Rappers Light Up E. Palo Alto
Dem Hoodstarz make their mark in the tradition of Bay Area hip-hop artists
By Todd R. Brown, STAFF WRITER
Band Aide, (right) a member of the rap duo Dem Hoodstarz, hangs out with the tandem's other half, Scoot, at a restaurant in East Palo Alto. (Tony Avelar/staff)
EAST PALO ALTO — At The Doctors Sports Bar & Grill on University Avenue, the jukebox is filled with CDs by the biggest names in hip-hop — Juvenile, Snoop Dogg, G-Unit.
Scoot, 27, a rapper with local duo Dem Hoodstarz, flips to the middle of the stack.
"You see that?" he says.
Front and center in the CD changer is his group's latest album, "Hood Reality," which the pair hope will bring them the kind of success the other artists enjoy — a precious dream for the lifelong residents of struggling East Palo Alto and Belle Haven.
"It's always been the murder capital, but now we making it a hip hop scene versus just a scene of tragedy," says Band-Aide, 26, the other half of Dem Hoodstarz.
It is no longer a secret that the Bay Area's urban nooks and crannies nurture one of the hottest subcultures in hip-hop, called "hyphy" — a style of upbeat music and dancing that encourages celebration instead of glorifying violence.
Vallejo-bred rapper E-40 and Oakland's Keak da Sneak brought national attention to the scene with their recent hit, "Tell Me When to Go," and MTV featured the Fillmore District's San Quinn and other local stars in its one-hour special "My Block: The Bay."
"Our regional scene is so hot right now," said Travis Loughran, music director for San Francisco hip-hop radio station KYLD 94.9 FM.
He said interest in the Bay Area sound is taking off, with stations in New York and Texas spinning Mac Dre and other local stars. Thanks to the hyphy hype, Dem Hoodstarz are in position to step into the spotlight.
Their hits "Getz Your Grown Man On" and the song's remixwith Oakland's Mistah F.A.B. have been bubbling on the streets and local radio for months, and the pair recently signed a deal with a Warner subsidiary to distribute their album nationally. They plan to shoot a video for "Grown Man" in the next few weeks.
Years ago, Oakland was known for churning out hip-hop stars, from MC Hammer to Too Short. Since the murder of Bay Area hip-hop legend Tupac Shakur in 1996, though, local rap has been mostly under the radar for the mainstream music business.
Things have been quiet in East Palo Alto since the mid-'90s, when such rappers as Chump, Sean T and Totally Insane got some buzz.
"The new generation don't know nothing about them," Band-Aide said. "All they see is all the artists from Oakland and San Francisco and Vallejo getting shine. So from them seeing some cats in East Palo Alto get 'em some shine, it gives them a sense of hope and faith, that they could be next in line."
"Don't get it twisted," said Scoot, his face framed by shoulder-length dreadlocks. "We ain't leaving the 'hood. But we headed for something a whole lot more positive."
Hood dreams, hood reality
At The Doctors, Scoot enjoyed a Strawberry Crush, while Band-Aide gulped down a hamburger and a plate of chicken wings and fries.
"What I see is guys that stayed with their dream," said restaurant owner John Farmer, who has known the pair for most of the 20 years he has run the place. "They learned the business from the ground up."
The Hoodstarz, who declined to disclose their real names, said they strive by example to put out a positive message about staying on track to make your dreams come true, because they know first-hand the pitfalls that so many rappers that have made it to stardom are talking about.
"My reality is having to go sit on a corner to sell some rocks to have food to feed my mom," said Scoot, who grew up in Midtown. "We don't live in Atherton, we don't live in west Menlo Park, we don't live in west Palo Alto. We ain't living in those high-ass hills, we living in the gutter. A lot of us have to make the decision to eat or go to school."
Scoot said his father died when he was young, and his mother was in and out of jail. His grandmother, who migrated from Alabama and was the first black resident on her block, raised his sister and him.
"She seen me in the mirror, practicing and break-dancing," he said.
But Scoot said the "hood reality" he raps was all around him, and he wound up spending 18 months with the California Youth Authority for gun and drug possession.
"The life that we see? I can't rap about me and my family sitting down to dinner and passing the cornbread and passing the peas," he said. "It ain't all peaches and cream where we from."
Band-Aide, who grew up in east Menlo Park, echoed his partner's thoughts. Although his parents were both professionals, and he studied marketing for two years at Chabot College, he was not immune to the drama of the streets.
"We ain't making it seem like we come from the Bill Cosby show," he said. "I went through the penitentiary doors."
