Jane Handcock has written for some of the top names in music, and now it's her turn to step into the limelight. She's an R&B vocalist from Richmond, who has penned songs for the likes of Kelly Rowland, Rick Ross, Teddy Riley and Tyrese. As of late she's worked with the Grand Nationxl collective, dropping multiple songs on their group productions as well as a solo project of her own.  Now Jane, who got her start singing in East Bay churches, has relocated to Los Angeles where she's on the verge of dropping a project under the guidance of the legendary Snoop Dogg.  This week, we discuss how Jane is handling the pivot from being "the most known-unknown" ghostwriter out here, to being a star in her own right.

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Bay Area Ghostwriter Behind Hip Hop's Biggest Names Takes Center Stage

In Evelyn LaChapelle's first team meeting at a new job in the cannabis industry, they were discussing sales when she noticed a "righteous anger" brewing inside her. "My paperwork says I went to jail for over a hundred kilos of cannabis," says Evelyn, "and they're talking sales goals in kilos."   Since Evelyn was incarcerated for marijuana related charges, she's worked in the hospitality industry, for others in the cannabis industry and has recently become the CEO of a cannabis company called 87 Months, named for the amount of time she was sentenced. But this journey has not been easy. Evelyn had a front row seat in California's changing cannabis laws, the whiplash from the speed of these shifts, and the inequitable ways the industry can shake out. She's also been a witness to the difficulty and lack of support in the re-entry process. And she's one of thousands. Over 10 years ago, California was ordered to reduce it's prison population due to severe overcrowding, and more recently the pandemic forced the state to release even more people. On the outside, many are met with self-doubt, issues with learning new technology or discrimination based on their record.  

Overcoming Re-Entry and Taking on the Industry That Incarcerated Her

East Oakland's Capolow is a rapper on the rise. Known for his high-energy anthem songs and his catchy "aye-aye!" ad lib, Capolow's music is ringing bells in the Bay Area and beyond. He made an album called "Oakland Nights" with Kamaiyah, and has made individual tracks with E-40, ALLBLACK, and Nef The Pharaoh. But before he was a rapper – ten years ago – Capolow was one of the students in my class at Oakland Tech.

Say Aye Aye for the Bay With Oakland Rapper Capolow

"Dynamite" Daisy Bamberger stands inside the ring by herself, shadowboxing. She's surrounded by free weights, kettle balls, punching bags and framed photos from old tournaments. Daisy continues to go through her routine. It's a routine that's obviously working for her. Daisy is a highly decorated 19 year-old boxer from Hayward. After ranking number one in the country and winning 10 national championships, she's setting her sights on competing in the 2024 Olympics. And the dream started right here, at Lightning's Boxing Club. She's been punching these bags since she was in elementary school. Boxing is in her blood. Her father, Mario Bamberger, is a boxer and now trains her. As a product of Hayward High School, the same school that birthed legendary boxer Andre Ward, Daisy looks to carry on the East Bay Boxing legacy. This week on the podcast we hear how becoming a boxing champion has not been as simple as floating like a butterfly. As a child, Daisy was teased about being overweight. Through hard training and personal sacrifice, Daisy overcame her bullies and laid the foundation for a run at Olympic gold.

A ‘Dynamite’ Young Boxer From Hayward With Olympic Dreams

Xiomara's "Chardonnay" was my song this summer. The track is an audio version of driving down Highway 1 at sunset. Smooth and melodic, with an earnest message to the listener-- advising them to steer clear of that glass of wine they're considering purchasing. Xiomara says that "Chardonnay" is a metaphor about living within your means and "examining this desire for some far off things, some opulent thing, and getting real and saying nah I need to let that go and stay in the moment."  That track is a single off her album, Sistas, a project that showcases Xiomara's ability to move through a spectrum of musical genres, while telling stories that speak to the experiences of sistas in her life. This week, we get a chance to talk to the East Bay musician about the influences she pulls from as an artist, and how she hopes to influence others with her work.

Good Vibes and Soulful Feels in a New Album for the ‘Sistas'

At San Francisco's Public Glass, locals have the opportunity to get hands on experience in this ancient and evolving craft. The organization's executive director, Nathan Watson, says his mission is to ensure that Public Glass isn't just located in the Bayview neighborhood, but actually involves community members in their work.

