Ariel Publicity

A two man operation including emcee S.A.G. and emcee/producer Rusty Mack Aychcee (pronounced H.C.) is blazing the way for what they call “College Crunk Rap.” S.A.G. explains “we write music about having a good time and experiences that our friends or we have had. The radio is dominated by hip hop talking about wealth or a lifestyle that our friends can’t relate to.” Instead Aychcee have synth dominated catchy ditties like Candy Flippin’ about popular recreations that people do at parties or Shenanighans about the mischief and practical jokes that is rampant among college kids.

Shenanighans is instantly relatable to probably every group of guys that hang together as S.A.G admits “Yeah, we talk about stuff we have pulled on our friends that make us jerks, but is funny, such as drawing all over the first person who passes out at a party with a permanent marker or playing waffle ball all night in the street and pissing off the neighbors.” An example of the musical shenanighans the group is up to is the song Goofy Pop which is their attempt to create a dance sensation around a left handed handshake. “Yeah it seems like all these crunk albums talk about a dance step or how to do a dance and we decided what’s better than a dance around the goofy pop?”

Students at SUNY Purchase, S.A.G and Mack met in 2006 through mutual friends and clicked with a mutual love of hip hop. On a whim they wrote and recorded Candy Flippin’ which S.A.G. claims came together effortlessly within an hour. “We weren’t thinking past that first song, we just were happy with what we did in our spare time and played it for our friends at the campus station. One of those friends Ted Rubin, President of Supertoad Records was so impressed that he said if they wanted to record a full-length he would put it out on his label. With a label backing them the duo were in the studio every other day working on material finishing the full-length Hot Cakes. Produced entirely by the duo and recorded in the campus recording studio (Mack just received a degree in music production) this is as DIY as it gets but with a professional sound.

Labeled as sort of a concept piece S.A.G. clarifies “we recorded this whole album in a party induced haze with kind of a theme to the songs that string them together with crunk style beats but I wouldn’t say that this is representative of everything we do, it’s more like an encapsulation of one side of our personalities and style.” An example of the group’s more cerebral/esoteric side is the track Cumulonimbus an instrumental track that is entirely constructed by the spoken word of the title. “I had a weather class and I was studying Cumulonimbus Clouds and couldn’t go in the studio. Mack liked the word and went in and created this track using the word as a starting point and chopping and processing the word into snares, kicks and synth parts composed from his voice.” Aychcee are currently gearing up for upcoming live shows and working on new tracks for a future release.