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Thursday, May 14, 2015
The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com
ARTS
ARTIST
PROFILE

IN

By WILL GREENBERG

Daily Arts Writer

It was a school night when Busi-

ness junior Gary King walked into 
the Michigan Union. King is pur-
suing a dual major in Business and 
organizational studies, and upon 
arriving he announces that he needs 
to get back home soon; he has a lot of 
homework to do. Most of his time that 
past week had been eaten up already 
while finalizing and releasing his lat-
est EP: Pre-Notions.

King released the alternative hip-

hop EP to his Sound Cloud in March 
and plans to have another project out 
in the next few months. He has been 
rapping for most of his life, and now 
that he’s at the University, with bet-
ter recording resources and a wider 
array of other talent to collaborate 
with, he’s looking to make some noise. 

King has been juggling school 

and music since he arrived at the 
University. A Detroit native, King 
started rapping in middle school and 
performs in the area as much as he 
can. He’s already performed at Ann 
Arbor’s Blind Pig, a University fra-
ternity, the Martin Luther King Day 
Symposium and some other open 
mics around town.

The show King remembers most is 

one of his first. He tells the story of a 
show with his friends at his church’s 
talent show during sophomore year 
of high school: 

“We messed up horribly,” King 

laughs as he remembers. “We had the 

coldest rhymes already set and then 
we went up there — we forgot every-
thing.” 

Luckily, the pastor approached 

him and his friends and offered to 
let them try again at the following 
mass on Sunday, in front of a crowd 
filled with friends and family that 
was roughly three times larger than 
the little talent show. King jumped on 
the second-chance opportunity and 
turned it into his launch-pad for his 
musical pursuits.

“I went up there, killed it; it was all 

cool. And then we ended up perform-
ing at the harvest fest; that was pretty 
dope. Then that’s how I got my first 
recording opportunity,” King said.

One priority for King in his music 

is creating a unique sound (as he says 
in “Choices (The Segue)”: “I just try to 
avoid the norm ’cause I’m tryin’ to be 
remembered”). He pays close atten-
tion to the underground rap scene, 
always looking for artists trying new 
things and creating anything alter-
native. A personal goal for King is to 
locate the next big name in the genre 
before they catch fame, but he also 
incorporates other rappers’ ideas into 
his own music.

On this most recent project, King 

worked with Kinesiology senior 
James Huang, who goes by the stage 
name “Blank Face Villain.” Huang, 
who has played piano all his life but 
only started recording in college, 
produced and mixed Pre-Notions. 
The duo worked out of the recording 
booths on North Campus, usually late 

on Saturday nights when they could 
get studio time. 

Huang said King introduced him 

to much of the underground scene 
and the two were on the same page 
for the type of sound they were look-
ing for on the EP. The beats are across 
the board, slow but driving, creatively 
blending computer-generated sounds 
and Huang’s piano. The EP has sooth-
ing tracks like “$ouls,” as well as some 
more chaotic songs like “Evolve.” 

What’s clear is that the EP isn’t 

merely two students dabbling in an 
after-school hobby; it’s pretty good. 

Unfortunately, Huang will be in 

graduate school at Northwestern 
next fall — though King doesn’t think 
it’ll sever the partnership completely.

“Chicago’s not that far,” King said.
Still, King himself said he always 

puts grades ahead of music. While 
the workload of a double major can 
be tough, King said staying organized 
and focused frees up time for him to 
work on his music. 

More than that, King said sacrific-

ing school for music would defeat the 
purpose of his rap’s message. While in 
a perfect world King would see him-
self rapping, he said no matter what 
he does he wants to be an example, as 
a good student to kids and as a whole-
some person to listeners at large.

He calls himself a “conscious rap-

per,” infusing his Christian faith, 
hard-working mentality and his 
belief in family into his lyrics. King 
said no matter what path he takes, 
whether in the business world or 

the music world, he wants to make 
a positive contribution to the people 
around him.

“I definitely want to get the right 

message across and help people in 
some sort of capacity,” King said. 

For now, King is working on gain-

ing attention for his music on Sound 
Cloud. Working mostly through 
word of mouth, King said this year 
he’s committed to performing as 
much as possible. 

