Up next in 10
Chris Walker, Billy Mitchell and Sly Yates On The Celebration of Black Music Through Urbanime
Jul 12, 2021
Urbanime has celebrated black music and reiterates that it sets the tone for all other genres today. Chris Walker, Sly Yates, and Billy Mitchell talk to the Sway In The Morning team about everything Urbanime has going on.
Subscribe Here! http://bit.ly/SubscribeSU
Watch the Best of Sway In The Morning! http://bit.ly/BestOfSITM
Check out More From Sway’s Universe
http://swaysuniverse.com
http://twitter.com/swaysuniverse
http://instagram.com/swaysuniverse
http://facebook.com/swaysuniverse
#Urbanime #ChrisWalker #SwaysUniverse #SwayInTheMorning #SiriusXM #Shade45
About SWAY’s UNIVERSE
Exclusive interviews from Sway Calloway and the Sway In The Morning/ SwaysUniverse.com team with some of today's biggest celebrities, like Kevin Hart, Kanye West, Eminem, Usher, Jessica Alba, Steve Aoki, Torey Lanez, Julia Stiles and so much more.
Chris Walker, Billy Mitchell and Sly Yates On The Celebration of Black Music Through Urbanime
https://youtu.be/LT_dvPDq5ws
Show More Show Less View Video Transcript
0:00
ladies and gentlemen round of applause
0:02
what you are now witnessing is the
0:04
future
0:05
okay what you are now witnessing
0:09
is the genius of a young man who had a
0:11
vision decades ago when he first met
0:13
heather b
0:14
bizzle he was talking about this years
0:17
ago
0:17
when we first communicated telling our
0:21
stories
0:22
our way by us the authors
0:26
in anime form the same heroes we read
0:29
about as kids in marvel and dc now we
0:32
can read about in urbana may
0:35
this man approach me we've been having
0:37
conversations for a long time so much so
0:40
that i said man i gotta be a part of the
0:42
team make me a board member what else we
0:44
got to do let's get this out
0:49
he did not hesitate mickey facts and i
0:51
had a brilliant conversation
0:55
on one of our events about the
0:57
importance
0:58
of representation especially in this
1:00
field and that's what abandonment has
1:02
been doing so if you like the comic book
1:04
world
1:05
if you are a collector if you are a
1:07
writer if you are someone with a big
1:09
imagination
1:11
if you are someone who has great vision
1:13
i want you to call up 888-742-3345
1:17
we got the one and only founder of a
1:19
brandon may
1:20
chris walker is on the line chris hey
1:23
what up chris
1:26
[Applause]
1:32
you was impressed by your own resume huh
1:34
chris
1:35
i was impressed by how you how he
1:38
brought me on
1:38
thanksgiving now i had to we got a lot
1:43
of things happening tonight that we want
1:44
to invite people to first off is
1:46
we having a listening party tonight from
1:48
7 00 to 8 30 on twitch.com forward slash
1:51
from benime
1:52
twitch and the feature conversations
1:54
have to be with the legendary kevin
1:56
powell
1:57
he will be a part of that um billy
2:00
mitchell
2:01
and our good friend music could be
2:03
provided by dj whatever
2:05
but you didn't come along chris who did
2:07
you bring with you
2:10
so i brought mr apollo himself
2:15
uh billy mitchell and i brought our
2:18
guest editor for the black music month
2:21
mixtape sly yates an incredible
2:25
journalist who really
2:26
uh brought it together and you know
2:29
we're really excited we had a great
2:31
month
2:31
and we're here to talk about what we did
2:34
and you know the future of black music
2:37
okay that's what's up man you guys all
2:39
get a round of applause
2:40
uh let's start with you mr mitchell how
2:42
you doing mr apollo
2:44
i'm good wayne how you been brother good
2:47
to see you man come on man i know billy
2:49
mitchell that's family
2:51
absolutely we went we go way back
2:53
brother we go way back we
2:55
we we met at the apollo theater we
2:57
signed your name on our wall of legends
2:59
you know
3:00
oh yeah yeah i posted a few i posted a
3:03
few apollo events and i was honored to
3:05
do so and even honored to be in your
3:07
presence
3:08
and i'm glad you're here because i i
3:10
think with the apollo i think
3:12
the apollo is an institution that is
3:14
under recognized and under acknowledged
3:16
for its influence on culture music
3:19
culture community
3:20
all the different things is done the
3:22
apollo theater is more valuable than
3:25
american idol could ever be
