Misdirected hostility headed in new direction

Misdirected hostility,a phrase from an old 311 song, is now the name of a new record label created by a group of college-aged guys.

One of them is Keene State College junior Josh Burke. Also known as MDH Records, Burke and his high school buddy, Benedict James "BJ" Sgro, started up the company on Jan. 5 with one thing in mind: finding raw hip hop and rap talent and introducing the public to up-and-coming new artists.

Burke wants to make one thing clear, however.

"BJ's the kid with the talent," he said. "I do not do anything [vocally]. I'm strictly the business end of it."

Burke was in charge of filling out the paperwork to get the label underway. He filed with the state and paid a fee to get incorporated.

Burke's father contributed to the start of the company as well.

"My dad is a business attorney and he helped with a lot of it," Burke said.

Burke and Sgro have each contributed around $2,000 to $3,000 from their own pockets to MDH Records' start up.

"He [Sgro] spent a lot of money on recording equipment and I spent a lot of money on legal filings with the state...t-shirts and CDs made...," said Burke. They make money back by selling Sgro's current CD, "The Soundtrack," for $5, as well as MDH Records merchandise.

He added that all the profits the company makes, so far, go right back into the company to buy more CDs, shirts and Internet services.

The company also includes Greg Bonnette, the webmaster (www.mdhrecords.com), Kevin Hogan, the sound engineer who sets up shows, runs the board and makes sure the artists sound good and Nick Piantedosi, a.k.a. 'Decap,' the "beats maker."

"Basically my whole company is based around using the skills of all our friends," said Burke.

KSC student Josh Schoen thinks the group is headed for success.

"I think the way they're going about everything, like putting shows together, is the right way," said Schoen. "I think if they get the right opportunities they'll become something pretty successful."

So far, the label has one artist signed to it: Sgro, also known as 'Skyline' on stage. Within the next few weeks there's "gonna be like four" other artists connected with the label.

"We have a bunch of artists that we use all the time but we don't want to sign them because then we'd have to market them and so forth," said Burke. He added that around December, the label plans on signing some singer and songwriter types of artists.

Sgro had already produced two CDs before joining with Burke, but together they created a "mix tape" of Sgro and a couple other new artists.

"We go to Decap's house and they'd play the beat in the headphones and he [Sgro] would rhyme or rap into the microphone," said Burke. "Then you arrange, mix and master...it's a huge thing."

The group of friends took their CD to New England Compact Discs, in Salem, N.H., where they had hundreds of copies burned.

"We've sold roughly 1,000 at shows, online and especially person-to-person," said Burke. The beats and lyrics Sgro creates are all original, said Burke. Most of Sgro's lyrics are about life experiences, girls, cars, and more girls. Burke added that not too many songs are about money.

He said that although cashing in on the deal would be nice, it's not everything.

"Success doesn't have to be monetary but success does have to pay the bills, too," said Burke.

Schoen said the new CD has a unique sound.

"It has an underground sound but its got pretty catchy beats. You don't really hear a lot of white rappers," said Schoen.

He added, "They definitely don't sound like Eminem. It's pretty different."

Sgro also alters his songs when he performs in front of younger age groups.

"A woman approached us because she saw our article in the paper in Manchester, N.H. and she wanted us to perform at a dance studio in front of 6 to 15-year-olds," said Burke.

"We curtailed our music to no swearing and performed some songs that were upbeat and at the same time bleeped out what was bad or BJ rewrote a few verses to make them okay," said Burke.

He added, "We can do anything and everything for the most part in terms of the audience and age range."

KSC junior Rane Christensen has attended some of the shows.

"Put it this way, the shows in bars and venues, they always pack the place on nights when it wouldn't be crowded," said Christensen.

Schoen agreed.

"It's pretty upbeat for the most part because a lot of people stand up on the stage. The group's stage presence is pretty good. They move around and get the crowd into it," said Schoen.

In a year from now, Burke said he hopes the label will be putting together press kits and will "shop [the label] to bigger labels and be a subsidiary of that label [that buys them out]."

He compares his friendship with Sgro to that of rappers Jay-Z and Damon Dash, the two multi-talented Roc-a-fella Records owners.

"If we could ever be at their level," said Burke. "I mean Jay-Z's a crazy businessman and puts out good music, too."

But Burke already has some of these traits, according to Christensen.

"Josh works his ass off," he said. "He's running around all the time. It takes up a lot of his time."

Christensen added, "They're all a bunch of nice kids and they do a good job. They don't sound like white kids rapping from New Hampshire."

And Schoen thinks they're only going to get bigger.

"If they keep doing things the way they're doing it, I see them doing more shows and having people calling them back, like the Railroad for example," said Schoen.

"They seem to bring people in. Hopefully the shows will have bigger venues eventually."

Today, Burke works on finding gigs for the label's artists. They once had a show in Manchester that over 300 people attended.An upcoming show at the Railroad Tavern, in Keene, is also in the works.

Even though the job is "way more work than imaginable," Burke said he plans on continuing with the label for a while.

"Depending on its success, I'll either stick with it and see how it goes or get BJ to the point where he can go off on his own," said Burke.

He said that although cashing in on the deal would be nice, it's not everything.

Although he's contributed a lot to the label's creation, he remains modest.

"If BJ could go huge, I'd really like to not have anyone know a lot about me," said Burke. "I kind of do this more because I really like doing work and seeing something grow."

He added, "It's really cool to step back and be like, 'We created this from working really hard and putting in that extra effort.'"