Tanya Morgan

Tanya Morgan is not a WNBA player or a soul singer. She’s not an actress either because this is not even a she, but a them, instead. Simply put, Tanya Morgan is an exciting new rap trio. MC Von Pea and MC Donwil now call Brooklyn home, whereas Ilyas resides in Cincinnati. Together, these talented men create music that naturally reflects real life, instead of, say, the violent prison fantasies and borderline porn music so popular – and so overdone – in mainstream hip-hop. And their most recent effort, Brooklynati, highlights an autobiographical side to this talented three-piece.

Stereo Subversion recently took a few minutes to talk with Von Pea about this uniquely named group, and their uniquely personable music. So if all the gratuitous sex and violence coming out of the hip-hop community has left you standoffishly cold to the genre, Tanya Morgan just may restore your warm feelings to the form.

Stereo Subversion: You folks are a group, and there aren’t many rap groups these days. What inspired you to form a group, where you’re better together, so to speak?

Von Pea: We all started out as solo artists. Myself and Donwil, we have so many different song concepts and just things that we wanted to do. For example, at our first show, we performed in suits. Just because, at the time, nobody was really dressing up. So as performers, we thought it would be funny to do that. I said to him, ‘One day, I just want to perform dressed up as if I was coming to work.’ And he said, ‘Yeah, I was thinking about that; that’d be funny.’ Just little things like that.

We just had so many little ideas that were similar that we just thought we should make more stuff together. Donwil and Ilyas, they were already a group because they went to college together, North Carolina. They knew each other from there and they both were doing songs together. So, more or less, I got together with them and they saw me and Donwil always having similar ideas. And you know, we just gave it a try. We just did the first project [Moonlighting], and people liked it. So we decided to stick together.

SSv: When it comes to creating music, do you all get in the same room and kind of create, or do you do things separately? How does that work out?

Von Pea: Most of the time, it’s separately.

SSv: Really?

Von Pea: Ilyas lives in Cincinnati. Donwil and I live in Brooklyn. He [Donwil] lives about maybe half a mile from me. I hang out with him all the time, but as far as doing music together, we try not to do too many songs together as far as the group because we don’t want to come up with ideas and flesh them out when Ilyas can’t be there. We come up with things all separately, and put it in a pot, figuratively speaking, and we all just pick from there so it won’t be so many ideas fleshed out without the third member. But we have done some songs that are all of us together, when we all get a chance to.

SSv: I imagine you have some funny stories about people getting confused over your name. What are some of your favorites, where people thought you were a woman or something?

Von Pea: The number one thing happened when we were in Foxborough one time and we were at a house party and the DJ was throwin’ like a graduation party or something like that. And the DJ was, like, ‘We have Tanya Morgan in the house.’ And it was funny because a woman’s actual name was Tanya Morgan that was there.

SSv: Oh no!

Von Pea: And she was, like, ‘What? What’s going on?’ Why would she be announced like that? Why would they be saying her whole name, like she was an actress or whatever? It was funny because we were, like, ‘Wait! That’s our group!’ And you know what, she wasn’t really weirded out. She just thought it was funny.

SSv: That was the greatest day of her life.

Von Pea: Yeah. She thought it was real random. She thought it was funny. That’s probably the best story of somebody being confused.

SSv: That’s hilarious! Do you ever get people that want to book you to sing as a soul act? Do the ever get confused and call you Ms. Tanya?

Von Pea: On the first album, Moonlighting, there was a woman on the cover because the concept of the album was to throw people off. It actually ended up working because they were seeing it in the wrong section of the record store. We once did a show that was a showcase for female artists. Bu they had us on as a joke. I guess as an inside joke for themselves. Everybody else was a female MC, or a singer, or a singing group. It was celebrating women, but they invited us out because they were just fans of us and wanted to see us come out. And just ironically, we have a woman’s name, so I guess that was their excuse for having us come out.

SSv: Well, that certainly gets you that extra attention; that separates you from the pack.

Von Pea: Yeah.

SSv: One of the things I like about your music, and I think I speak for a lot of people like me in that once rap music started to get into all of the gangsta stuff and all of the drugs and the thugs and that sort of thing, we kind of got off the bandwagon because we don’t really relate to that. But when I listen to your music, you guys tell stories. You talk about your hometowns. You talk about people in your life. You talk about things that everybody can relate to – not just guys breaking the law.

Von Pea: Thank you.

SSv: Is that intentional? That you want to reach people that are beyond sort of the core rap fan base?

Von Pea: It’s not so much us trying to reach a certain demographic or anything like that. I can’t speak for all of us, but it’s a lot easier to speak on what you can just directly relate to. The music is more of a conversation. It’s almost like…I would compare it to you hanging out with your friends. You can sit there and talk to them about something they know you didn’t do, or you can just talk to them about what you did at work or what you’re going through today, versus, ‘Ah no, yesterday I was in this crazy shootout and I jumped out of the helicopter’ because they know that didn’t really happen. And it’s a lot harder to lie than, you know, tell the truth. That’s where we come from with this.

SSv: Do you think you were born with your gift? Was there a point in your life where you knew you had the imagination to take, say, a life experience and turn it into a song?

Von Pea: The funny part is yes. I’ve seen video tape of when I was a kid and I would just stand in front of the video camera and just make up all these stories and just be like sitting there just trying to perform for the camera. It’s funny because as I got older I got kind of shy, but I still get up there and perform shows and perform on songs on our albums. I remember writing songs when I was in fourth grade; now I’m 27.

SSv: Did anybody in your family tell you you’d be doing something like this? Did anybody predict it?

Von Pea: It was funny, but a guy who plays piano, a session musician – this is from the ‘80s. My mother used to tell me the story about when she found out we were making music and sending out videos and stuff. She was, like, “You know, that guy came up to you one day, and he was just, like, ‘You know what, your son is going to make you rich one day.’” There hasn’t been any rich money, but beyond that, just getting to do it, I’m happy for that. If all else fails, it’s a talent that…you can lose money, but you can’t lose your talent. They can’t take that away from you.

SSv: Do you get frustrated about the future of the music business, or are you excited because it’s changing so rapidly that we won’t know what it will look like five years from now?

Von Pea: I don’t get frustrated. It’s kind of scary. I don’t know what’s going to happen. I think it’s scary more than anything. I’m not mad at it. You don’t know what’s going to happen. It seems like a lot of bands that used to make a lot, sell a whole bunch of records, this and that, they can’t do it anymore. Regardless of what you think about him, 50 Cent was huge a few years ago. And now when he puts out a song, people are, like, ‘Whatever.’ But just two or three years ago, he was selling millions and millions of records. Regardless of what you think of him, I don’t even see that as cool. I think that’s scary.

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Tagged as: Brooklyn, Cincinnati, Hip-hop, Rap

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