3:27
for what is given to this universe so i
3:29
want to say i want to commend the apollo
3:30
theater and invite people to always
3:32
support what they're doing at the apollo
3:34
theater
3:34
billy why is this music month so
3:36
important well
3:37
you know i think not only is it
3:39
important to celebrate
3:40
uh uh black music but to remind people
3:44
that we created the music we created
3:46
jazz we created dua
3:48
we created blues we created castle r b
3:51
hip-hop and even rock and roll so a lot
3:54
of people
3:54
need to understand uh that we celebrate
3:57
this month which
3:58
you know you know they give us a little
3:59
bit of crumbs but we also
4:01
need to be reminded of our creation we
4:03
are the leaders in creating the the
4:05
works that sent around
4:06
artists and voices of the african
4:07
diaspora you know that's who we are
4:09
we are geniuses in this music thing
4:12
called
4:12
called life you know um suede the apollo
4:16
theater has i've been working with
4:17
given service to the apollo theater for
4:19
over 55 years
4:21
yeah i started running errands there in
4:23
1965 when i was 15 years old
4:26
i'm 71 now bro and i'm still there you
4:29
know
4:31
yeah come on man you are so valuable
4:35
into our history not just music history
4:37
cultural history
4:39
as a whole and having working there man
4:42
can you tell me a milestone
4:43
performance that you saw that sticks out
4:45
to you as a yes
4:47
uh uh i saw stevie wonder earth winning
4:51
five together in concert
4:53
i'll never forget that because wow
4:56
[Applause]
4:58
stevie wonder nerf wind and fire i need
5:00
to take a breath hb
5:02
in concert together yeah on the same
5:05
bill
5:06
and uh that was extraordinary you know
5:08
i've seen you know i remember when a lot
5:09
of the hip-hop artists first came out
5:11
you know big daddy kane
5:12
uh eric and uh rock cam run bmc
5:16
nas vicky you know uh i was there to see
5:19
them their growth and they how they
5:21
evolved
5:22
and uh you know they no one knew who
5:23
they were at the time you know russell
5:25
simmons that brought run dnc they were
5:27
the first
5:28
uh hip-hop uh group to to bless the
5:30
apollo theater stage
5:32
so you know you've seen the evolution of
5:35
our music
5:36
whether it was hip-hop whether it's jazz
5:37
you know rb whatever
5:39
and i've been so blessed and fortunate
5:41
to have witnessed all this
5:43
and now that we are a not-for-profit
5:45
foundation
5:46
headed by our ceo janel proco we have uh
5:49
now
5:50
we created the apollo theater performing
5:52
arts center
5:53
which is a few doors away from the
5:55
apollo theater we're managing two small
5:57
spaces 199
5:59
seater and a 99 seater and we'll do
6:01
collaboration with with
6:03
organizations in the community that have
6:05
no place to
6:06
develop their works so we're doing big
6:08
things at the apollo theater
6:10
we've been close to the pandemic but we
6:13
had to pivot and bring a lot of stuff on
6:15
our digital state
6:17
see even then you just in that two two
6:19
minutes man you just giving us decades
6:22
of history just fell out your mouth man
6:23
it's like every time mr apollo talks
6:25
history gyms
6:26
just drop on the ground man and i
6:29
appreciate that and i'm loving your
6:30
energy and when you're bringing up all
6:32
of these names of
6:33
earth wind and fire and stevie wonder
6:35
big daddy kane run dmc
6:37
you know chris you know you and i talk
6:39
about this a lot chris
6:40
like growing up i was a big marvel guy
6:42
my brother was a collector still
6:44
collects
6:45
and um and so whether it's dc or marvel
6:47
we had every first edition of whatever
6:50
um at that time and we looked up to
6:52
these characters even though they were
6:53
fictional characters
6:55
we look we looked up to them they were
6:56
our heroes they were different from the
6:58
heroes that we saw coming out of
6:59
john wayne was not my hero you know what
7:02
i mean
7:03
so it was it was different from what
7:05
hollywood was
7:06
presenting us as heroes so it's
7:08
important that we tell these stories and
7:10
we're going to be doing a uh
7:12
a space on a bernabeu called sways verse
7:15
and where you want to break that down
7:16
chris what that's all about
7:19
yeah you know and i love what you said
