Its like the perfect birthday cake: Within each bite there's that taste of hip-hop, rock, and punk; the hip-hop is the cake, the rock is the icing, and the punk is the filling.

14 MP3 Songs
POP: Today's Top 40, ROCK: Punk



Details:
The Grand Skeem Members: Ali Dee (Vocals)
Vin Alferi (Lead Guitar)
Rich Liegey (Bass)
Jon Zakis (Drums)
BIOGRAPHY

You gotta figure a band that can claim Reverend Run from the legendary Run-DMC as their personal mentor must have something pretty special going on for themselves. And inspirational phone calls from one of the biggest hip-hop artists of all time is just the beginning when it comes to New York City's THE GRAND SKEEM.

Led by up and coming vocalist, songwriter, producer, and remixer Ali Dee, THE GRAND SKEEM combines a delicious rock and pop assault with old school hip-hop stylings for a sound so infectious, they should probably start handing out penicillin at shows.

"I wanted to combine everything I loved about hip-hop with some brutal guitar playing, slamming beats, and killer pop hooks," Ali says of THE GRAND SKEEM vision.

The hip-hop part of the equation was easy. While barely out of his teens, Ali Dee was already racking up production credits with the likes of Public Enemy's BOMB Squad, Eric B. and Rakim, and Big Daddy Kane.

Ali found the rock power he was looking for in the form of guitarist Vinni Alferi, a Long Island native who had been annoying his parents for years while mastering his favorite punk rock songs in the family basement. Locking themselves inside a Midtown practice space, Ali and Vinni began writing songs together and soon after enlisted the skills of bass player Rich Liegey, a
veteran of the New York hardcore scene and former member of the pop rock act Wheatus. Skins pounder John Zakis was smuggled from suburban New Jersey in order to complete the lineup.

In true D.I.Y fashion, the four young men began plotting THE GRAND SKEEM world domination. Not content to simply confine themselves to the local New York club scene, the quartet piled into a beat up Winnebago and put as many miles behind them as their coffee, candy, and alcohol-fueled bodies would allow and began winning fans, or 'Skeemers' as they have come to call themselves, throughout the United States. When not on the road, the band holed themselves up in the recording studio they built themselves to lay down tracks so impressive, noted mix engineer Brian Malouf (Everclear, Michael Jackson, Luna, Madonna) jumped at the chance to lend his skills to the project.

Released on the band's own GrandDee Records label, THE GRAND SKEEM's self-titled debut is one of those albums you'll want to crank on your car stereo and completely disregard traffic laws while singing along with every word, no matter how many people give you strange looks at stoplights. In addition to their own hits, the band puts THE GRAND SKEEM touch on Sir Mix-a-Lot's Baby Got Back and enlists the skills of none other than Slick Rick on their smoking version of the hip-hop classic Pimpin' Ain't Easy.

Take one listen to THE GRAND SKEEM and it won't be hard to figure out why everyone from Busta Rhymes to O-Town has been asking Ali Dee and his boys to pay them a visit in the recording studio lately. Still, the Grand Skeem feels most at home when they're tearing it up live with the Skeemers.

Then again, maybe guitarist Vinni puts it best. "We live to play and we play to live," he explains. "I will die with my six string in my arms and my band by my side."