta producer Don Cannon, who presents the A Matter of Time mixtape with DJ Benzi.

Posner’s future mass appeal will have something to do with his diversified taste. Growing up, his father and mother had him listening to The Grateful Dead and balanced it out with Luther Vandross, Marvin Gaye while Motown was “ubiquitous” around the Detroit area as he was growing up. High exposure to singers and songwriters is the reason why Posner calls himself a singer and not a rapper, why he prefers to produce his own beats instead of handing them off to rappers and the reason behind the crossover sensation that he will become.

Mike Posner on A Matter of Time:

[cardboard living]: You mentioned that your mixtape A Matter of Time has a story behind it from the opening “Tick” to the last song “Tock.” What do you think the motif is behind it?

Mike Posner: There’s a few meanings to it… one of them is “it’s a matter of time before you’re gonna have to deal with me” but I first came up with that name from the song “A Matter of Time”, which has more of a darker meaning and I was writing that song at a time where, for the first time in my life, people were bombarding me, asking me for beats, asking me to get on the hook with them and stuff like that. I remember just thinking, “Most of these people are just not gonna make it and not be what they think they’re gonna be and it’s only a matter of time before reality is gonna set in for them. And for the people who do make it, it’s only a matter of time before everybody forgets who you are, so there is kind of a double meaning between those two things. That song was special to me because at the time that I wrote it, I was one of those people as well.

A Matter of Time

8.5/10. The title track for the mixtape A Matter of Time is also one of its best. The haunting keys and bongo percussion echo underneath Posner’s raspy notes.

Evil Woman

9.3/10. The catchiest song on the mixtape features a sample from Electric Light Orchestra’s “Evil Woman.” The track showcases Posner’s versatile sound that traverses through disco, dance and hip-hop.

Lewis Corson

Mike Posner Is No Poser

We’re not sure if he’s a college dropout or a current student, but what we do know about the man from Duke (that school in North Carolina) is that he’s blowing up. Mike Posner & The Brain Trust recently inked a deal with RCA Music Group and he will be playing a couple dates in the coming months including one organized by a frat at University of Southern California in Los Angeles (actually, it’s in Watts, but we won’t hold that against them).

On his mixtape A Matter of Time and other side projects, Posner has worked extensively with G.O.O.D. music (KiD CuDi’s label) protegé Big Sean, singining on and producing “Who Knows” and our personal favorite, the stoner anthem “Smoke and Drive.” What more, he has also worked with Jackie Chain, KiD CuDi, Kanye West and Wale (we think he should spell it Walé if he doesn’t want people to confuse him with a giant orca), all self-proclaimed stoners themselves.

Posner has a remarkable and quite memorable smoker’s rasp to his voice, which makes him a very attractive crossover artist. Kanye West, the king of crossover, featured Posner on his blog earlier this year and the Dukie also was featured on Wale’s latest BACK TO THE FEATURE mixtape with buddy Big Sean on “Wonder Why”, where he sings the hook and seems to add a considerable amount of poppiness to the track.

Posner has been a favorite at Duke for a couple years and regularly performs for a crowd that couldn’t be more fond of their fellow Blue Devil. He sings, he raps and students there couldn’t love him more if he was doing backflips off the stage. The sound is cut at this show below but the crowd knows every word:

Check out Mike Posner on Kanye’s blog.

Smoke & Drive feat. Big Sean, Donnis and Jackie Chain

8.8/10. Posner’s raspy voice works perfectly on this piano-driven track that conjures up Chronic 2001 nostalgia (is Dr. Dre ever going to finish Detox?), specifically, “Still D.R.E.” Speaking of chronic, Jackie Chain a.k.a. ultimate stoner is on the track.

Halo

7.5/10. Only a true crossover artist would cover Beyoncé’s “Halo”. While we’re not in love with the track, we’d like to think that Posner did the track for his mixtape A Matter of Time out of respect for Jay-Z. 

Still Not Over You feat. Eric Holljes

8.3/10. This rendition of The Fray’s “Over My Head (Cable Car)” is genius. Fellow Durham, North Carolina resident Eric Holljes sings the hook, which has been altered to reflect the content that Posner has chosen for the track. At the start of the song it’s hard to take the song seriously, considering the sample. However, Posner’s voice makes an appearence about twenty-five seconds in and the Discovery-esque beat drops shortly afterwards. Eric Holljes is a pretty convincing singer and guitarist as well… we assume that he is responsible for the acoustic guitar on the track.

