BA#7

Warm up: If I could write about a famous person I would write about TobyMac. TobyMac is a christian song writer. TobyMac has allot of albums and won 4 grammys and has his own website, http://www.tobymac.com. TobyMac is also famous on Klove. I would like to write about him because his songs make me smile.


BA#7 Write about a person:
      I am writing about TobyMac, whose real name is, according to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toby_Mac, is Toby McKeehan. TobyMac was one of the first Christian rappers. He was first known for being a member of the Christian singing trio DC Talk, staying with them from 1987 until their announced hiatus in 2000. He has since continued a successful solo career with the release of four studio albums: "Momentum", "Welcome to Diverse City", "Portable Sounds", and "Tonight". He also made two remixed albums of the first two albums titled "Re:Mix Momentumand" and "Renovating Diverse City", respectively. Between DC talk and his own solo career, he has sold more than 10 million albums. TobyMac has had six #1 hit singles including "Gone", "Made to Love" and "Lose My Soul." 
        Fusing pop, rock, soul and hip-hop into what he calls a “musical gumbo,” TobyMac’s solo debut,"Momentum" released in 2001.  According to http://www.klove.com/music/artists/tobymac/ it featured popular tracks “Extreme Days,” “Get This Party Started” and “Yours,” which were all spotlighted in popular TV shows and video games.Then with his 2004 album "Welcome to Diverse City", TobyMac upped the creative ante with tracks such as “Burn For You” and “Atmosphere.” All three songs were used in promos for hit television shows, movies, sports programming and commercials. Welcome to Diverse City was also awarded the Dove Award for “Best Rap/Hip-Hop Album of the Year.” Continuing to make compelling music with a blatant faith focus, TobyMac has released two more successful studio albums which recently debuted at #6 on the Billboard 200. Their names are "Portable Sounds" and "Tonight."
        “Right here, right now / Under the stars / I promise You my heart / ’Cause it starts tonight,” Toby sings on the chorus of the title track.“If you gotta start somewhere why not here? If you gotta start sometime why not now?” he asks on “City on Our Knees.” And “I wanna straighten this before the sun goes down tonight,” he proclaims on “Start Somewhere.” His co-producer Chris Stephens, who has worked on TobyMac’s last three CDs, says,“There’s definitely a sense of urgency on this record.“And it’s an album that speaks of unity, of coming together and finding common ground to worship God.” Toby has long had a passion for racial reconciliation and unity, a recurrent theme in his music.His song TONIGHT includes songs of reconciliation of another kind—between husband and wife.  
           Toby and Amanda have been happily married for 15 years, but like all couples, it can be hard work sometimes. For Toby, who best expresses his emotions through music, it was a natural step to write about it. In “Hold On,” he sings, “If you move just a little bit closer / You can put your head on my shoulder . . . / Wipe away those tears / This one’s for you.” And on “Start Somewhere,” he’s downright confessional: “I said some things that I regret / And if I could, I’d take ’em back / But here I am, and there you are / The space between us is not so far / I’m reaching out my hand in love.” "Hold On’ is very personal,” Toby says. “Many lines are there to encourage my wife, but I know those lines could encourage anybody in a relationship. As for ‘Start Somewhere,’ any time you’re in love with somebody, you’re going to bang heads from time to time. I don’t know how many times I’ve been lying in bed, sweating it out and thinking, How am I going to make this right? But then you reach that moment of apology and forgiveness.
        TONIGHT is typical TobyMac in many ways—an eclectic mix of rap, rock, pop and funk, all laden with catchy hooks and melodies just itching for airplay and audience singalongs. There’s even a healthy dose of reggae on the album closer “Break Open the Sky,” where Toby flexes his Jamaican family ties while Israel Houghton provides guest vocals. Other visiting vocalists include Skillet’s John Cooper on “Tonight” and Relient K’s Matthew Thiessen on “Wonderin’.”

That’s one of my favorite songs on the record; it’s a personal

Of course most of the vocals belong to the artist himself. Stephens says Toby “has stretched himself as a vocalist, he writes about things he is passionate about and his vocals reflect that urgency”. Toby agrees: “I do more singing on this record than ever before. I’m learning to use my vocal instrument in different ways, and I’m getting more comfortable with it everyday”.

It all adds up to a project that reflects one man’s desire to push himself beyond “very good,” to dig deep in the quest for that other country where greatness resides. He certainly reached for it. Hard.

http://www.google.com/#hl=en&sugexp=gsis%2Ci18n%3Dtrue&cp=3&gs_id=f&xhr=t&q=Tobymac&qe=VG9i&qesig=VvpRE6EA3uZ6U8Wb83cFdA&pkc=AFgZ2tnA9x9PgHO
http://www.tobymac.com/about/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toby_Mac
http://www.klove.com/music/artists/tobymac/
http://www.tobymac.com/tour/