Planet Asia
Is well known throughout the hip-hop community. It wasn’t always like that – he was determined to hit the big time.
After moving to the Bay Area, Planet Asia hooked up with Rasco and formed the rap duo Cali Agents. Following the independent album release“How the West Was Won,” major labels started to call. The Source Magazine named him First Round Draft Pick and gave him their Independent Album of the Year award for“How Was the West Was Won” in 2000. He was even nominated for a 2002 Grammy Award for his collaboration with hip-hop diva Mystic on “W.” His collaborations have included everyone from Black Thoughtof The Roots, BT, the Dub Pistols, Talib Kweli, andGhostface Killah of Wu-Tang Clan. His versatile skills on the mic resulted in a collaboration with the multi-platinum selling rock group Linkin Parkon their hugely successful “Re-Animation” LP.
Asia’s perseverance soon landed him a record deal with Interscope Records. Coming from Fresno California, not many people make it out to a huge record label, home to some of the biggest artists in the world, like 50 Cent, Dr. Dre, and Eminem. However, being signed to one of the largest labels in the world has its drawbacks.
Rasco is known as a member of the West Coast hip-hop groups Various Blends and Cali Agents. His debut solo album, “Time Waits for No Man”, was released in 1998 on Stones Throw with a production team that included Paul Nice, Peanut Butter Wolf, and Evidence of the group Dilated Peoples. Moving from Stones Throw to Copasetik, Rasco released Hostile Environment (2001) and Presents Hip-Hop Classics, Vol. 1 (2003), but after a falling-out with the label, he left to start his own, Pocketslinted, in 2004 where he has been releasing all his albums ever since. His most recents albums are “Global threat” (2010), including productions by Alkota, DJ Wich, Mad Skills, and the 2012 album “United Fakes Of America”.
Lords of the Underground
Is a hip-hop trio based in Newark, New Jersey. MCs Mr. Funke and DoItAll Dupré met DJ Lord Jazz (a native of Cleveland) when all three were undergraduates at Shaw University.
The group released their debut album, Here Come the Lords on March 9, 1993 with production handled by Marley Marl and K-Def. The album peaked at 66 on the Billboard 200 and featured five charting singles, including the group’s signature song, “Chief Rocka“.
The group released their second album, Keepers of the Funk the following year on November 1, 1994. Keepers of the Funk peaked at 47 on the Billboard 200 and featured three charting singles, the most successful of which was “Tic Toc“. The group disbanded in 1995.
They reunited for a third album with 1999′s Resurrection. Released via Queen Latifah‘s Jersey Kidz imprint, was so small-scale a release that few realized it had been recorded. The Lords returned again in 2007 for a fourth album entitled House of Lords, but like Resurrection, it failed to reach the Billboard charts.
The Lords are best remembered in connection with the golden age of hip hop. As such, when Nas decided in 2007 to do a remix of his song “Where Are They Now?“, which asked of the fates of several long-forgotten golden age rappers, the Lords were among those requested to appear. DoItAll Dupré performed eight bars on the track.
DoItAll appeared briefly in the final scene of the final episode of The Sopranos credited as Du Kelly, as one of a series of potentially ominous figures entering the diner. He also appeared on other TV shows; Law & Order as Two Tone, on Oz the HBO series, and on the Christmas episode of 30 Rock on NBC (2008). He has also been in independent movies such as Somewhere in the Citywith Bai Ling, Rhyme & Reason, and with Treach of Naughty By Nature. He has also starred in an off Broadway play entitled Diss, Diss, & Diss, Dat.
