PROBLEMS: The 24-year-old Houston, Texas, native has encountered more than a few problems with his stage name.

By Geoffrey Rowlands


“What’s in a name? That which we call a rose by any other name would smell as sweet.” These lines from Shakespeare’s “Romeo and Juliet” could perhaps apply to American rapper Tyshon Dwayne Nobles, better known now as T-Wayne. But the 24-year-old Houston, Texas, native has encountered more than a few problems with his stage name.
“Everybody knew me as T-Wayne since 5th grade,” he explained. “Nobody called me Tyshon, it was always T-Wayne. I liked this combination of my two given names. Everything was fine until T-Pain and Lil Wayne announced they would be recording together and intended to call themselves T-Wayne.
“This caused all sorts of confusion. I wasn’t a major player at the time but I was trying to make my way on the rap scene and here were these two stars basically stealing my name.
“I wasn’t going to take legal action against T-Pain and Lil Wayne. I’d have to spend I don’t know how much money on a lawyer’s fee to stop them using a name which not all that many people knew anyway.
“I decided to just change my stage name to Rickey Wayne. I’d heard the name in a ‘Riot’ freestyle that 2 Chainz had done. It sounded pretty good so I thought I’d call myself Rickey Wayne and see how things worked out.”
He released a mixtape under his new name. It had the appropriate title of “Who is Rickey Wayne?” The cover artwork featured a picture of T-Wayne plus the mixtape title but there was no artist credit. More confusion arose when reading the song details which were all credited to T-Wayne rather than Rickey Wayne.
With the combined T-Pain/Lil Wayne project not being released, T-Wayne reverted back to his original name.
“I guess I brought some of the confusion on myself. I still haven’t really decided which name to use. I tell people Rickey Wayne is my other name.”
If the T-Pain/Lil Wayne album ever does see the light of day, it could be these rap superstars who have to come up with a new name for their joint effort. T-Wayne is widely known now thanks to using his YouTube channel as a promotional tool. Fans who had previously only heard his work suddenly had videos to watch.
“I wanted to get my face out there. I posted stuff on YouTube every week. Music videos, dance videos, anything to get noticed. I made my first mixtape back in 8th grade. I passed it around the kids at school. Since then, I’d made so many recordings but no videos. My YouTube channel changed all that.”
His freestyle track, Nasty, was the song that really took off.
“Everybody loved the original dance video and could easily relate to the lyrics. It’s a hard freestyle saying some real stuff but there’s also some funny stuff that made people laugh.
“There were videos of people copying the dance moves. Some of the lyrics were pasted on to different short video clips and posted on Vine. The whole thing went viral and I found myself with a big hit song.”
300 Entertainment was the label which very wisely signed T-Wayne. With most of the song promotion already done on his YouTube channel, T-Wayne found Nasty hitting fourth spot on Billboard’s Hot R&B/Hip Hop Songs chart, number nine on the Hot 100 and selling pretty well throughout the world.
“I’ve been recording songs for years and doing okay on America’s rap scene but nothing more than that. All my success now happened so quickly. I’m comfortable with being famous but decisions have to be made about what happens next.
“I’m still promoting my ‘Who is Rickey Wayne?’ mixtape but we’re now talking about making albums rather than mixtapes and launching the video for my next single, I Be Killin It. I’ve got my name sorted out anyway, at least for now.”


in brief


The Phoenix Foundation

New Zealand indie rockers The Phoenix Foundation have announced an August 4 release date for their sixth studio album, “Give Up Your Dreams.”
Despite the rather downbeat title, frontman Samuel Scott insists the songs on their new album “represent something quite defiant, joyous and celebratory.”
See if you agree by listening to Mountain, the recently released lead single. The official audio is the latest posting at www.youtube.com/user/phoenixfoundationTV
Also available here is every track from the band’s previous albums, their entire “Tom’s Lunch” EP and all of The Phoenix Foundation’s official music videos.

Rob Thomas

Matchbox Twenty frontman Rob Thomas will release his third studio album, “The Great Unknown” later this year. Available now though is lead single, Trust You.
Although Rob has written or co-written songs for a host of stars such as Santana, Mick Jagger and Tom Petty, he has seldom collaborated with other writers for his own material. This pattern has been changed for the songs on his new album.
Rob wanted to try a different approach so deliberately sought co-writers whose work he particularly admires. These include Shep Goodman, Aaron Accetta and Ryan Tedder, the latter being his co-writer on Trust You.
The single can be heard at www.youtube.com/watch?v=D9JNrToT5T4
Rob’s previous solo albums are posted in full online. “...Something To Be” is at www.youtube.com/watch?v=eG9lskIUK48
“Cradlesong” can be found at www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL75823B0F4950059D

Disclosure

English electronic duo Disclosure say their second album is “nearly finished.”
Despite there being no title or prospective release date, Guy and Howard Lawrence have chosen to issue Holding On as the lead single. Featuring American jazz vocalist Gregory Porter, the song can be heard at www.youtube.com/watch?v=gVN6FqPpChQ
The new album will follow Disclosure’s 2013 UK chart-topper, Settle. This is available to hear in full at www.youtube.com/watch?v=8mhmB31TTE8&list=PLg4aSwO3XsLto--TP53MVt8iKg0vT-g4h

Icona Pop

Swedish duo Icona Pop have not exactly taken the music scene by storm since their world-wide chart success with I Love It.
Unlike guest artist, and song co-writer, Charli XCX, Caroline Hjelt and Aino Jawo have largely toiled in obscurity since they seemed set to become international stars. Perhaps they can recapture the glory days with their latest single, Emergency. Judge for yourself by checking out the official audio posted at www.youtube.com/watch?v=5a3KOyfkF7g
Links on this webpage take visitors to videos and audio postings of other Icona Pop singles. Their album, “This Is Icona Pop,” is posted in full at www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gwij-RcTl4w

Saara

How does a video of a girl speaking complete gibberish in a variety of languages attract ten million YouTube hits within a week?
Even the video creator, Saara Forsberg, has no idea. Like so many YouTube phenomena, the video took on a life of its own. It resulted in Saara making an appearance on The Ellen DeGeneres Show, signing a video development deal with Omnivision Entertainment and a recording contract with Capitol Music.
Although no-one could have imagined how popular Saara’s original video, and the subsequent sequels, might have become, the Finland-born but Los Angeles-based 21-year-old is certainly not your average YouTuber. She is an actress, comedian, impressionist, multi-instrumentalist and singer/songwriter.
Her debut single, Ur Cool, has just been released. Two different videos have been made. These are available to view at www.youtube.com/user/SAARAVEVO
Also here is a behind-the-scenes posting filmed during the video shoot.
Saara also guests on Finnish singer/musician Kasmir’s new single, Vauvoja. The video is at www.youtube.com/watch?v=fYqrcgqmI9Y brief