Rec League

Every once in a great while, God-given talent and geographical proximity combine to form a kind of perfect storm of artistic expression, a superhuman movement that shocks the world. Cubism, for example. Or the Wu-Tang Clan. After all, John Lennon and Paul McCartney are both musical geniuses, but what’s extraordinary is that they were in the same band. With George Harrison. When they were in grammar school. I mean, seriously, what are the odds on that? Well, my friend, all I can say is brace yourself, because it’s happening again. The tide is turning. The planets have aligned. So take off your haterpants, put on your gold chain, and get ready to love rap again—Rec-League is in the building.
The Rec-League All-Stars are Northern California’s preeminent hip-hop crew you’ve never heard of, a reputation cemented by countless live shows, albums, mixtapes, and memorable appearances on highly-respected radio stations from underground classic KZSU (on DJ Kevvy Kev’s legendary show The Drum) to commercial heavyweight KDON (central Cali’s urban-music powerhouse). Rarely have so many high-quality rappers come together under one banner.
Stepping straight out the golden age and into the future, the members of the Rec—QM, Grip Grand, Haji P, MF Shalem, Proe, Bob Clean, Richie Cunning, No Wonder, and Rob Rush—come correct with complimentary styles that represent different sides of the same classic hip-hop story. And, like the fabled crews of yesteryear, they present a unified sonic front, with versatile in-house production from rappers Grip, Proe, and Rich C, as well as from DJ/producer Shalem.
And the world is taking notice. Fully 50% of the group’s six rappers have been honored by Urb Magazine as part of its annual Next…campaign (Grip Grand was previously featured in the magazine’s Next 100 issue, while Richie Cunning and Rob Rush made the rounds through Urb’s online Next 1000). In addition, Grip has worked with A.G. and Percee P; and on a press junket through North Carolina, Barack Obama totally bought a copy of the Brown Company album starring Haji P. In short, word is getting around: Rec-League is the truth.
From self-pressed vinyl in the 90’s to their own digital blog-erhood and superstore in the now (www.routinefly.com); from selling 4000 copies of a single EP in Japan to being sampled by Madlib; the Rec-League All-Stars have been there and done that. After their 2010 Compilation Release “Season Two“. The crew dished out a bevvy of albums starting with Richie Cunnings “Night Train” in January, followed by Haji P with “Neighborhood Kid” in February, then by QM with his album “Happy Hour” released in April. Members Grip Grand and Proe both released free mixtapes later in year and since the start of 2011, The crew has been releasing a new song every week on their website, routinefly.com.
Richie Cunning spent the start of 2011 on the road with the legendary Hieroglyphics crew for a total of 9 shows up and down the west coast. Rec-League as a whole added multiple shows with New Jersey’s classic hip hop duo, The Artifacts, to the notches on the belt and QM made a solo appearance alongside Los Angeles’s Alkaholiks crew. To round it out, Richie Cunning came back again sharing the stage with hip hop icon KRS-One in Berkeley, then proceeded to win the Trojan Magnum Live Large Emcee Competition held in San Francisco a few weeks later. Needless to say, the first two months of 2011 has been a pretty wild ride..