Naledge

Born Jabari Evans in Cincinnati, Ohio, Naledge serves as the MCing half of the progressive rap duo Kidz in the Hall. His family moved when he was two, after which he was raised on Chicago's South Side. Both parents held Ph.D.s, and the high-school valedictorian moved through academics without difficulty before finding his outlet in poetry and writing. It was his cousin Memo, one-third of the Chicago production outfit the Molemen, who urged him to convert that skill into hip-hop rhymes. Naledge first encountered his future DJ/producer partner Double O during a 2000 recruiting visit to the University of Pennsylvania, and the pair soon became close friends and musical collaborators. While still enrolled at Penn, Naledge obtained a solo deal with Rawkus Records, then brought the Kidz in the Hall project under Rawkus management once he and Double O committed to forming the group. Shortly after graduating from Penn in 2004, he issued the mixtape The College Graduate as a nod to Kanye West's breakout debut album, The College Dropout. Following several Kidz in the Hall mixtapes and an aggressive Internet-promoting campaign, Naledge and Double O released their debut album, School Was My Hustle, in 2006. Naledge's solo debut, tentatively titled Naledge Is Power, had been slated to arrive soon after the Kidz in the Hall LP, yet the duo instead severed ties with Rawkus and signed with Boot Camp Clik imprint Duck Down in 2007.