DPA

An independent hip hop group from Silver Spring, MD representing a universal and mature east coast sound. Lyricists/producers GreyMatter and z1 thaESSENTIAL typically stray away from everyday hip hop radio and album content, opting for more elusive topics like faith, family, struggle, triumph, love, life, loss, job issues, career laments, and especially industry qualms. DPA set themselves apart by managing to explicitly and in poetic form, let you know how they “feel” but without using language that is profane and inartistic; so their appeal ranges from the avid hip hop consumer (statistically, a lot of youth of varying cultural backgrounds) without turning away their parents and yet because of the high lyrical content and writing direction, the material is definitely for fans that actually listen to the artists’ words.

What is DPA?
Basically, a burning need for something that's clean, thought-provoking and all around original in hip-hop. Something not to be ashamed of because in life we grow and develop into conscientious human beings, not robo-clones of successful prototypes spewing out the same vantage point for the same subject perspective.

What is life to you? What does it mean to you? What can you learn from it? What can IT learn from YOU? This is the deeper experience... this is DPA. Enough with that radio childplay, you can call this grown folk music. It's time to build.

It's been 10 years in the making, but we're really just getting started with this. Basement and attic wannabe recording setups, turntables, sampling mixers, keyboards, a drum machine, tape decks, loads of Maxell tapes with crazy beats and freestyles for hours; finally culminating into the concerted effort that we're putting into this craft that we call DPA. It's about the deeper experience, not what the industry wants you to make out of it. This is life and life in its richest and most heartfelt content.

Group members: z1 thaESSENTIAL & GreyMatter