Beneath the white-capped surface of Ithaca’s music scene, a whale has been swimming around our campus, gathering steam as it prepares to unleash a torrent of hip-hop innovation the likes of which will flip the space between your ears. A musical collective that combines minds from all of Ithaca’s corners, Time Out Club is more of a harmonious think tank than a group of musicians. Spearheaded by Doug Cloninger ’10 (Kid Vision), Darrell “Money Mars” Tate and Jaraun Wright (Khaim The Supreme Black), Time Out Club consists of an array of DJs, MCs and singer-songwriters working and thinking together to incite social and musical creation. The concept of individual advancement through musical cooperation started less than a year ago, but already the members find themselves under a number of encouragingly eager microscopes both online and in studios.

The Reality of Rap: Time Out Club

Time Out Club represents a new kind of musical community. While not all of the output has every voice on the track, there’s sure to be an array of ideas and suggestions coming from the different members. Rolling into their headquarters, I realized how powerful those different voices can be once combined. A lot like the Power Rangers, not so much like Captain Planet. Joining Doug in the circle were Mars, Mark Gaines ’09, Colin Calabrese ’10 (DJ Grumble) and Ellie Cushing (a.k.a. elly p), who provides the vocals and goosebumps for the group’s tracks. While we sat, she broke down a remix of Grizzly Bear’s “Two Weeks” that had the room silent for its entirety, no small accomplishment for any musician.

Kid Vision is set to release A Brave New World in January, his first mix-tape that will undoubtedly reflect the work and passion that have gone into its production. His beats are raw electronic symphonies that lend themselves to Mars and Black’s hip-hop sensibilities. Samples find a new identity in his music and swim around our ears in disjointed unity to create an eerily optimistic hallucination of the future. Vision’s philosophy, however, is one of the reasons this assortment of musicians has become a collective. Stressing the importance of social activism and change, he sees Time Out Club as an example of “our generation’s more conscious revolutionaries … we recognize the importance of getting respect from the powers that be in being able to reshape our surroundings.” Rather than the violence and conflict of the ’60s, however, this rebellion fixates on the emotional power of music. Sometimes our available passion can’t be fully realized without the psychological push and pull of a song.

Grumble has already released a number of mind-blowing mix-tapes called Freestyle Tools, with volumes one through four available to download — but only if you feel like getting your spine tingled by some of the wildest underground beats out there. Crawling around Ithaca’s vintage record stores, Grumble looks to an album’s artwork for inspiration. “If I see something I like, I’ll buy it … this music can often be about exposing great moments in a song and making it relevant for a contemporary audience.” His latest collection of beats, Freestyle Tools Vol. 4, features six of Kid Vision’s tracks intertwined with Grumble’s. Both artists have an unmatched ear for sample-based beats, twisting and turning tones from all musical walks into fresh new sounds for the waiting listeners.

Mars, for his part, has already released one major mix-tape with another waiting in the wings. The first, Mars Attacks, dropped this fall while his sophomore attempt Life On Mars is due out January alongside Kid Vision’s A Brave New World. Mars’s style is a supernatural sci-fi voyage, a futuristic acid trip through concrete streets filled with lessons learned and promises of an uncontaminated truth. In “Reality Rap,” Mars touches on one of Time Out Club’s mantras, letting us know, “You’re living with your eyes closed / This is the untold exposed / Money Mars the hip-hop nympho / My soul sold is a no go.”

What makes Time Out Club’s message all the more exciting is their imminent explosion. The group is set to unveil a new venue in downtown Ithaca with a massive show early next semester. The shows will take place in a 500-person space on the top floor of the Community School of Music and Arts. In collaboration with Moving Box Studios, an Ithaca-based production house, Time Out Club members have been steadily filming music videos, with “So Heavy” set to shoot this Thursday. Over the next couple of months, they plan on recording and finishing a new chapter of music to unleash to the public.

Almost all of Time Out Club’s different sounds can be found online at the Myspace accounts kidvisionmusic, khaimthesupremeblack and moneymars. Grumble’s beats can be found at Youtube.com/grimelab.