Stone Mecca: First Contact

As part of the Wu-Tang family, Stone Mecca is an amalgamation of hip hop, funk and soul music–a musical movement venerated at first contact. Live instrumentals and tantalizing lyrics over smooth melodies and heavy bass are the makeup of First Contact, the group’s debut album. With noticeably old school funky rhythms in tracks like “The Key” and “Dream Maker”, the album is nonetheless a refreshing equilibrium of soulful songs like “In Love” and “A Walk.” Stone Mecca takes listeners on a journey through the intricacies of love and relationships, while offering a genuine introduction into the music that is Stone Mecca. Come join the movement.

Q: Who comprises the Stone Mecca family?
Nine of us make up the group (Sir Joseph, Prince Darryl, Princess Adrienne, Princess Azure, Sir Branches, Prince Damon, Princess Dionna, Prince Jevon, and Prince Trú) but the family is vast. If you’re down with the movement that is STONE MECCA, you’re considered family because we all become one through music.

Q: How did the Stone Mecca movement get started?
It was born of people outside of the music telling us the effect our music had on them. The initial focus was to give people the quality of music we think they deserve and now it’s our mission.

Q: What’s the meaning behind the name?
Stone being solidarity and Mecca being the spiritual center or the home. We want our fans to know they can depend on us to be true and always give them music from our soul. A solid(STONE) home(MECCA) for the heart.

Q: Your album, Stone Mecca: First Contact, is truly refreshing. Songs like “A Walk,” Beautiful” and “Good Woman,” for example, are reminiscent of those old-school, feel-good melodies, yet maintain a modern sound. What themes does this record explore?
This album is the introduction to our sound and mainly focuses on relationships. We have a lot of songs done for our next album and some touch more on life issues but we will always have something for the lovers.

Q: Who/what are your musical influences?
Anyone who ever wrote true songs from the soul. It could be a rock song, a soul song, a country song or whatever, if a person puts his soul in it you can feel it. And of course Stevie Wonder, Sly Stone, Earth Wind & Fire, Marvin Gaye, Rufus and Chaka, Patti Labelle and all the other soul pioneers that have transferred their emotions to sound.

Q: If you could go back in time and work with an artist from a previous era, who would that be?
I’ll give you one of a few and that is Bob Marley because he was able to put into songs the true feeling of what people really wanted to say and remain raw in doing so.

Q: How does Stone Mecca separate itself from some of the commercialized music of today?
We don’t approach music from a ‘what’s going on in music today’ state. We create from the moment and what we’re feeling right then. We try to keep it as genuine as can be from the first drum sound to the last vocal take.

Q: Stone Mecca is featured on The RZA Presents: Afro Samurai Soundtrack, what was it like working with RZA on that project?
He’s genius-minded and a very real person. He told us what he needed for the project and we gave him “A Walk” and “Oh” and they fit.

Q: Are there any future projects in the works with Wu-Tang?
Well, we’re part of the WU-TANG family and we played with them on the 07′ Rock the Bells tour and the last Bobby Digital tour. We also did work on the new WU-TANG 8 Diagrams album. There’s talk of a few collabs in the future that will be updated on our site.

Q: What does Stone Mecca hope its fans and listeners will take away from the music?
We hope to move the souls of people and fill a void in the spirit that may be missing in music today. We believe music can heal people mentally, spiritually, and emotionally and we want to do our part as a source of that healing. People need to be able to turn on a song and have there emotions stirred in the world today to make an easier tomorrow.

Q: Is there anything else you’d like our readers to know about the movement?
We believe that we are all brothas and sistas of this earth, when it comes down to it, and our mission beyond music is to bring people together to know each other and get rid of the preconceived notions and fears that separate us. Let’s celebrate humanity as a whole and not be afraid to be different, expressive and innovative.

First Contact is available on iTunes, Rhapsody, MusicNet, Napster, eMusic, Sonny Connect, GroupieTunes and Amazon MP3 for download and hard copies are available at stonemecca.com. For more Stone Mecca, visit myspace.com/stonemecca.