clando: Sandpeople Crew

Straight from Portland, Oregon, here comes the Sandpeople Crew: Mo-B., Illmaculate, Only One, Gold, iame, Al-One, Simple, DJ Spark, Sapient & Ethic.
Already the next big thing. No doubt.

Sandpeople was formed roughly four years ago as an unlikely gathering of hip-hop artists in the Pacific Northwest. The crew that now calls Portland, Oregon home has evolved into a 10-member unit fully equipped to fill a stage and empty a keg (preferably in reverse order). In their early stages, founding member Mo-B assembled a crew of eight members who were all carving out their own respective niches as solo artists, which included Illmaculate, OnlyOne, Gold, iame, Al-One, Simple and DJ Spark. When Mo-B then moved down to Eugene, Oregon for college, he became impressed with the work ethic and skills of a rapper who had previously had considerable success in Australia named Ethic and a rapper/producer named Sapient. Soon, Ethic and Sapient spent the next two months doing “power weekends,” leaving Eugene after work on Friday to drive two hours north to Portland and then driving back down the following Monday morning just in time for work so they could a full weekend with the rest of the crew at Simple’s home studio.

In their formative years, Simple’s house became the creative think tank where all members worked around-the-clock on new projects, sharpening their skills and collectively honing their craft. Within the first two months of “power weekending,” Sandpeople created and self-released their debut album, Points of View, which was recorded over a two-week span. The album gained a cult-like following and spread virally along the west coast and the underground hip-hop scene.

Points of View, which was only for sale at CD Baby and iTunes, quickly grabbed the attention of music fans everywhere; people started burning CD’s and passing them to friends, and they even discovered that someone in LA was selling a compilation made up of his favorite Sandpeople tracks called Sandtrap. Eventually, industry people in LA picked up on Sandpeoples’ buzz, which led to a yearlong courtship by Epic Records in 2005. “The whole experience was crazy and a proved to be a very valuable lesson for us,” remembers rapper Ethic. “I remember two funny things – Epic Records flew a producer up to Portland to work on our demo. At the time, he was dating a girl who would eventually be in Danity Kane and she sang on one of our hooks. Later we saw them break up on the show, which was kinda weird,” he says lightheartedly. “The other amusing thing was that our A&R guy from Epic was juggling two projects at the same time – one was us and the other was The Fray. Boy, we got the short end of that stick,” says Ethic with a laugh.

Sandpeople used their experience and valuable lessons learned from the Epic Records courtship to step up their hustle. In addition to learning how the business worked, the crew worked to improve their song writing. They evolved from being rappers who had fun recording all weekend long to finish as many as six songs to focusing on perfecting just two songs. “We concentrated on increasing our quality, as opposed to quantity,” says Ethic. He continues, “The dream became more attainable to us. We felt like we were on the same level of people we had previously looked up to and changed our level of professionalism accordingly.”

The groups' appeal has grown immensely amongst industry players and fans alike because of the recent success of a few key members of Sandpeople. After winning the world-renowned battle at Scribble Jam in 2004, rapper Illmaculate went on to win back-to-back titles in the internationally recognized World Rap Championships hosted by Jumpoff .TV. He has since gained exposure through Comcast On-Demand, XXL Magazine and was named one of Vibe Magazine’s top 50 rappers on MySpace.