Posts Tagged ‘Komrade’

Hockey Pucks is the fifth single off Komrades solo album Fallen Empire. This video features Komrade playing a creepy disgruntled preacher whom takes matters into his own hands when people won’t listen to him. Lets just say this video is the BOMB! Directed by Sonik Hip Hop and produced by Prosper.

Komrade will be performing this track and others on November 14th when he opens for Madchild of Swollen Members.

Komrade has 4 years in the game with over 100 performances, 3 full length CD’s and 10 music videos as the duo Brothers Grim. (with his brother Pat Grim). Hailing from the 118 Avenue of Edmonton, Alberta, Canada, Komrade aims to make an impact in Canadian Hip Hop and beyond. Fallen Empire is Komrades first solo album.

-Wade Stanley Earl Tompkins, Co-Founder, Flavor Clothing

Nato has been working hard, man. Take a look at his website (7nato.com), he’s pumping out a lot of quality work. From Komrade’s album, Fallen Empire, to the Stompdown Killaz crew out in Vancouver, he’s getting things done.

What does a producer really do though? I had heard people talk about it in the industry, but I didn’t know what the hell it meant. Nato set it out for me, “As far as a producer’s duties, it varies from person to person, artist to artist, genre to genre… Typically a hip hop producer will make a beat and sell it”.  Nato isn’t a just a producer though, he’s also an engineer. He’s the guy that takes the raw audio files, cuts them, tweaks them, cleans them up and gives them that final quality polish you hear on the CD.

You can tell he cares about his work, too. He told me he likes to get involved as much as he can without getting in the way. “As a producer/engineer”, he said, “ I have the opportunity to impact the performance of an artist over my productions (beats)”. Nato’s the guy that will take a word or two out, maybe change the voice a bit, help with rythm and ptich. He likes to “let [the] artist do their thing” while still giving some suggestions so they can get the best product possible.

It’s good to hear he’s taken this on full time now. Taking that leap from doing something in your spare time and moving it to the forefront of your life is tough. He tells me he’s trying to keep busy but “It’s up and down”. We get that. We totally get that. Being a small business just starting out is rough. With Flavor, we’re just like Nato. One week you’ve got people talking about you, talking to you and things are getting done. Then the next week you’re scrambling to get any kind of income. But you know what? I think he’s going to do just fine.

I like Nato. I like him because of what he brings to the table. The music he created with Touch was from an era of Hip Hop that was so powerful. Every song they made had beats and lyrics with impact. Sometimes it feels like we’ve lost touch with that kind of passion.

With the vets we have in this city though, guys like Marlon from Politic Live, Touch and Nato, I think we’re going to be able keep it alive. There’s a lot of respect for the veterans of Hip Hop in E-Town and  the current generation of rising stars is showing that by working closely with them. I’m damn glad Nato is one of those vets, passing on his talent and expertise.

- Wade Stanley Earl Tompkins, Co-Founder, Flavor Clothing

PG and Komrade from the Brothers Grim are throwing a BBQ party this weekend, June 10, 2012.  What’s the celebration? They’re releasing their music video ‘Love Thy Brother’ ft Trippz and directed by Jeff Eckert, and new merch designed by yours truly. It’s been great working these guys… it went a little something like this.

Flavor and Grim have been in touch for a while and it was only a matter of time until we collabed on some apparel. Komrade had seen some of our other work and was pretty stoked to work with us. Being a creative artist himself he knew from experience that creativity comes from freedom. “Look”, he said, “ I want it to have Future is Grim on one shirt and maybe another one to represent my neighbourhood. Other than that, you’ve got the reins”.  We love working under these conditions. It’s often harder, but the rewards are much higher.

You see, on one side you’ve got this broad spectrum of ideas to work with, but you also have to come up with them. It can be hard doing whatever you want but having little to jump off of. Not to mention, if you show up with something you think is real slick, there’s a chance the customer will hate it. That can be devastating.

Luckily for us, having done a few designs for the Brothers before, we had a good idea of what they wanted. We also know what their fans want; We’re from the city, we’ve hit up 118 ave and seen the Grim live. They told us about their trip out to Van for the 4 20 performances. I really dug the Metal To Rust vid, so we took all of that and got on some designs.

Usually we’d bump back and forth with collaborators until we finally hit the nail. This time though we hit it nearly at the start. Maybe we had more background info, or maybe we just got lucky. Hopefully though, we’re just gettin’ better! Hah!

Here’s the two designs that made it all the way through:

If you’re digging these, and you like free food annnnd want to see a new music video, check out the Brother’s Grim BBQ this Saturday. For details on time and place: event page.

-Wade Stanley Earl Tompkins, Co-Founder, Flavor Clothing