Bathgate 'The Education' album

Harlem’s back! Uptown mc Bathgate (formerly known as Billy Bathgate) returns with his new single “Everything’s A Go (The Flow)” b/w “Badside” for the brand new indie hip hop label Supreme Clientele Recordings.

Starting from the ground up in the late 90’s – at park battles in the Manhattanville housing project – to spittin’ freestyle classics on countless mixtapes like Kay Slay’s Streetsweeper series and other street joints by Purple City and DJ’s like Clue, Whoo Kid, Envy, Enuff, Dirty Harry, Kool Kid and Clinton Sparks, Bathgate built an enormous underground street buzz and following for an artist without an album out or a record deal. With his name ringin’ off in streets everywhere, a bidding war ensued that landed Bath at Virgin records. His jumpoff single “Fuck That” (aka dubbed “Bump That” for radio) became an instant hood anthem, which Rolling Stone magazine also dubbed one of their cool hip hop, singles of the year in April 2001.

After Vibe magazine tipped him as being a part of “Rap’s New Generation” alongside Remy Martin and T.I. and with “Bump That” receiving major airplay and running mixshows nationwide, demand for Bathgate’s full-length debut Dear Rich America, My Story To You was high. But major corporate restructuring at Virgin on the eve of the album’s release, resulting in much of the label’s roster being dropped and key staff being laid off, left no one to properly work the album. With his label situation in disarray, but several tracks bangin’ on the streets, Bath stayed focused on music. He was a headline performer on Funkmaster Flex’s College Tunnel Tour with Jadakiss, appeared on Volume 3 of Flex’s well-respected vinyl-only Big Truck Series Freestyle EP’s, was featured in the soundtrack to the Project Gotham video game and wrote songs for others including Puffy, Trina, Amil (and a few others who shall remain nameless).

Now, after schooling himself on the business side to the industry, Bath is in control of his own destiny running his own label, Capital Gang Records, and inking a 12” single deal with Supreme Clientele to reintroduce himself to the hip hop game. The club heater “Everything’s A Go (The Flow)” and the more pensive “Badside” are the first two songs from his official debut album The Education and the Supreme Clientele compilation The Clientele Chronicles Vol. 1 both due in 2005.

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Bathgate - The Education