This album is for anyone who's ever felt your life was more complicated than the world wanted to let you be. If you're growing up but your dreams keep getting wilder, if you're a hippie who wears a suit and listens to gangster rap, this music's for you.

8 MP3 Songs in this album (41:24) !
Related styles: Hip-Hop/Rap: Instrumental Hip-Hop, Pop: Folky Pop, Type: Lyrical

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Details:
Jon Braman, aka the Father of Ukulele Hip Hop, found his ukulele in a garbage can when he was about 15. Several years later, and after the ukulele - a baritone - had become his constant companion through school, life and while walking to the grocery store, Jon discovered the joys of hip hop while working on a grassroots campaign for clean air. What happened next doesn't really make sense, but it's historically documented: he started rapping while playing the ukulele. Pretty soon, he was writing and performing hip hop-influenced melodic, political, emotional songs that didn't sound like novelty music, but the kind of music you want to listen to over and over again. The kind of music the helps you get through the day.

Fast forward to 2011: Jon Braman is now releasing his third album, called You and Me. It is his first with a full band (including drums, bass, harmony vocals, saxophone, beatbox, piano), but is still centered around the same uke he found in the garbage at 15. The band is high-energy, jazz soaked, live improvised music with an infectious groove and enough musical and lyrical nuance to keep you coming back.

Jon has been featured in the Mighty Uke documentary, opened for Jake Shimabukuro, been a 3 time regional finalist in the Mountain Stage New Song Contest, is the resident songwriter on a weekly arts and culture show on WBAI radio (99.5 FM in NYC), co-hosts the Melting Pot, a monthly showcase-jam in New York, and performs regularly with his band. This is music you have to hear to believe: an energetic, totally original concoction that surprises first time listeners which just how right it sounds. You'd never guess it would work to combine elements as different as hard-hitting rap, a baritone ukulele, melodic songwriting that swings from folk, to rock, to reggae, to blues, to R&B, smart-political lyrics, jazzy horn lines. Doesn't sound like it would work -- until you hear it.