Band-Aide said he spent five years in prison, from San Quentin to Mill Creek to Folsom, but was hesitant to go into detail why. Instead, he said he wants young listeners to take his word for it that a life of crime is not worth doing time.
"Do you all really want to go through this for a simple-ass pair of tennis shoes?" he said.
The whole world goes stupid
Brandon Rodegeb, 28, president of Flip & Co. films, cast Scoot and Band-Aide in a comedy he is making about the hyphy scene called "The Yadada Movie," which he compared with Ice Cube's day-in-the-life
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comedy, "Friday."
"I'm born and raised in Hunter's Point," said Rodegeb, now married with two children and living in suburban Vallejo. "We have a close kinship with East Palo Alto since the '80s. We would go down and party with them."
Rodegeb said he cast the Hoodstarz in his film — named after local slang "yadadamean," a running together of "Do you know what I mean?" — after getting to know the pair years ago when he worked for a Tower Records distributor.
"Right from the beginning, writing the story, I just had their characters in mind," he said. "Even though they're from the 'hood, they're really professional, they really handle their business. They just stole the show."
Rodegeb said he hopes his film will draw attention to the diversity that has developed in Bay Area hip-hop, from Middle Eastern and Punjabi rappers to Filipinos such as Elemnop, a group in the Daly City-Colma area.
"Anytime you have anger and frustration, you're going to get some great artistic outlets," he said. "East Palo Alto will always have the 'murder capital in the mid-'90s' thing; it's no secret that it was a hot bed of violence. But there's so much more."
Nump, an Alameda rapper and producer who has engineered Dem Hoodstarz' recordings and is putting the finishing touches on his CD "The Numpyard 2" for summer, also had praise for the pair.
"When they're in the studio, man, they ready to work," he said. "They get on the mic, and they do they thing and they make hits."
Recovering from a recent attack outside a Los Angeles bar that required several surgeries and having his jaw wired shut, Nump was still able to muster enthusiasm for the blossoming scene he and Dem Hoodstarz are a part of.
"We're making so much buzz — like what the South was making with crunk. The Bay area's half a state, dog, and we got the whole world going stupid," he said, referring to hyphy dancing described tongue-in-cheek as stupid, dumb or retarded.
"You take Nelly, no one ever really though of St. Louis as a hotbed for rappers," said Loughran of KYLD, which plans to do some concert promotions with Dem Hoodstarz this summer. "That's what it takes for people to take a hard look at a region, is someone breaking out of it."
A new life
Dem Hoodstarz have come a long way from the "street game" with its drugs and guns, vice and violence. They make about $3,000 a concert — "a nice amount of dollars," Scoot said — allowing them to enjoy iced-out watches and other niceties. But they say they've got nothing but love for the 'hood they come from.
"East Palo Alto is the smallest city in the Bay Area," said Band-Aide, with a long chain around his neck and a pair of Nikes emblazoned with the Mexican flag. "It's more like a tribe out here versus a hood. We got East Palo Alto on our back, the whole six-fifty. That's why the cake is so much sweeter when we get it, because we worked that much harder."
On May 3, they performed in front of a huge crowd at a concert with Bow Wow and E-40 at the HP Pavilion in San Jose.
"For our little bitty city — for me and this man here to go and get in front of 18,000 people? Man, that was a beautiful thing," Scoot said.
Although two people were shot across the street after the show, Band-Aide said people focus too much on the negatives that wind up associated with hip-hop.
"That can happen at a restaurant," he said of the shooting. "If two people are having a dispute — that can happen inside a church. There's gonna be fights at Cinco de Mayo — does that mean we gotta stop having Cinco de Mayo?"
On the positive side, Scoot said Dem Hoodstarz helped raise $10,000 at a Katrina relief benefit show, and the pair give out backpacks at the start of the school year.
In February, the duo performed at San Quentin — the same prison Band-Aide spent time in.
"We come from a negative past, but to turn that all around?" he said. "I showed all the people I left, 'Look where I'm at now. It's a much bigger world than this box we trapped in.'
"I'm now in the corporate world. We was real felons. I'm out of the game, I ain't on parole no more, so I'm one step ahead. I got a whole 'nother life. The Hoodstarz is here. Get used to us, 'cause we are the future."
Dem Hoodstarz are set to perform Saturday in Parkside Hall in San Jose. Watch for "Hood Reality 2" in August with a DVD of the group performing in San Quentin. For more information, visit http://www.myspace.com/demhoodstarz.
Reach staff writer Todd R. Brown at (650) 348-4473 or [email protected].
