Battle for The Bridge

So The Roxanne Wars kicked off another rap war off the song "The Bridge" by MC Shan and Marley Marl.  This was the song where Marley made sampling in hip hop music famous - using bits of a drum kit from "Impeach the President" by Honey Drippers.  The lyrics of this song were taken as inaccurate, seemingly claiming that the Queensbridge projects in Queens as the birthplace of hip hop.  The group Boogie Down Productions took offense and retorted with their singles "South Bronx" and "The Bridge is Over."  The conflict between KRS-One of BDP and Marley Marl reported continued as late as 2007, but has since ended as they collaborated on an album in the same year.

A live performance between KRS-One and MC Shan was the first where rappers attacked each other, instead of battling to get the crowd most excited.  There is speculation that KRS-One defeated MC Shan with this performance, and articles that indicate that KRS-One pushed in order to advance his career.  Shan wanted the conflict to end, and KRS-One used the hype surrounding The Bridge Wars in order to get ahead.

The conflict, intentional or not between KRS-One and MC Shan, only lent itself to the success behind The Bridge Wars, one of the most influential hip hop wars in history.

An Early Timeline of Cold Chillin' Records

1983-1984 - Mr. Magic Rap Attack radio show

1985 - Roxanne's Revenge is released on Pop Art Records

January 1, 1987 - Cold Chillin' Records is born, original 4 artists are: Roxanne Shante, MC Shan, Kool G Rap, and Marley Marl

1988 - deal made with Warner Brothers, and by this time all artists were signed to Cold Chillin', and included Masta Ace, Craig G, Tragedy, Wu Tang Clan, etc.

Big Daddy Kane

In the rap vernacular, a crew is a group or mob that is "down" together, and sometimes up to no good.  The recently established rap label, Cold Chillin' Records, has the Juice Crew All Stars,a self-sufficient in-house tribal production team headed by Len Fichtelberg and Tyrone Williams.  Rounding out the Juice Crew All Stars is the writer or lyricist for the group, Antonio M. Hardy, better known as Big Daddy Kane.

A native of "Bedstuy" (Bedford Stuyvesant) in Brooklyn, Kane is to Cold Chillin' what Holland-Dozier-Holland was to Motown - a hitmaking mean machine on overdrive, turning out "fresh" material that captures today's sound of young America.  In addition to writing all the material for Roxanne Shante's pre-Cold Chillin' releases, Kane has also scored big for the independent label with monster hits by Biz Markie, including "Nobody Beats The Biz" and the hip hop gross out "Pickin' Boogers." Big Daddy Kane says he became a rapper because a cousin who he looked up to was so heavily into rap music in the late '70s.  He credits his development as a lyricist and performer to his association with Biz Markie.  The two young men became fast friends, hanging out and performing together in high schools in Brooklyn and out in Long Island. 

Kane has worked very closely with producer Marley Marl on session for Shante, Biz Markie and other artists signed to Cold Chillin' Records.  His songwriting ability has awed Marley Marl and the Cold Chillin' front office personnel, but they are equally excited about his prospects as a recording artist in his own right.

Kool G.Rap

Since the late 1970s,the term rapping has come to be associated with rhythmic talking over a funky beat, with a support base growing out of the heritage of scratching, breakdancing, and graffiti art.  Kool G. Rap, an artist signed to the Cold Chillin' label, is one of the best contemporary rappers on the scene today!

Born Nathaniel T. Williams on July 20, 1986, Kool G. Rap got his name from Kool Genius of Rap, but recently changed it because he thought it was "corny," not current!  A native of Elmhurst, Queens, NY, he got involved with rap music in 1986 when his homeboy Eric B. released "Eric B. for President," and Kool asked him to get him a break in the music business.  Eric B. introduced Kool G. to D.J. Polo and rap producer Marley Marl.  Out of this association came early records like "Polo Beats," and the classic "It's A Demo," an autobiographical number with a James Brown "Funky Drummer" backbeat!

Kool G. credits LL Cool J, Rakim and Melle Mel with his present style.  The former are smooth and mellow, and the latter, what Kool G. calls "hard."  His style on cuts like"Road to riches"is a combination of the hard and smooth rap traditions.  With "It's A Demo" and "Road..."under his belt, Kool G. Rap's upcoming LP I Declare War, features more autobiographical hard core rhymes, and other tunes, described as Kool as "sharp, attractive, catchy and brief..."  Go for it!

Biz Markie

Biz Markie has been called "hardworking," "fun-loving," "the star of the show" and "Mr. Dynamite."  He is all of this and more.  Biz Markie is hot!  His vocal delivery is different and ususual.  His lyrics are enjoyable, funny, and occasionally outrageous.  He loves an audience and will do anything to please them.  This shows in his lyrics, "When it comes to partying, I'm a nymphomaniac."  Known as the "Inhuman Orchestra," Markie is an expert human beat box virtuoso, literally making the music with his mouth.  He has been using his body as an instrument since he was a kid.

Born Marcel Hall in Harlem, April 8, 1964, Biz Markie seems to be the creation of a mad B-movie scientist.  Biz worked the rap circuit for a couple of years, playing the Roxy, the Fun House, and other venues.  But his big break came when he ran into producer Marley Marl in a hallway in the Queensbridge project in 1985.

According to Biz, "Marley and I met up and went into the studio and did some stuff."  This stuff included some of the hippest, freshest rap records to come out in a long time.  With Marley Marl at the production helm, Biz Markie signed with Len Fichtelberg's Prism Records and brought out a number of wonderful recordings that have further established him as something of a cult hero among the hip-hop hardcore.  The success of tunes like "Make the Music With Your Mouth, Biz," "Nobody Beats the Biz,"and "Pickin' Boogers" prompted Fichtelberg to go into partnership with Biz's manager, Tyrone Williams, and launch Cold Chillin' Records as an exclusive rap label with Marley Marl as producer.  Future product by Biz Markie on Cold Chillin' promises to build on his reputation as one of the newest and most innovative rap artists on the scene today. 

