Names: Nick Vitale & Nick Taldi “Nikko”
Year: Junior / Junior
Majors: Business Administration with a Concentration in Entrepreneurship / Creative writing major and music minor
Meet Nick Vitale and Nick Taldi, best friends, college students, music lovers, young entrepreneurs, emerging artists, inspired writers, and dreamers who are ready to reach their reality, One Way or another. Vitale, NiKKo (Taldi), and their other friends work together on their new movement – One Way – despite the ten hour distance between them. Meet these talented young men who aren’t going to let anything stand in the way of doing what they love – creating music by cutting out pieces of themselves to share with the world. Be prepared to be blown away, check out their Facebook page and hear some of their music here!
What do you do in your free time?
Vitale: Listen to music, make music, read up on music like whats going on in Hip-Hop who’s making what, what album is dropping when how did this person make this song and whos working with whom on this project. How did this artist start out, what techniques does he like to use, how did this hip-hop mogul get started, what was their background, how did this record label get started etc. There’s so many things about this industry that it takes a while to wrap your head around it all.
NiKKo: In my free time I write as much as I can and play basketball, I play ball for SUNY New Paltz.
What is your ideal career?
Vitale: My ideal career is to one day head my own artist management firm. Kind of like an agency for musical artists. This is truly what I want to do with my life and I see myself personally and professionally managing NiKKo one day. I kind of do that right now but its on an amateur level but so far we’ve done well for ourselves with little resources.
NiKKo: My ideal career is to be a songwriter or a musician performing for people who appreciate my music. Yes I’ve changed my major to accommodate this dream. I also have a Journalism minor as a fall back.
Vitale, your name is mentioned at the end of the song “Only One Way,” how are you affiliated with Nikko?
Vitale: Like I said, you can call me NiKKo’s unofficial manager right now but right now. My main goal is to get him in front of as many people as I can so that people can hear how good he is – like I see everyday. Not a day goes by where we don’t talk about music or what we’re trying to do even though we’re 10 hours away from each other.
Is there a name for all involved?
Vitale: We like to call ourselves One Way. I foresee me naming my company after this title we’ve given ourselves someday. The idea behind One Way is that we’re only traveling in one direction and that is up and to our dreams. The story behind where the idea One Way came from is that apparently on a late night, Nick and a couple of the people we know were walking home from the bar and one of our friends actually walked into a one way sign. Nick said it just clicked at that moment and all he could think about for the rest of the night was heading straight to the top, and there’s only one way to get there.
NiKKo: “One Way,” it represents everyone involved including Church St., my friends (EMC) and the movement itself. Only headed towards success.
What exactly do you do? Write, rap, support, book shows, deal with press, manager, publicist?
Vitale: Well one thing I always do is take advantage of every opportunity I see as helping get NiKKo an audience, a fan base that will support him. An artist is nothing without his or her fans so right now that’s what I’m working on, whether it’s emailing bloggers, interviewing CEO’s of Hip-Hop websites, putting together interviews on local radio stations, and telling her campus about the worlds next biggest artist. I also take responsibility for coaching Nick, giving him advice, motivating him when he’s down, updating our fan Facebook page, street marketing … the list goes on but it’s all about exposure. One of my favorite things to do is show his music to a non-believer, or someone who doesn’t think that he or someone I know, could possibly have any talent. Whether it’s through my headphones from my iPod in class, on my computer, or in my car, that’s one of the greatest and most satisfying – seeing someone’s face light up when they hear his music and say to me, “you know what Nick, you may have something here.”
NiKKo: I write the songs, find the beats, and rap and sing on them. I’m the creative side of the organization.
How and why did Nikko get started making music?
Vitale: NiKKo got started writing poems in high school. One day we were in his room and he came up to me and was like, “Nick I can make my poetry into rap by just changing around the wording and stuff.” I was like, “what are you talking about that’s the dumbest thing I’ve ever heard and that will never work.” But he convinced me to give it a try and the first ever song we recorded was on my iPhone using its recording app. We actually put the iPhone up to a speaker where a YouTube instrumental was playing a beat and he would just rap into the iPhone. It took us a while to get it to work right but that’s how we started and we never looked back. I’ll never forget that day. It’s one of those things that I love telling people because when you look at how far we’ve come since that day its amazing.
NiKKo: I’ve always been a writer ever since I was a kid and was always actively listening to music. I was more into writing poetry, but when I got to college some of my teammates told me I should head into rapping, so I did. I started rapping with Vitale and recording songs for almost 2 years. Finally we’ve developed this movement and things are starting to grow.
How did you get started as being a part of this?
Vitale: I’ve been apart of NiKKo’s career ever since day one when I was holding up that iPhone to the speaker in his room.
Do you spend any money on this?
Vitale: Yeah we spend a good amount of money, but once our parents and friends started seeing how serious we’ve taken this, we’ve gotten some help with some good investments.
NiKKo: I spend money buying beats and equipment for recording, outside of that it hasn’t been too expensive.
How much time and effort does this consume?
Vitale: As much effort and time I can afford without letting myself fail out of college. I always get distracted when Nick sends me a song he’s made. If I have a test the next day, I know now not to listen to it because I’ll be way to excited about it to study anymore. It kills me that I’m not making music with Nick during the school year but over the summer and during breaks that’s all we do is work on what we like to call the One Way movement.
NiKKo: Writing was formerly a hobby but I’d usually write almost everyday. Now as the One way movement has progressed I’m working on songs or setting things up for performances or mix tapes every single day. It’s almost a full time job.
What are your hopes for the future?
Vitale: I know NiKKo’s going to be famous someday I have no doubt in my mind, it’s just going to take time to build up our fan base from a local following to a considerable fan base. Like I said before, its all about exposure and the more people that hear about One Way, the better.
NiKKo: My immediate hope is for our mixtape, “Chandelier Dreams,” to be a success and for it to help broaden our fan base. After that things should all fall into place and we hope to be signed to a record label and performing shows every weekend.
Are there any concerts or shows coming up?
Vitale: I am looking for shows around here that NiKKo can perform in, so if anyone wants to have NiKKo perform at there club or bar I’m sure we could get that done. In and around New Paltz we have some shows coming up, too.
NiKKo: We’ve entered a contest locally to open for Nas. Also, we should have some performances in New Paltz upon the mix-tape release of April 22nd.
Music videos could be a hit, have these been talked about?
Vitale: Yes and plans are in the works to shoot a video this summer. One of my friends actually shoots videos and wants to pursue a career in this area so he is going to help us once we come back home to Long Island for the summer.
NiKKo: Yes we plan to release one or two music videos before the release of the mix-tape.
Where can people find your music?
Vitale: Right now the main place you can find NiKKo and Kraus’ music is on Youtube, however, once the mixtape is done I will be posting links via our Facebook fan page so that people can download it for free. We’re looking at an April 22nd release date. Anyone interested can “like” NiKKo’s fan page on Facebook and be able to get all the latest news there. NiKKo also has a twitter: @NiKKo4three.
NiKKo: Youtube and Facebook; just type in NiKKo or One Way music.