Rapper-Producer Michael Barber who has a co-sign from hip hop legend, Nas, might be the equivalent of Jay-Z's newest signed artist, J.Cole. Barber isn't on the Nas imprint label at Sony Records, he is signed to Universal Records and set to release his debut album "Shotguns and Canned Goods" this year.
Barber, who was featured on 2008 Sony Records remix with Nas, "Kick in The Door", is also credited with being a guest engineer on the Nas Street's Disciple album. The song "Kick in the Door" was a free give away at Hot96 in New York, and the Vinyl single is a must have for all collectors.
The key reason behind the comparisons to J. Cole and Jay-Z might not be the same lyrical, music type of angle but more of the future of Nas, Barber, and music distribution.
Barber who started ECP Music Group last year with some of the biggest names behind the scenes in the music business, and has been working with the likes of Warner Music Group, Sony, and even Itunes/Apple with the next generation of music distribution. Barber has done promotional work with more artists than I can name even being the first to break the news behind Kanye West's MTV PR stunt/hoax. Barber was also the first to report that his good friend, Kia Shine, was writing for Drake, and had won three BMI awards for "Best I Ever Had". Drake issued a statement to Barber, saying "it is disrespectful to talk about points on an album."
Barber hit the ground running with his Universal debut album due out this year, releasing a song, "She's My Pennie Lane" to FM radio, and the Aftermath Records produced "Stage Name". Both hit in two different markets, one being a ballad-folk-
Barber was signed to Universal Records after his movie based series mix tape series, Motion Picture Mayhem parts 1 and 2, were downloaded over 100,000 times and single handedly shut down torrent sites. After being released as a free download the second part of series was downloaded 8,800 times in less than a month on Itunes and Amazon.
Nas might have found a gem, not only an artist, but a kid with the vision of the future of how music will be distributed. Barber's ECP Music Group is being shopped to many private investors and record labels including the before mentioned Sony and WMG. Working closely with Best Buy, Itunes, and now LA Fitness, for advanced music distribution, Barber and Nas seem poised to deliver not only music on a futuristic distribution scale, but also give us the hits they have both been capable of doing over the last few years.
Nas has an album with Damian Marley due out called "Distant Relatives".