7:21
uh what did chuck d said none of our
7:22
heroes appear on stamps so
7:24
i feel you um but but they are we we're
7:27
going to make our band amazing
7:28
but yeah you know with sway verse it's
7:31
really
7:32
exploring the stories of hip-hop that
7:34
have been told and
7:35
you know some stories that are there
7:37
that we know about
7:39
and i'm really excited to to have urbana
7:42
may partner with you uh we always say
7:44
that
7:44
you know you are uh hip-hop's uh you
7:47
know superhero you have been a keeper of
7:49
these stories
7:50
you have moved the culture forward
7:53
you've cared
7:54
you know way more probably than any
7:56
human should
7:57
and so we're excited to start telling
7:59
these stories
8:00
and have you be essentially the hip-hop
8:03
watcher and be the keeper of these
8:05
stories and start making
8:06
amazing comics and you know the first
8:08
story that we really want to tell
8:10
is the origin of sway and so we're going
8:12
to let the people know
8:13
where you came from you know your story
8:16
how you came to be
8:17
that that journey from you know oakland
8:20
to being an emcee
8:22
to uh your journalism career and how you
8:25
have
8:26
both helped move the culture and shape
8:28
the culture and really
8:29
nurture the culture so we are super
8:31
excited about that
8:32
and thank you man and i'm super excited
8:35
about the anime that you created you got
8:37
to see the suede character hd i looked
8:38
hey
8:42
[Laughter]
8:46
mixtape that's out now on the website uh
8:49
you can see
8:50
behind the scenes characters you know
8:52
i'm bugging sway
8:53
on text you know he's sending us over
8:56
voice over
8:57
notes and so uh i loved it i love seeing
9:00
it come to life shout out to ryan
9:01
adagawa
9:02
one of the artists on the team and you
9:04
know i i cannot wait to tell these
9:06
stories with you
9:07
absolutely tell them where they could go
9:09
on the site all everyone listening
9:10
please check the site out i think you'll
9:12
enjoy it
9:13
definitely if you go to urbanimate.com
9:16
you are b-a-n-i-n-e
9:18
if you click on the drops uh the mixtape
9:21
is right there
9:22
or if you go to urbanime.com for slash
9:24
drops but
9:25
the black music month mixtape is live uh
9:28
feel free to grab it we've got a great
9:29
school edit interview
9:31
in it we uh talked to vince lawrence who
9:35
who is one of the co-producers of the
9:36
first house record and we've got a
9:38
really cool
9:39
fashion editorial with some young jazz
9:41
musicians coming out of
9:42
new york where we illustrated them doing
9:44
a jazz session in the park and
9:46
illustrated
9:47
some really cool fashions and styles
9:49
that we pull with them so it's a really
9:50
exciting
9:51
uh culture zine uh i i encourage
9:53
everyone to check it out
9:56
urbanime.com u r b
9:59
a n i m e
10:02
dot com and this mixtape is so important
10:05
we it's so important man we had to you
10:07
know we had to go to a head hunter hp we
10:09
had to find somebody that was
10:11
you know somebody that was specifically
10:13
made for this only one person can do it
10:15
and she's the guest editor she's a
10:17
journalist she works with aspire tv
10:19
she's worked with afrotech we vote she's
10:21
done it all
10:22
it wouldn't be right if we didn't have
10:24
shanique sly yates here sneak what up
10:26
slide
10:28
whoa whoa whoa woah
10:34
thank you for that intro come on i
10:36
already know what it is thank you for
10:38
all of us being a part of this family
10:40
and we we finally telling our stories
10:42
and as as a journalist
10:44
when you first heard about this concept
10:46
what did you think about it and
10:48
what has this process been like for you
10:51
um when i first
10:52
heard about it it was like honestly a
10:55
dream come true
10:56
i love black music i love telling our
10:58
story so
10:59
i was immediately just excited um and
11:03
it's just been a journey like you know i
11:05
got to speak with people like scully d
11:07
who pioneered uh hip-hop you know what
11:10
i'm saying
11:11
and and vince lawrence the pioneer for
11:13
house music
11:14
and so all in all i just it just
11:17
reiterated the fact
11:18
that black music sets the tone for all
11:21
the music that we listen to today
11:24
um we we determine what's hot
11:28
