NIKO IS – Mos Def Rap
2013 · Directed by Quinn Parker
1.1K Likes
Best comments
1.“Sounds like the '70s and old-school hip-hop made a baby.”
More comments
- 2.“First time I listened to this, my mind was overloaded with information. A rare sensation.”
- 3.“Mos Def, Slick Rick and Capital STEEZ already killed the 'Auditorium' beat. NIKO IS did good, though.”
The story
NIKO IS is Nikolai Paiva, born in Rio de Janeiro in 1988 and raised in Orlando after his family moved to Florida when he was seven. At Dr. Phillips High School he teamed up with producer Thanks Joey and got a name as a freestyler. This one he labels a free verse: NIKO rapping over two Mos Def tracks, Auditorium and The Panties. Quinn Parker directed, Lucas Gonzalez shot it, and it went up in June 2013.
The timing was good. That May, Talib Kweli recorded with him and then invited him onto his new label, Javotti Media. According to Orlando Weekly, Kweli got hold of NIKO's mixtape Chill Cosby through Triska, a former host of Backbooth's Shake 'n Bass, and came back the very next day. NIKO's Javotti debut, Brutus, followed in 2015.
A Brazilian-born kid from Orlando, borrowing Mos Def's beats right as Talib Kweli came calling. Hip hop is a small town.
