While speaking to Cloud 9’s two lead vocalists, Doug Fredericks and Mike Tangney, we got a chance to know the up and comers and really get a feel for what they’re all about. Starting off as two college students who just loved to make music, Doug and Mike had been in a group previous to Cloud 9 that I guess you could call just another Hip-Hop act. With a decent catalog of songs under their belt, the group felt that they were on to something great. It was around that time that a member of the group got flakey and ditched Doug and Mike to pursue another project.
“Once that happened, Mike and I decided that we had been in college too long=2 0and we had to move back home. When we got back, we did one of our first shows with a guitarist named Mike McInerney. We had used nothing but beats before so after having some live music on the stage, we knew it was an avenue that we had to pursue” said Doug
The guys agreed that a mixture of hip-hop with live music was not only more interesting, but a lot more fun! Within a week and a half, Doug and Mike had themselves a band that consisted of family members and long time friends. Now a group complete with two guitarists, a bass player, a drummer, and two vocalists Cloud 9 was complete.
The group was on a mission to do something great, something that they could call their own. They didn’t just want to be another band on the road trying to make it, and if they were going to make it, they were going to do it on their own terms.
“Even from the beginning, Doug and20I said that we would only make music that we felt was real to us. It was going to be about what was going on in our lives. We would write about being broke, crazy girls, and getting wasted. It was never a fake portrayal of something that we weren’t, and people dug that. What’s most important to us is that people have a great time listening to our music” said Mike
The group is currently touring and has recently wrapped up a video with Lunch Box Beats, an Audio/Visual house that does video shorts of Hip-Hop artists performing clips of their own songs. The video features Doug and Mike rapping over a pre-recorded beat, something that they haven’t done in quite a while.
“We thought it was a cool idea because it puts the raw essentials of an MC up on display. You get what you get, there’s really no smoking mirrors behind it. We’ve gotten to know these guys (Lunch Box Beats) through shows and eventually we found out that we’re actually on the same page so doing this video with them brought all of us down to earth and made us realize that we ’re all idiots. It was a great collaboration!” said Doug
The band has also just released their debut album titled Evolution 9 which is available through ITunes and the bands website, IHeartC9.com. Evolution 9 has been a hit so far with bangers like How ya Livin’ and one of Cloud 9’s ballads if any, Ball and Chain.
Cloud 9 is keeping busy writing material for their sophomore album while touring at the same time. With shows everywhere from Plattsburgh to New York City the band is having a great time doing what they’re doing, and show no signs of slowing down. This is definitely one band to keep a close eye on!