Cooler Than Me feat. Big Sean

7.7/10. A flatter track than the rest of the mixtape greats featured above but Posner’s versatility in both singing and producing is properly showcased.

Lewis Corson

The Beez

Tons of new music today for everyone. “We Be Steady Mobbin’” is killer and some of the best material we’ve heard from Weezy F. in a while. I’m not even going to get started on the Limp Bizkit-esque rap-rock phase that he’s going through. Lupe’s got a new track that sounds oddly familiar to “Superstar” but his snippets have some promise to them. Wale has come out with a mixtape entitled BACK TO THE FEATURE (“New Soul” is on it) and it’s pretty tight. Spoon’s “Got Nuffin” is the crunchiest thing they’ve put out in years while Air France’s “CBG Belongs to Us” is the complete opposite. Michael Jackson Top 10 cover tracks and tributes to come soon…

Spoon – Got Nuffin

8.9/10. The edgier version of Spoon that infringes on a Queens of the Stoneage sound. Did they meet up with Dave Grohl before going into the studio? Look out for the upcoming EP.

Air France – CBG Belongs to Us

6.7/10. A new move for Air France with someone singing on the track. We’re not sure where this is coming from…

La Roux – Quicksand (Mad Decent Remix)

8.4/10. Who doesn’t love Mad Decent? The label has one of the best artist rosters in the indie world. It seems that Diplo can’t be stopped.

Lil Wayne & Gucci Mane – We Be Steady Mobbin’

9.6/10. Tightest lyrics that we’ve heard from Wayne since “Yes”. You won’t hear autotone, just raw content and rawer lyrics.

KiD CuDi – Heaven at Nite

6.2/10. Seeing as there’s already a video for the track, we assume that this is the second single off of his upcoming LP, to our disdain.

Wale – New Soul feat. Yael Naim

8.2/10. Producer BKS creates a banging slow jam with a Lilly Allen spin on the track. Wale might finally get is 15 minutes.

Wale – Wonder Why feat. Big Sean, Ken Starr & Mike Posner

7.8/10. Not as good as “New Soul” but Kanye’s protegé Big Sean is on the track with Mike Posner (hoarse voice), his buddy from Duke, who is up-and-coming. Story is that Big Sean rapped on the spot for Kanye outside of a radio station and was signed shortly afterwards.

Lupe Fiasco – Shining Down feat. Matthew Santos

5.9/10. Doesn’t Lupe understand that he can’t release the same song on two different albums? There’s no formula here, Lupe. Hopefully Jay-Z will agree to mentor him.

Here are a couple snippets that we found for Lupe’s upcoming album Laser:

Lupe Fiasco – Two Ways (Sample Snippet)

Lupe Fiasco – Ladies and Gentlemen (Sample Snippet)

Lewis Corson

“Chillin’” feat. Lady Gaga Video

This is a snippet from the new Wale track that is growing in popularity.  Lady Gaga is featured and producers Cool & Dre have used such a fucking hot sample from “Na Na Hey Hey Kiss Him Goodbye,” the 1969 Steam song. The track has also got some “Arab Money” feel to it at parts as well.

Lady Gaga is on the cover of this month’s Rolling Stone and there’s some pretty racy context in the article. As the new Pop Princess, it seems that everything she touches turns to gold.  Look out for Wale’s upcoming LP entitled Attention: Deficit.

 

 

 

Wale – Chillin feat. Lady Gaga

7.8/10 Hot beat but, as usual, lacking lyrical magnificence.

Lewis Corson

Chillin

[cardboard living] has some fresh tunes to help get you through the week, and if your lucky, a head start on spring break next week. I wanted to post these joints all weekend but didn’t have time since I was busy getting shut down by girls.

Wale – Chillin (Prod. by Cool ‘N Dre)

9.3/10. This track is hot fiyahhhhhh and the second single of his upcoming album. The beat is ridiculous and Wale does his thing. Great combination.

T.I. – Get That Money

7.0/10.  Another new song off of the Trap-A-Holics Gone Till November mixtape. It’s a nice track and pretty standard T.I.

Mike Tully