Hip-Hop Lives Here
Hip-Hop Lives Here
When he was growing up, music was something of an escape for Clinton Brand. Now he wants to share his own music with everyone he can, as a light for others in the dark.
“There are a lot of people in general who are struggling and I want to be that light,” he says. “To show them don’t give up, if you have a dream you can chase it.”
Brand, better known by the stage name CB3, is an emerging hip hop artist who overcame countless obstacles in his childhood before realizing he had a gift for music. He was taken away from an abusive mother at a young age and sent to live with his grandparents. When he was 8, with his grandparents experiencing homelessness and his father no longer in the picture, Brand ended up in foster care for several years. His mother eventually passed away when he was a teenager.
“So I’m an orphan at 14, getting bullied in school and I just started writing,” he says. “Writing down my feelings. Later on I think those two kind of intertwined, the music and the writing and the writing slowly turned into me going to talent shows and performing in front of the school and people started telling me, ‘Wow, you’re really good at this. Ever thought about actually making music?’”
His answer was always no, but years later a music career has become a reality for the Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania native. This month, CB3 released his newest single, “Tick Tock” featuring Aylius.
Time is ticking, don’t wait for nobody
I’m on a mission, to be great like Mohammed
I got tunnel vision, I can only see the top
But time is ticking, tick tock
That mission, Brand says, is to “uplift others, build a foundation for my family, face my fears and overcome them. Be the best me I can be and then more.”
It’s an inspiring track, but not a lighthearted one. Brand says it’s not a song to be listened to carelessly.
“You’ve got to actually hear the words and feel it,” he says.
The single features a beat from Freek van Workum and American producer Aylius, and CB3 is trying to put together more collaborations for his future releases.
“I might even try singing,” he says. “I’ve always been able to sing, but I’m scared to. I might have to give that a try.”
CB3 adds that, “a life lived in fear isn’t a life lived at all” and he’s focused on bringing his music to as many people as he can.
“I never thought I would be doing it professionally,” he says. “I remember having friends over and we would stand on the couches and play music and I remember when I was dancing and singing along with the music thinking like wow, I actually like this feeling inside. It kind of ignites my soul. That probably sounds corny but it feels good. That’s when I realized I love music and it’s something I want to pursue.”
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When Jimmy Mallia released his first song at the turn of the year, it wasn’t to start a career. He wanted to put out some of the music he had been writing for 15 years for somebody to hear.
“I had no thought I would actually sing them. I thought I would sell my songs to someone. I just wanted people to hear them. First and foremost, I’m a singer-songwriter, so, my first time was just to get the music out there, just to say that I did it.”
Four songs later, he will release his sixth song, “Uncle”. Like most of his songs, it is a folk/country ballad written from a story from his life. It will feature his guitar and more instruments than his usual.
Most of all, it will feature his distinctive voice, a rich deep bass with a fine-toothed saw at the bottom edge. The voice and his music together make you want to sing along.
“This particular song is about an uncle I had growing up,” he said, beginning a story that one day, when she finally heard it, horrified his mother.
Uncle, which is all Jimmy ever called him, is one of those people out of a storybook, he said. Rich, retired at 30, a lifelong bachelor, living with Jimmy’s aunt and grandmother in the family home, built before 1900, in Galveston, Texas.
“We happened to live around the corner and every other Saturday or so, I would go stay with stay with them, and my uncle and I got kind of a tradition of getting up Saturday morning and getting in the car. He would take me around town all morning, and it’s the story of those Saturday mornings.”
Uncle took Jimmy, age 6 or so, on a tour of his banks to visit his money and show off Jimmy, sometimes to the Walgreens lunch counter, and always — the part that his mother found so horrifying — bars. Plural.
Driving home, Jimmy often had to tell Uncle whether the light was red or green. From the chorus:
He was loud, he was mean and fun
He loved me, this much I know
Saturdays were our day alone
Just Uncle, me, best day I’ve known
“I think people probably hear it and get mortified. But for me, what a great childhood memory. I was king for a day.” The song’s perspective is that of the 6-year-old king for a day, not the alcoholic uncle.
Alcoholism and Jimmy’s recovery after more than 40 years of drinking are the perspective of his first song, “Hey Hey.”
“A lot of my songs are, with my own personal experience, intended to be something that people can kind of relate to. I’ve covered mental illness, alcoholism, death of a mother. But this is a joyful memory of childhood. Everybody’s got a story, and, hopefully, it will help some people look back and remember childhood was fun.”
Looking forward, he will release his seventh song the day after Thanksgiving, “All I Want for Christmas.” It will probably be, he says, his one and only Christmas song.
“It’s a fun song, about wanting all my daughters with me for Christmas. It’s very much a throwback. Hopefully everyone who hears it will think Bing Crosby, Nat King Cole, Frank Sinatra, Dean Martin. There hasn’t been a really good Christmas song released in a very long time. I think that’s how it started. Man, I miss that whole sound of Christmas.”
He says if “Hey Hey” had not done well, he would probably have quit. But that song quickly hit a hundred thousand streams, and three of the next four, did too.
“Which, you know, for beginners — not half bad. Especially considering there are like 8 million artists on Spotify. Then I’m like, ‘Well, heck, let’s try this again.’ And I’ve thoroughly enjoyed the process.”
The next mountain to climb for a singer-songwriter who never really thought about singing his own songs is live performances. He put his songs out on Groover to get the feedback, and he has received hundreds of comments.
“And people started complimenting on the vocals, and the timbre and what a unique sound. And I’m like, ‘Really?! Wow! Okay, thanks.’ I just wanted my song heard. Never did I think that the vocals would have anything to do with it, so, it’s kind of changed my direction a little bit. Now I’m like, ‘Heck yeah, I’m gonna sing ’em.’”
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