M.C. Shan

M.C. Shan, Shawn Moltke, is one of the freshest, most intelligent and coolest rap stylists and innovators to "rock the mic viciously" in recent memory.  His professional character is partly one of pure virtuosity, and partly one of exciting showmanship.  His debut album on Cold Chillin' Records, Down by Law, surpassed the 150,000 unit mark last summer with virtually no airplay.  Ever since going out on the road with Roxanne Shante in 1985, without benefit of a record, the word on the street has been that M.C. Shan is a serious performer who can fire up basic human instincts, like humor, romantic sentiment, and a strong desire for something essentially hip and physically intoxicating.  Over the past couple of years, he has unleashed a torrential outpouring of fresh def jams, including "The Marley Scratch," "The Bridge," and the preachy but funny anti-crack rap, "Jane Stop This Crazy Thing," all produced by main homeboy and blood cousin, Marlon "Marley Marl" Williams.  His 12-inch, "The Bridge," a tribute to the Queensbridge project in Queens, New York, was the subject of a hilarious answer record called "The Bridge is Over."  Prior to signing with Cold Chillin', M.C. Shan built a following with releases on Nia, MCA and Bridge Records.  "Jane" came from his Down by Law LP on Cold Chillin'.

His next Cold Chillin' release will be Born to be Wild, produced by, naturally, Marley Marl and featuring more great dance hall rhymes and love raps.  Although W magazine has declared rap "out" for 1988, M.C. Shan is confident that he and cousin Marley will have cooked up some "sure-fire" winners that will appeal to the core street audience, and cross over into the general mainstream market, as well. 

Roxanne Shante

The metamorphia of LolitaGooden into rap phenomenon Roxanne Shante began, unbeknowst to her, in December 198 when Steve Salem, manager of the group UTFC brought a new record to WHBI-FM in Manhattan for DJ Mr. Magic to break on his very popular and highly influential "Rap Attack" program.  Salem was hyping the A-side,"Hanging Out," but Magic and his hanging buddies, Tyrone Williams and producer Marlon "Marley Marl" Williams, dug the B-side, "Roxanne, Roxanne."  They played this cut and the response was immediately overwhelmingly overwhelming!  Pretty soon other stations picked up on the record and UTFO found themselves with a smash hit.

In the meantime, a teenage neighbor of Marley Marl's in the Queensbridge housing project in Queens, New York, Lolita Gooden gets pissed offat the way the girls are downed in the song and and bugs Marley until he takes her into his home studio to cut a tape dising "Roxanne, Roxanne."  To "dis" means to Disrespect someone, to insult with total Disregard for the person's Disposition.  Her spontaneous "answer" set off an explosion, a rap phenomenon that we can now call the "Perils of Roxanne."  There was an on-slaught of Roxannes, dozens of records and a fair amount of legal entanglements.  But when the smoke cleared, there was one obvious victor: Lolita Gooden, now known to the world as Roxanne Shante, the "First Lady of Rap."

With Tyrone Williams as her manager, she has built a solid career from what she calls "a stroke of luck."  "But," she adds, "then it became a stroke of skill.  If it wasn't for me being able to rap the way I do, I would not be able to catch peoples' eye.  And mostly I think it's my voice.

These days, Shante splits her time between school and work in the studio with Marley Marl, readying for her Cold Chillin' debut.  She says that the album is going to be filled with more than a few surprises and a whole lot of good music.  Some may be shocked, but none will be unmoved, she boasts.

Marley Marl

Hip Hop culture may have begun up in Harlem and the Bronx, but Queens has been kicking up a ruckus on the rap scene in the 1980s.  Everyone's coolest producer and record-mixer, Marlon "Marley Marl" Williams has been turning black vinyl into solid gold hits in his Queensbridge electro-funk studio for years.  He has produced all of Roxanne Shante's records and made epochal def jams for D.J. Polo, M.C. Shan, Biz Markie, Kool G. Rap, T.J. Swan, and Big Daddy Kane.  Marley Marl is one of rap's greatest Titans, a young hero to many a rapper, the studio alchemist with the blueprint for success.  He is teaming up with Len Fichtelberg and Tyrone Williams to make Cold Chillin' Records, in his words, the hottest, freshest label in the country."

Born Marlon Williams in Queens, NY, September 30, 1962, Marley attended high school in Manhattan and first heard tapes of rap music from classmates who lived in Harlem and the Bronx.  Rapping is a word that has been a part of the Afro-American vocabulary for a long time.  But what Marley was hearing back in the late 1970s was the first rumblings of a new black American popular music - Rap - rhythmic talking over a funky beat.  He acquired a lot of wisdom and knowledge working as an intern at Unique Studios in 1982, where Arthur Baker, Force M.D.'sand Afrika Bambaata regularly recorded.  His career began to accelerate when he started mixing records at location sites on "the Juice Mobile," the promotion truck for radio stations WBLS-FM, in NY.  The station had hired a young, brash, street iconoclast called Mr. Magic, whose "Rap Attack" program was raking the numbers like crazy.  Marley Marl, Mr. Magic, and Tyrone Williams became the Three Musketeers of Rap, and from their initial encounters have been part of many heroic adventures, including stopping a conspiracy to ban rap from the airwaves.

Len Fichtelberg and Tyrone Williams are extremely delighted to have Marley as Cold Chillin's exclusive producer.

When not conjuring up hits in his studio, Marley Marl rides shotgun with Mr. Magic on the "Rap Attack" weekends over at WBLS-FM, co-mixing the records and engineering the program.