As he continues to record new 

material, King is always looking 
for feedback, consulting friends 
he feels are tuned into the hip-hop 
world. Business junior Max Quer-
termous, a friend of King’s, serves as 
a first set of ears from time to time. 
As a fellow Business student, Quer-
termous can attest to the workload 
of the school — which he said isn’t 
unreasonable — but said King’s 
music doesn’t suffer from being one 
of two focuses.

Quertermous said he also watch-

es the up-and-coming rap scene 

closely and would compare King to 
others in the underground scene. 
He said what he likes about King is 
his unique message and approach to 
his music, declaring it one of his big-
gest assets. 

“If you’re serious about hip hop, 

you consider yourself a serious lis-
tener, and if you care about the 
music, then I would suggest that you 
do check out Gary’s music and listen 
to it closely,” Quertermous said. 

Yes, keep an eye out for the name 

“Gary King” when returning to cam-
pus next fall. King said the title of 
Pre-Notions is a not-so-subtle hint of 
things to come, saying his next proj-
ect should be his best work yet, some-
thing that should attract many new 
ears.

“This is just basically supposed to 

be an outline,” King said. “You know 
how you have papers and you make 
an outline before you get into a paper, 
or the real message you want to do? 
That’s basically what the idea of this 
was.”

AMANDA ALLEN/Daily

He calls himself a “conscious rapper.”

By KAREN HUA

Daily TV/New Media Editor 

Summertime 
brings 
warmer 

weather, sunnier souls and the 
season of music festivals. There’s 
something liber-
ating, refreshing 
— 
empowering, 

even 
— 
about 

being in sunny 
haze 
among 
a 

crowd of strang-
ers 
bonded 
by 

the love of cer-
tain bands and 
musical 
culture. 

Coachella 
and 

Bonnaroo 
are 

renowned 
for 

bringing concert-goers into wide 
desert and farm fields, but a newer 
trend has brought these festivals to 
cities for a change of pace and envi-
ronment.

Over Memorial Day weekend, 

Boston Calling Music Festival will 
hold its fifth event since its inception 
two years ago. What began as a sim-
ple idea to bring the festival culture 
to an urban atmosphere was soon 
picked up by the Bowery to sponsor 
the event to reality — first headline 
by The National in May of 2013. This 
year, Grammy award-winner Beck, 
My Morning Jacket and The Pixies 
will headline on May 22, 23 and 24, 
respectively. Other favorites such 
as Marina and the Diamonds and 
St. Vincent will be returning, while 

bands such as Tame Impala, Tena-
cious D and Ben Harper will make 
their Boston Calling debut.

To hype up both ticket holders 

and the city for the musical start 
to the summer, Boston Calling has 
been holding a block party concert 
every Thursday from 5 to 8 p.m. 
Last week, Tigerman Woah headed 
the first of the series in Downtown 
Crossing, where most attendees 
were regulars socializing after work 
or local passersby drawn to the 
springtime pulsation of sound. It 
was a small but hearty crowd enjoy-
ing a more private concert of a grun-
gier, edgier sound with a twang of 
blues. The party brought an eclectic 
audience from yuppies to older pro-
fessions, just like the diverse audi-

ence Boston Calling usually draws 
— a crowd of 20,000, from college 
students to families to independent 
fans of the music. Some come for 
the music, while others come just to 
enjoy the air of festivity.

Bernard, a 25-year-old finance 

worker from Lebanon, rocked out to 
the music up front even though he 
had never heard of the band before. 
He was spontaneously attracted to 
the event after stepping off the train 
led by the sentiment to “taste the 
local culture … know more about the 
local scene.”

What sets Boston Calling apart 

from other music festivals is not 
only the urban setting off of which 
the music resonates; the event, 
much like the block party series, 

has a lower key nature and also an 
open door reentry policy that allows 
goers to both explore the city and 
stay on the grounds for the concert. 
The schedule is structured around 
two stages so that no performances 
overlap, and attendees may see all 10 
acts.

Boston Calling intertwines both 

local bands and up-and-coming art-
ists amalgamated with big-name 
headliners — a way to expose the 
community to diverse musical cul-
ture. The festival brings in a wide 
variety of artists — it isn’t only an 
alternative music haven like most 
festivals are: It caters to an audience 
comprising wide demographics and 
different musical tastes and, hope-
fully, an open mind to new sound.

Boston Calling heads into its fifth year

EVENT PREVIEW

Boston Call-
ing Music 
Festival

May 22-24

Boston City 

Hall Plaza

$50 - $350

