Few people work harder in the Triangle hip-hop scene than curator, promoter and festival founder Crystal Taylor. Eight weeks away from her third annual Beats N Bars Festival, and four weeks away from having her first child, she came to the Runaway Store for our Season One finale episode. In an almost hour long interview, we covered hip-hop topics near and far: rapping vs. singing, the hardest part of starting a festival, why free activations are so important, getting inspired at Broccoli City in DC, dealing with problematic artists in hip-hop, and much more. Also on this episode: Holland, Ryan and Alex discuss the startling news of XXXTenatacion’s death, as well as the outrageous viral success of Duragfest in Charlotte, NC. Thank you to everyone who listened to these 21 episodes! We’re excited to come back in the early fall bigger and better. Peace.

Over the past five years, no NC hip-hop label not named Jamla Records has been more successful in reaching an audience than the Chapel Hill-via-Charlotte crew Immaculate Taste. Started out of necessity when brothers Alec Lomami and Mike Tambashe (along with cousin Leroy Shingu, now better known as the rapper Well$) wanted to pursue music and didn’t know any business-minded friends to help them run it, IT has gone on to earn its flagship artists Well$ and Angelo Mota major looks, from press coverage, to music festivals, to Spotify playlists. With Angelo’s new record, When All Is Said And Done, hot off the presses, label co-founder Alec joined us on the pod to talk about networking in New York, booking Well$’ first show (opening for G-Eazy) while he was in South Africa, the shift of tastemaking from blogs to playlists, and more. We also talk with Alec about the new 9th Wonder x Drake mashup album by DJ Critical Hype called More 9th that has been making the rounds on hip-hop Twitter over the past few days, and Justin gets more than a little excited for the upcoming 9th Wonder & Black Thought album. Soundtrack: Angelo Mota - “Sweet Tooth” DJ Critical Hype - “Over” Marley Pitch - “Plush” Listen to “Best Of The Carolinas,” Vol. 2, out now! https://open.spotify.com/user/xmupw84s3ykc32gzftrsflufv/playlist/5EUEJGmeB4AmozRgsUafPz?si=ixpY_-0RQLCyYsoII1wKew And don’t forget to follow us on social, if you don’t already. Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/superemptync/ Twitter: https://twitter.com/superemptync

Saleem Reshamwala stops by The Runaway Store and we talk about the path that led him to some of his more recent career highlights: an 11-week stint at The New York Times, and a multi-million views music video in G Yamazawa's "North Cack," among them. A longtime contributor to the creative energy and scene of the Triangle, Saleem (aka Kid Ethnic)'s wisdom and learned experiences are always a pleasure to hear, and this episode is full of commentary that will be useful and interesting to budding creatives hoping to make artistic pursuits into a career. There's about 20 extra minutes of interview that didn't make it into our iTunes upload (we want to try to keep these around an hour), but if you want to hear it, head over to our SoundCloud account (http://soundcloud.com/superemptymusic) and give it a spin. Thanks to the artists/songs featured this week, Danny Blaze's "Down Right Punch," and Tab-One's "Man On The Moon Freestyle." And check out the newest piece on the Super Empty Site, rounding out some new pieces from around the state: http://www.superempty.com/news/2018/5/9/the-catch-up-may-9-the-best-year-ever-so-far If you haven't yet, leave us a review! We're trying to flex out here on these podcast haters. Let's keep this streak of 5-star reviews rolling.

With a lot of shine coming to the NC hip-hop scene and a number of new (and old) artists starting to get major buzz, it’s easy to forget about some of the long-time acts that have consistently made the area what it is through thoughtful, high-quality music. One of those artists in the Triangle is Durham rapper Kourviosier, who was making and distributing his own tapes by middle school, and got his first taste of the big leagues by regularly dipping out after school at Hillside High to visit 9th Wonder across the road at NC Central. We talked to him about those early days, why he collaborates almost entirely with one producer (Dre Rubio) for all of his albums, the moment when he thought he wanted to quit rapping altogether, and much more. Also, there’s a new album out from a guy named J. Cole out of Fayetteville, so Ryan, Alex, Mandy, Justin and Holland drop everything to discuss the content of the project and the controversies surrounding it. If you didn’t have time for last week’s episode with G Yamazawa, make some time for that this week — that’s one you won’t want to miss. As always, if you enjoy the show, please rate and review us! It all helps us place higher in the charts and get this NC hip-hoperation in front of more smart, cool, attractive people just like you.