Radius - Neighborhood Suicide

Chicago's hip hop producer Ramon Norwood or better known as Radius released his first official release Neighborhood Suicide on May 6 under The Secret Life Of Sound.

Radius is an innovative sample-based artist creating music with his MPC digital sampler. Started off his beat-making career in 2001 using the MPC Akai sampler which he still uses today, he have produced tracks for local rappers and appeared in several influential mixtapes in Chicago.

Radius commented on his new album adapted from a press release....

“Neighborhood Suicide started in late 2006 and early 2007, The Winter Season… I was tired of Chicago, but only because I felt I couldn't make anything workout here. I needed fresh air. I started working on a project that I felt reflected the way I was feeling, down and out but happy, free and expressive too, like I knew that if I could be heard I would feel better and I felt I would/could have people that would support my sound. I also was working on a lot of more break-heavy, experimental, more layered and zone out /journey tracks, as I'd like to call em. I knew I wanted to be known as a dope instrumentalist in addition to being known for crafting beats for rappers. I started piecing tracks together that had a particular energy or feeling and would not only reflect me personally but also my city. I felt my city even with all the recent progression within various types of media, still wasn’t receiving the shine it so deserved. So, I decided to make an album for Chicago, and all the elements that make it up, personally the neighborhoods. And to really make it from me, I decided to relate it to neighborhoods I for the most part lived in, frequently visited or just really enjoyed. Chicago is a high competitive city, where u are supported and can come up, but you always have to leave, you cant get stuck here, because as a whole we are disconnected and segregated and a large part of that has to do with our neighborhood and overall city layout and the elements within, including the CTA trains. So with the combination of my personal feelings as an artist and also as my regular self I felt the feeling of dying or suicide. I didn't want to really kill myself, but I knew the feeling. I chose to present that in my music, in this album. So a journey through Chicago, but also within me, u see it from the eyes of South Chicagoan but from a view from all over the city, because I lived in at least eight neighborhoods…”