| The Rundown |
| Hip Hop Name: |
Billy Drease Williams |
| Alias: |
Edreys |
| Discipline: |
MC (Oral Tradition) , Producer, Visual artist (Illustrator) and Educator wrapped in flesh darker than a brown paper bag.) |
| Strengths: |
Water (a creative mind that adapts to anything) |
| Weakness: |
Human |
| Reps For: |
Buff (Buffalo, NY) |
| What olde skool record always puts a smile on your face? |
Planet Rock - Afrika Bambaataa & the Soulsonic Force |
Who he is:
For the past 10 years, Edreys –pronounced “Ed-dreez” –has been
charting his own course through the Hip Hop industry as an independent
artist, all the while working to unify Buffalo’s piecemeal rap scene.
He also has challenged the bountiful stereotypes that have plagued Hip
Hop from its beginnings.
“Hip-hop gets a bad name, and some
of that is justified,” says Edreys, who also performs beneath the nom
de plume Billy Drease Williams. “I’ve always worked against that whole
idea that Hip Hop concerts are unsafe, that anyone who Raps is a drug
addict who carries a gun and has a misogynistic streak. “Hip Hop is
art, when it’s at its best. And it is also a significant part of the
culture –here in Buffalo, of course, and in the whole country, as well.”
Casting
himself as a conduit between what he sees as the popular conception of
Hip Hop as a dangerous, unsavory art form and the reality –“It’s a
celebration of a culture, and of art in general” –Edreys has balanced
his career as MC, record-maker and songwriter with efforts to provide
opportunities for the Buffalo rap community to flourish. Along the way,
he has become the most promising, adventurous, nigh-on-visionary Hip
Hop artist Buffalo has yet produced.