and what's not um and so i just
11:31
i just learned so much and uh speaking
11:33
with ativa berkeley
11:35
um from the blues preservation society
11:37
like he said you know
11:39
blues is the original pop music you know
11:42
like our
11:43
we use music to tell our stories and so
11:46
just bringing that to life through this
11:47
project
11:48
was it was truly an honor well wow we
11:52
honored to have you on board
11:53
um and and congratulations schooly deep
11:58
philly stand up school led looking at my
12:00
gucci it's about that time
12:02
[Laughter]
12:04
hey so uh sly uh where are you from
12:08
where are you from i'm actually from
12:10
virginia
12:12
but i'm housed in atlanta and house in
12:15
atlanta
12:15
okay cool uh well thank you for being a
12:18
part of the team and everything we're
12:19
doing
12:20
um i'm open up the phone lines if
12:22
anybody got any questions
12:23
have their traits of y'all want to ask
12:24
them anything yeah i'm curious to know
12:28
for all of y'all what are your personal
12:30
credentials
12:31
required for calling someone an icon
12:35
or a legend this is something that we
12:37
that comes up in conversation a lot on
12:38
the show
12:39
because you know younger generations
12:42
someone can just have their debut album
12:44
or even sometimes
12:45
it's just a mixtape and we just fling
12:47
around the world the word icon you know
12:49
and it kind of discredits those who put
12:51
in so many
12:52
years so is it the amount of years that
12:55
they have
12:56
remained relevant in the game is it the
12:58
number of albums do we have to look at
13:00
how long an
13:01
album um like is still sounds good you
13:05
know what i mean
13:06
what is it for you guys sales
13:10
well that's an interesting question uh i
13:14
i think it's a combination right like i
13:16
i think it's
13:18
sometimes it's longevity when it comes
13:20
to you know staying current and putting
13:22
things out
13:23
sometimes i think it's the music that
13:25
stays
13:26
current even though you know someone's
13:28
not putting more things out and
13:29
sometimes i think it's people who just
13:31
shifted the whole sound of hip-hop i
13:33
remember when
13:34
uh wayne just literally just changed the
13:37
sound of hip-hop overnight
13:39
you know and it was incredible so i
13:41
think you know maybe that
13:43
maybe that's a a mixtape or an ep we can
13:45
do for banime right like everybody loves
13:47
having the goat conversation maybe we
13:49
need to have a
13:50
a goat you know mixtape drop just to say
13:53
like hey let's let's talk about what it
13:55
means to be icon i love that question
13:57
maybe tracy if you ask her you know
14:00
chris can come on board and maybe help
14:02
guests edit that one what uh
14:05
we heard it here sweet sweet i didn't
14:07
say nothing
14:08
[Laughter]
14:14
that might be an outlet tracy got quiet
14:16
wow
14:18
wait ask me again ask me again ask her
14:21
chris
14:24
uh so can you can you um
14:28
help us you know put together a mixtape
14:32
or kind of our short versions which we
14:33
call it ep
14:35
that talks about being an icon and a
14:37
goat i think that would be an amazing
14:38
job to do
14:39
and we can talk about it you know i love
14:42
that discourse
14:43
of our culture to say what makes
14:44
something an icon and then we can
14:46
interview different people you could be
14:47
the guest editor you could leave the
14:49
conversation
14:50
and it's something i think the culture
14:51
would really love and that's with the
14:53
pretty please on top
14:55
[Laughter]
14:57
listen man that has my my full attention
15:00
and my interest the only thing that
15:02
comes down to is if it has my time
15:05
there it is you got it right i would
15:07
just have to figure that out
15:09
okay we'll write it up and see you know
15:12
you like that answer hb
15:13
i love it man tracy being honest about
15:15
it i have a question what's up
15:17
everybody though this is heather thank
15:18
you for joining us today on the show
15:20
um i have a question though for mr
15:22
mitchell mr apollo
15:23
we i was always curious when apollo is
15:26
not open and running shows
15:28
where do they keep the lucky log like it
15:30
does have a special room a glass case
15:32
like where is it
15:33
well we it's actually called the tree of
