Young MC

You'll see him on the hit NBC series, The Weakest Link and hear his slammin' CD on the airwaves. 2002 is the summer of YOUNG MC. His voice is recognized throughout the world and his lyrics are virtually that of Urban Myth. His new album, Engage the Enzyme, set for a summer 2002 release features the tracks Stress Test, Feel the Love, Heatseeker, Whoop de Whoop, Flows, Unsigned Diva, Babe, Crucial, One Time For Your Mind, Ain't No Way in the World, In Case, Without Doubt, Easier, and a bonus hidden track, the Heatseeker remix. Young MC is ready to Engage the Audience. But just what does Engage the Enzyme mean? Young MC says, "As they grow older, my rhymes get better with age as does wine when it ferments." And the new release is a project for which he has strong and personal feelings. The artist notes, "I feel this is the best record I've ever made. I feel I'm at the peak of my talent & the peak of my business acumen and I'm eager for people to hear it." Young MC adds, "I've never had a record where I give it to people -- friends co-workers, whatever and they ALL say they like it. They all have strong opinions about what their favorite cut on this album is, but those opinions are good. People in the business wanna know how they can help and are rooting for me. A friend of mine told me, ‘Marvin, if you were mortgaging your house to promote this record I wouldn't argue with you.' HE feels it's that strong. That means a lot to me. It's one thing for me to sit here and tell everybody how good this record is until I'm blue in the face, when other people say how good it is, that's what means something." Engage the Enzyme is a project featuring many musical twists, turns and surprises. Young notes, "That's what I wanted to do with the record as a whole -- just get different feelings for every cut. So that for somebody listening to the album all the way through, there is a consistency from one cut to the next -- because it's a mirror image of me, the opinions I posses and viewpoints that I have -- but there's diversity as well. I wanted to deliver a different feeling for every track -- different genre's, different sounding production and different approaches." Young MC is sure his own enthusiasm for the new release is infectious. "I can't wait for the word of mouth -- one kid telling another kid -- and have everybody be pleased. I want this record to do as well as my first – that one went double platinum and won a Grammy for me. I want people to feel like they've gotten their money's worth. Basically, I wanted to do something different -- not release something with 4 minutes of hits and 75 minutes of filler. I wanted to take it back how it used to be -- how you could put a record on and listen to it from A through Z." Throughout his career, Young MC has broken new ground on many fronts. He went on to become one of the first rappers to be featured in a national television commercial and throughout the course of his career, his appeal has been universal. His friends and colleagues from New York knew him as an East Coast Rapper, while he simultaneously was a favorite on West Coast radio and regarded by many as a "west coast" artist. He believes that "Engage the Enzyme" will prove to be his most poignant work to date. More on Young MC: Who is this Young MC? Between their sophomore and junior years in college, most students are trying to figure out what Economics class to take. Between his sophomore and junior year, Marvin Young was trying to figure out what record label to sign with. That's the way things have progressed throughout his career -- one surprise after another. His new album, "Engage the Enzyme" is by all accounts, his most aggressive and according to Young, "My best set of recordings ever." The story is legendary, after signing with Delicious Vinyl Records, Young MC was asked by label honchos to write a rap to the "Wild Thing" track and "Funky Cold Medina." His credibility firmly established, he penned his soon-to-be signature monster hit -- in an hour and a half. Young MC notes, "All throughout my career I've found it a good idea to write things all at once during a stream of consciousness." A good idea? The single, "Bust A Move" was a staple on the charts for over 40 weeks. He received a Grammy for Best Rap Performance, won an American Music Award for Best Rap Artist and also garnered a Billboard Award for Best Pop Artist. The album "Stone Cold Rhymin'" went on to achieve double platinum status. Young MC notes, "I was traveling so much during the time the album was climbing the charts (a year and a half), I never got a chance to see people's reaction. Now, years later I'm finally experiencing fan response up close." The Grammy Winner Discusses Engage the Enzyme: Stress Test is all about those things that bother me personally and may bother others too -- the state of the rap game, the state of the music business, a bad relationship that has ended, the perception of me by those that don't know me -- talk about me behind my back and they think that I don't hear it. It's about how I deal with stress which is through my music. Stress Test is most aggressive. I believe it shows people that I'm capable of being edgy and a little harder than previous projects.. Feel the Love is a track that refers to seeing a girl and being into a girl who has a man, but didn't bother to let "you" know. It's got a catchy hook. This will be a song people will hear and get into. Heatseeker is a pretty basic concept. Guys are always talking about women being hot. If they're hot, they're obviously giving off heat. If you see a hot woman and you wanna get with her, what do you do? That makes a Guy a Heatseeker. The remix is tight. Whoop de Whoop describes people that live lives that they're lying about. Like when a guy says his car got stolen but it actually has been repossessed. People make their lives more meaningful than they are. It's all lies and it's the Whoop de Whoop. I believe Flows is where I'm at my best lyrically right now. Some of the best lyrical acrobatics appear on this album, as do some of the best rhyme schemes, some of the best vocabulary. On Unsigned Diva I worked with Producer/rapper E-man (Eric Adger). The song refers to a girl that claims she can sing and gets into the studio, but of course she can't. But, she's pretty so nobody is mean to her. There are unsigned rap diva's as well. Unsigned Rap Diva's are "all full of themselves" rappers -- they're male rapping unsigned divas. It's a very funny track. In my mind, Babe is the biggest stretch on the disc. Yes that is I, singing on this track -- in a high range. I like the way the verses flow together. Why singing -- I got sick & tired of writing stuff that I couldn't perform. I got tired of demo-ing great songs for other people. So I worked and worked on my vocals, got tips from everybody and recorded my voice over and over. I love how it came out. Crucial is 911 through my eyes. We were bombarded with so much information in such a short period of time. Unlike some of the early projects on the subject that were released, I had the luxury of time passing -- and watching -- some people even pretending that it didn't happen. I wanted to chronicle the event in my words and thoughts. So for those people who didn't want to watch Bill O'Reilly or Larry King all day, every day -- or FOX News Channel or CNN for two weeks, this is my take on it. It's my personal perspective on this tragic event. I am an immigrant. As someone who came from another country and was naturalized, I had the choice -- whether or not to be a U.S. citizen here -- and I chose to do so. Crucial is a chronicle for people 10 or 15 years from now. It's a song somebody could play for their kid years from now. On One Time For Your mind I'm rhyming as fast as I possibly can -- trying to do some Lyrical acrobatics. This track was created with a great singer, Wil Wheaton who wrote the title track for the artist Anastasia's album "Not That Kind" with me -- it sold six to ten million albums in Europe and overseas. Wil's a talented guy. I've learned a lot from Wil and this song is me at my best lyrically. At 127 BPM this is a totally different approach lyrically than Flows. Ain't No Way in the World is a hybrid of rap and singing. I'm also singing on this track. It was sequenced here to break up the album and slow the down the mood. It's a change of pace and a straight R&B bob your head kind of tune. In Case has a Live bass loop sound & a live guitar sound. It's talkin' about rockin' a party. I have a feeling I'll perform this early in my live show. It's a great party starter. The track's all about comin' in a venue, showin' your skills and gettin' people dancin and rockin' the place without doubt. Easier is about the potential of loving & losing and it's more in my singing range. It's a Trip Hop track. The cool thing about this track is that it sounds more like Garbage or an alternative group rather than a rap or an R&B song. The Remix of Heatseekers is a hidden track. Within reason, as I create remixes as we go along, I plan to insert them as hidden tracks on the album as we re-manufacture it. – To platinum and beyond.

Discography: