DJ Envy & Red Cafe 'The Co-Op' album

HOT 97 Radio personality DJ Envy and Mix-Tape heavyweight Red Café come together to bring you The Co-Op. Fueled by the singles, “Dolla Bill” ft/ Fabolous, and “Things You Do” ft/ Nina Sky, together, these 2 New York giants bring together clever street anthems with truck rattling production.

A staple on HOT 97, NYC’s #1 Urban radio station, DJ Envy has been making noise in the hip-hop community for years. Red Café is no stranger to hip-hop fans himself, having graced countless mixtapes and major label releases.

biography
While New York undergoes a transformation in the form of high-rise luxury condos on nearly every block, most owners of real estate in the Big Apple still reside in Co-Ops, building’s where occupants each own individual shares of a corporation that collectively owns the property.

It’s this same ownership principle guiding two staples of New York’s urban scene ? Red Café and DJ Envy ? as they join forces to form The Co-Op and present It’s Moving!!!!! Volume 1. The Queens-bred Envy, who’s been a member of DJ Clue’s Desert Storm Camp since the late ‘90s, and Red Café, a Brooklyn rapper who signed his first deal with Violator Records at age 19, are no strangers to the music business, though they’ve both fallen victim to Industry Rule 4080.

For Envy, his first LP, The Desert Storm Mixtape: Blok Party Vol. 1, was released in 2003 by Sony Records and went on to sell only 110,000 units despite featuring notable artists like Jay-Z, 50 Cent, and DMX. Following years of industry grind, the album was the culmination of years running alongside Clue in the ‘90s, then emerging as a popular club and mixtape DJ in the new millennium, and finally becoming a staple of New York radio as a mixshow DJ on Hot97.

“I put my life into that Sony album,” says Envy, still noticeably disappointed that the project failed to meet his expectations. “I was so disgusted with Sony and the system that they had in place, so I said I’d never do another record in my life. But all it takes is one good artist or one feel good record to make you change your mind. Red Café came in the picture, and when we started doing records it made me want to do an album. Everything came out so good and so smoothly that I had to give it another a chance.”

Although the two officially linked up in 2006, Envy and Red had known each other in passing for some time, as they were both active in their own regard in New York’s mixtape circuit; Envy dropping tapes, and Red Café supplying the streets with freestyles and exclusive songs.

The underground was familiar territory for Red, as he’d started buzzing as a teenager in the group The Franchise, which was signed to Violator Records. Later, Red went solo and wound up at Arista Records through legendary production duo The Trackmasters, before heading to Capitol Records through Mack 10’s Hoo Bangin’ imprint. While on Capitol, Red released the Reefa-produced street single “Bling Blaow” featuring Fabolous, which was embraced by mixtape and mixshow DJs nationwide. The song garnered him enough attention that he was again on the move, this time to Universal/Motown, where Tone from The Trackmasters was a senior level executive. Following a short stint there, he finally signed with Interscope, where he is currently recording as a solo artist under the umbrella of Akon’s Konvict Music. While some artists are happy just to get a deal, Red’s already had his fair share of them, and that’s partly the inspiration for the KOCH Records Co-Op project.

“I was caught up in a couple situations but they were not all what they are cracked up to be,” says Red. “I just kept running into jams where the people who believed in me they lost their positions, or just the tables turned while I was at the company and you know things change and I wasn’t able to get the support that I needed. That’s why I’m here with DJ Envy doing this album.”

For Envy, who still holds down his slot as an on-air personality for Hot97’s morning show, as well as a 12pm-6pm gig on Sirius Satellite’s Hip-Hop Nation and a monthly show on cable’s Music Choice channel, finding an artist to work with is not a difficult task. In Red Café, however, he’s found a suitable counterpart. A Fresh Prince to his Jazzy Jeff, if you will. A Guru to his DJ Premier.

Their musical relationship began when Envy started giving Red Café creative advice on records he was submitting to him for mixtapes, and that blossomed into a situation where they were bouncing ideas off one another, eventually becoming a group. The chemistry between them is readily noticeable in the music. Check the infectious Rocwilda-produced “Dolla Bill,” featuring Jermaine Dupri and Fabolous. While Envy introduces the song, Red carries it with his unique brand of BK swag, spitting braggadocio parables that’ll have both the clubs and streets on lock all summer long.

Describing how the album took shape, Envy, who also produces, says: “I did a couple of tracks, but I am more or less A&R on it, making sure that we’ve got Red rhyming on the right tracks. We had our fights when he wanted one thing to go one way and I wanted one thing to go the other way, but we basically had to sit down and decide what would be best for the project.”

Moving forward, videos will soon be shot for “Dolla Bill,” and the 2nd single, the Nina Sky-assisted “Things You Do,” which Envy expects to ride from the summer all the way into the Fall. Guests on the album include Styles P, Fabolous, Remy Martin, and Sheek Louch, among others.

“When we made the songs we just listened to them and asked ourselves who we thought should be on them,” explains Red. “If I thought so and so would sound good, that’s how we’d move forward and eventually complete the record.”

The duo has high expectations for The Co-Op and plan to keep releasing music through the venture, continuously keeping the streets fresh with material. “A Co-Op is people doing business together, like when you live in an apartment and all of you together own the building,” says Red. “That’s what me and Envy are doing, owning our own building.”

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DJ Envy & Red Cafe - The Co-Op