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Showing posts with label Rohan Marley. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Rohan Marley. Show all posts

Wednesday, August 1, 2012

Snoop Dogg No More- How About Snoop Lion


Talk about rebirth, nearly 20 years after releasing his debut single, "What's My Name?," Snoop Dogg -- born Calvin Cordozar Broadus, Jr. – shall now be referred to as Snoop Lion, so say the rapper during a press conference in NYC on July 30. The legendary hip-hop star has taken on the new identity after undergoing a spiritual and artistic rebirth in Jamaica. "I didn't want to be Snoop Dogg on a reggae track. I wanted to bury Snoop Dogg and become Snoop Lion, but I didn't know that until I went to the temple and received the name Snoop Lion from the Nyabinghi priest," he explained. "From that moment on, I started to understand why I was there and was able to create something magical in this [Reincarnated] project, something I haven't done before in my career."
Married to high school sweetheart Shante Taylor since 1997, Snoop has three children: Cori, Corde and Cordell. The rapper, famous for profane, over-the-top tracks about sex, drugs and partying, believes his new music will give him "a chance to perform for kids and grandkids."
According to him, the image makeover was a necessary step in fulfilling his musical destiny. "I have always said I was Bob Marley reincarnated," the rapper said. "I feel I have always been a Rastafari. I just didn't have my third eye open, but it's wide open right now." Marley's son, Rohan, 40, gave Snoop his blessing at the press conference, which was held at the popular Caribbean restaurant - Miss Lily's in New York City.
"There comes a point where you say I done it all, or there isn't much more to do," Snoop said. "This was like a rebirth for me." The 13-time Grammy Award nominee added that "rap is not a challenge" anymore. "I had enough of that. It's not appealing to me no more. I don't have no challenges. I'm 'Uncle Snoop' in rap. When you get to be an uncle, you need to find a new profession so you can start over and be fresh again. I want to be a kid again."
“This awakening was necessary,” he told a press assemblage at Miss Lily’s jerk joint in New York’s West Village on Tuesday. “I don’t even know why, I don’t know how. I thought I was going to make another gangsta record. I thought I was going to do another pimp album. I thought I was going to do what I do. But this called me and put all of that to rest.”
The album, Reincarnated, featuring the lead single, “La La La,” was produced by Major Lazer, the team known for their work with Beyonce, Usher, M.I.A. and Santigold.

“Snoop wanted real reggae music,” Major Lazer’s Diplo explained. “He wanted to sing and find a new voice. It’s a dream for a producer to work on an entire record. I always work on a song here or a song there, but working on an entire record is very rare to do that with an artist nowadays. There’s no label here. It’s Snoop putting together the project and Ted. That’s 100% creative control. That doesn’t exist anymore.”

Snoop isn't the only celebrity to change his professional name: rapper Sean Combs has gone by Puff Daddy, Diddy and P. Diddy, Los Angeles Lakers forward Ron Artest changed his name to Metta World Peace and "1 Thing" singer Ameriie added an extra "i" to her name.



Friday, June 22, 2012

Stir It Up Marley Coffee Getting To Be Quite The Brew

Jammin Java Corp. (OTCBB: JAMN) d/b/a Marley Coffee, a sustainably grown, ethically farmed and artisan roasted gourmet coffee, today announced a general corporate update to supplement its recently filed first quarter 2012 results.

The Company believes a key to its growth is a multichannel distribution and sales strategy and its success in introducing a wide array of coffee products through multiple distribution channels using the Marley Coffee brand name. The main channels of revenue for the Company are now and are expected to continue to be: US and international grocery retail, online retail, office coffee services (OCS), foodservice, vending and automated retailing.

"Over the past 10 months, we've gone from selling one line in the US, our organic Whole Bean offering, to become an international gourmet coffee company with a portfolio of exceptional, distinctive coffee and tea products," said Rohan Marley, chairman, Marley Coffee. "Our expanded product line allows us to offer Marley Coffee through any business channel we choose to pursue and we've been working with distributors and other business partners worldwide to aggressively establish sales in new and diversified channels."
"We have created a foundation from which to increase our market share and bring our brand and products to customers worldwide, which we expect will deliver long-term value to our shareholders," said Brent Toevs, CEO, Marley Coffee. "While we're very pleased with our significant top-line growth, we recognize there is still much work ahead of us to improve our bottom-line performance and to effectively build upon our forward momentum.

Our first quarter 2012 revenue increase reflects the hard work of many people on our team and among our business partners."  Since August 2011, the Company has expanded beyond its original organic Whole Bean offering to introduce:
  • Marley Coffee Organic Ground and Marley Coffee Jamaica Blue Mountain® Ground;
  • Award-winning, compostable Single-Serve Pods for Bunn and other pod-based home and office brewers;
  • The new Marley Coffee RealCup™, compatible cartridges for use in most models of Keurig's popular K-Cup brewing system;
  • New OCS and foodservice products, including 2.5oz frac packs and 2lbs. Whole Bean bags;
  • Branded vending solutions with industry innovators, AVT and Seaga/Saeco; and
  • The Marley Coffee-brand Bike Caffe mobile retail franchise.
Toevs, concluded, "Our goal is to make Marley Coffee universal and give coffee lovers and those invested in the success of the industry the opportunity to provide and enjoy our products whenever, wherever and in whatever format they prefer – at home, the office or on-the-go through traditional and online retailers, office coffee services and foodservice programs, branded vending solutions, and our new, earth-friendly mobile franchise concept. We look forward to continued growth."
U.S. and international grocery retail channels have grown to become the Company's largest revenue channels, followed by online retail, office coffee services, food service and licensing. Geographically, the Company initially focused on retail grocery sales and marketing on the West Coast and Southwestern parts of the United States and Western Canada. In the past few months, the Company has expanded to add distributor relationships in the Midwest and Northeast regions of the United States. The Company expects ongoing discussions with retailers will enable it to place Marley Coffee products in more retail chains throughout the year. Key retail products currently include Marley Coffee Organic Ground, Jamaica Blue Mountain Ground, and Whole Bean offerings. The new Marley Coffee RealCup is expected to begin shipping in September 2012 with orders being accepted now.


The largest and best known Marley Coffee retailers in the US currently include Fresh & Easy (a subsidiary of UK-based Tesco), Whole Foods Markets, Mollie Stone's, New Leaf Markets, Andronico's, Dean & Deluca and many independently owned gourmet specialty shops as well as online via Amazon.com and others and International distribution partnerships, which the Company began to establish in late 2011, are beginning to reap benefits. Marley Coffee is now available in the United Kingdom and Europe, Japan, the Caribbean and Chile. The Company expects to expand distribution to Australia as well as additional markets in South America in 2012.

The Company expects to experience growth in its OCS business segment starting in September 2012 when it begins shipping its new Marley Coffee RealCup product to distributors and OCS service providers.  The Company announced a licensing partnership agreement with AVT, Inc. (OTC: AVTC), a leading developer of automated and self-service retailing systems, to create high-end Marley Coffee-branded automated coffee vending and merchandising machines that target college campuses, traditional retail locations, high-density traffic areas such as theaters and hotels, and traditional foodservice vendors. Several large retailers have already inquired about these new vending machines and the Company expects to begin seeing revenue from sales this fiscal year.