ILL BREAKS CREW

The Runaway, an emcee and producer from Milton, Ontario, Canada has some news:

The Runaway is offering his single “Away We Go” as a free download! Click here for the Bandcamp link and some history of the song.

The Runaway site is been back up and running. Check it out by clicking here.

Here is a video of The Runaway freestyling, featuring Ill Seer & Soul Natural @ The Hard Rock Cafe. (For more freestyles from The Runaway, ILL Seer, Shad & Soul Natural, check out the free Prophetic Poetic release called “Off The Top”. Download it by clicking here.)

We asked The Runaway for some behind-the-scenes insights and thoughts about this show and performing in general. Here’s what he shared:

This was shot at the Hard Rock Café in Toronto. The show was the kick off for a cool new Canadian indie music website called Pay What You Want.

“At my shows, I really like to provide a diverse experience. We do the beats & rhymes, a DJ (when we can grab one), (my hype man) Showtime pulls out a guitar, and my cousin Lady Blaise brings the vocals. I really like to have a community feel – with many people on stage getting their shine.

On this night, two very good homies from WAY back were in Toronto to share in the celebration, so of course we had to do it like we did back then. During my days at Wilfrid Laurier (2001-2005), ILL Seer & Soul Natural (along with Shad and Mere Mortal) used to regularly freestyle and fellowship. When we first got together, I had a campus radio show and I would be the DJ. Eventually I began rhyming too and their encouragement inspired me to develop my skills as an emcee.

From that crew, most people recognize Shad’s name for his career with Black Box Recordings. In a cipher, Shad would sharpen EVERYBODY. However, I would credit Soul Natural as a greater influence. This dude lived to express himself and would always encourage me to freestyle regardless of how I was feeling. He is tireless in his approach and that often motivated me. So, that night it was an honour to freestyle with such gifted wordsmiths and feel like I could hang. When I watch the video, my mind’s eye sees that cat from 8 or 9 years ago who was just getting started. But I am so thankful that I have kept going because the community spirit of the cipher session has never left, and it fills me with joy each time I get to commune with someone.

Shouts to ILL Seer (who let me hype for him while I was getting my performance legs), Qu-C (my brother who made all the beats) and Youngdo for filming (and being a good all around dude).“

Cop his album, Round Two, off of iTunes (tracklisting below) and make sure you catch a show. He puts on a good one.

1) Away We Go – beat by The Runaway
2) Bless You Too (Structural Damage remix) – beat by Re:Flex
3) Heart Mind Body Soul – beat by MatAmax
4) Lord I Need Ya remix feat. Crisis – beat by The Runaway
5) Time To Think – beat by Qu-C
6) Spit Hot Fire feat. Sivion, ILL Seer, Shua James, Shad, Relic, Braille & Die-Rek – beat by Theory Hazit

A fresh dude named Calmplex did up this dope graf piece of our name. Check out the “making-of” video below. Thanks Calmplex for the piece! For more of Calmplex’s art and music, click here.

Due to the crazy response, Relic is extending this giving away through July. Download The Green Light for free! You’ve heard his work on joints from Shad to Sev Statik as well as his own projects. Rapper, producer, singer, engineer (with his own studio), this guy does it all. Click the album cover on the left to head to the link. Know this: it’s been in the top 20 for the last couple months on Canada campus radio. After July, you can buy it on iTunes, but download it now (even if you don’t have the time now to listen to it, download it and check it out later) and let others know about this good hip-hop!

Who says the Bible is boring? Did you know that a lot of the Bible were songs, like poetry to music? We don’t know what the music sounded like, but we do have the lyrics. Below are a couple examples, but recited over hip-hop beats by a couple emcees, Othello and Boogalu.

These are a couple samples from a project called “Streetlights” from an organization called Alert. To check out more about them, click here.