15:35
hope and and it remains
15:38
off stage right uh we used to have a
15:40
little uh cubicle that we kept it in
15:42
but we kept it out because we wanted the
15:44
spirit of the ancestors to be around it
15:47
so it remains on the stage we break it
15:49
out for amateur now we bring it out when
15:51
certain concerts are done and the
15:52
artists request that the tree of hope
15:54
be placed here but it's called the tree
15:55
of hope tree of hope
15:57
so every man okay got it okay i was
15:59
always curious thank you
16:01
you're welcome okay and then chris maybe
16:03
you have heather has to be one of our uh
16:06
people we interview in those um early
16:08
epis those early editions
16:09
you know what a sway verse oh yeah i'm
16:12
down
16:12
you know it's cool because we we're
16:14
going to make a character heather
16:16
you're going to love the characters man
16:17
that our our
16:19
you know our illustrators they're
16:21
they're awesome chris chris you see how
16:23
he trying to put everybody to work but
16:24
he's really
16:25
putting you to more work chris you see
16:27
how this is happening right
16:28
i i see what's happening this way i i
16:31
see what's going on
16:32
it's a village baby chris don't fall for
16:34
that man don't fall for that chris
16:36
heather does this every day you don't do
16:37
this
16:38
trust me let it go don't tap into this
16:40
okay
16:41
okay so listen that's that's it
16:44
collaborative efforts i mean look at
16:46
this as some
16:47
ensemble of guests we have we have
16:49
shanique sly yates
16:50
we have billy mitchell who's a legend in
16:53
his allegiance
16:57
living legend mr apollo
17:01
mr mitchell thank you for being on this
17:03
show today yes
17:05
it's my absolute pleasure it's real you
17:07
know
17:09
as long as my friend fly and chris you
17:11
know it's just uh it's just an
17:13
absolute blessing this old man will
17:15
still be able to kick with you young and
17:17
you know and uh
17:18
enjoy my my wisdom
17:21
you know my brother take this out when
17:23
we open our building up which will be
17:25
soon we'll start doing some things
17:27
inside the building again i want to
17:28
invite you and be a guest on our show
17:30
let's talk about those stories i'd love
17:31
to hear your stories live on there
17:34
absolutely absolutely okay i got your
17:37
info
17:37
um sly thank you i hope we do we i know
17:40
we're gonna do more work together it's
17:42
an honor to work with you
17:44
absolutely same here thanks for having
17:46
me
17:47
absolutely yes thank you sly you're
17:50
destined for greatness
17:51
and then tonight tonight is all going
17:54
down
17:54
citizens tonight we will be on twitch
17:58
twitch what is it again chris twitch.com
18:03
forward slash urbana mate what is it
18:05
chris go ahead give it to me
18:06
it's uh twitch.comanimateswitch
18:11
so and we'll be live at seven with
18:13
whatever
18:14
seven to eight thirty twitch.com forward
18:17
slash at
18:18
urbana made twitch enjoy it and we got a
18:21
lot going on
18:22
you you should one last thing that that
18:24
i forgot to mention there is a
18:26
five page story comic book story in the
18:29
mixtape
18:30
about the apollo theater uh working with
18:34
uh sly and mr mitchell
18:37
to bring that to life so if you really
18:40
you know
18:40
want to have some fun it's an incredible
18:42
story about his journey
18:44
as well as the theater so we're really
18:46
excited to celebrate
18:47
uh our culture this year okay and you
18:49
can you can
18:50
go to urbana made too right or
18:52
baname.com yep
18:53
yeah that's like the feature of the
18:57
mixtape itself
18:59
okay i appreciate you all joining us
19:01
today on black music month by the way
19:03
what's the date today
19:04
is it the 30th june 30th yes june 30th
19:07
okay cool all right today is keem tech's
19:09
birthday so happy boring
19:10
oh wow happy birthday king gang
19:13
tech yeah we're calling to see if he
19:15
picks up um
19:18
thank you for being on the show let's
19:19
continue to do greatness okay
19:21
sly uh mr apollo chris walker
19:25
our band of 18 talk to you soon and talk
19:28
to you tonight okay
19:31
thank you i appreciate you
19:34
thank you very much you guys have a
19:36
beautiful day
19:49
[Music]
#Arts & Entertainment