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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