2000 Degrees: Glassblowing in the Bayview

Have you ever wanted nail art that highlights your favorite Disney Movie? Maybe nails that show Mulan below a cherry tree, or Alice at her Wonderland tea party, or maybe you want to see Stitch getting into shenanigans across your hands... Whatever your preference, Vivian Xue Rahey has you covered. These conversation pieces are clear fan favorites online. Vivian's Pamper Nail Gallery has hundreds of thousands of followers on Instagram and TikTok, and millions more views. It's a unique art form. And luckily for the fans, getting these fly nails has gotten easier. Since the start of the pandemic, Vivian Rahey, has switched up her "Disneyland of Nails" business model: moving from appointments in the salon where nails are painted on site, to an e-commerce model where you can order press-on sets that arrive to your doorstep already bedazzled and painted with scenes from your favorite flick. Despite changes to the model, the company is staying true to the vision she first described to me in the Spring of 2019. Today, we're revisiting that conversation with the queen of Disney nails and hearing how this art-based business not only stayed afloat, but expanded in the midst of a global pandemic.  

Pressing On with Press-On Nail Art During The Pandemic

Tajai Massey sees Hiero day as a physical manifestation of the Souls of Mischief's most famous song, "93 Til Infiinty", where he and the other emcees give listeners a taste of life in Oakland. These days, living in Oakland, it's hard to ignore the growing wealth disparities, the massive unsheltered population, and continued gentrification. "A lot of folks I see during Hiero Day, they've had to move away, to Stockton, Sac, L.A... anywhere that's cheaper than here. But we see them on Hiero Day, so it's like a big family reunion," says Tajai. Another unfortunate change in the Bay Area: fewer affordable art spaces. This week on Rightnowish, we talk to Tajai about the intersection of culture and the built environment, and the importance of having access to space in order to share, celebrate and create culture.  

On Hiero Day, Tajai Massey Says Culture Needs Physical Spaces

Wolfe-Goldsmith teamed up with a handful of artists to create the 5th Story NFT art gallery, where murals were adapted into augmented reality by Black Terminus Labs. They are also converting the art into three dimensional pieces that will be housed on the blockchain network and sold as NFTs, which will allow the creators to have more control over the value of their work. Wolfe-Goldsmith is a talented muralist behind some of the largest new pieces of public artwork in Oakland, including the two-story mural of the women of the Black Panther Party in West Oakland, and he huge mural of Stoney Creations and Yanni Brump on Telegraph and 17th. You can also see her depiction of an African American woman dancing on the side of the Oakland Tribune Tower in the heart of the town. But this latest project is one she hopes will change the future of murals and hopefully bring more stability into the livelihood of muralists.

Rachel Wolfe-Goldsmith Is Imagining The Future of Murals

Prentice Powell is an East Bay poet whose been working from home a lot lately. This has caused some confusion for his kids, "They were just like, 'So dad, do you have a job?'" Powell does have a job, and does big things: he's performed his poems on The Arsenio Hall Show, Verses and Flow, and in the upcoming Nick Cannon movie, She Ball. And just this week, Powell concluded a residency at The Kennedy Center in Washington DC with Fiveology, a poetry group of his longtime friends and collaborators. For Powell, poetry is his work, his passion, a way to express what he feels and work out what he thinks. And while he puts a lot of his life into his poems, he's decided there are certain topics to keep off the page and the stage, and certain poems he'd like to leave in the past. This week on Rightnowish, Prentice Powell talks about fatherhood and poetry: how sometimes they mix and sometimes they don't.

How the Art of Fatherhood Informs the Craft of Poetry for Prentice Powel

As the COVID-19 pandemic ravaged the health of individuals and communities around the world, Harvey Lozada focused on the stories coming from the neighborhood just south of San Francisco's Market Street, the SOMA District. Through the film “It Takes The Hood to Save The Hood," Lozada shows how community organizations shifted their focus from being community resources, to being first responders.  

Frisco Born Filmmaker Harvey Lozada Turns the Camera on SOMA

Bookcases and bird feeders take shape amid the whir of chop saws, the bang of hammers and the trill of drills. Behind the power tools are girls and non-binary youth, mostly in high school and middle school, but the youngest builders start at age 9. West Berkeley's Girls Garage was founded by Emily Pilloton-Lam in 2013, the organization's mission is to make sure young women and non-binary teens have the physical and metaphorical tools to get the job – any job – done. This week, we're back to talking to people in-person for the first time in over a year. And what better way to get out there than to jump into the saw dust and discuss all that comes from the process of building.

Building Confidence One Power Tool at a Time at Berkeley's Girls Garage

In 2006, when music producer Trackademicks remixed the smash hit by E-40 and Keak Da Sneak, "Tell Me When To Go," he created a cultural jewel that sent waves throughout the Yay. The remix took a seminal song from the Hyphy Movement, added a unique wrinkle, and then proceeded to make your face melt. The track could be heard at pep rallies in the valley, in nightclubs in San Francisco and blasting out of the front grill speakers of Chevy vans as they smashed through Deep East Oakland. Trackademicks, a half-Black and half-Filipino guy who was raised in Alameda, looks at his own lineage and says remixing things is in his DNA, literally. It was already in the music too, the Hyphy movement has its own history of mixing genres, which allowed it to birth something unique in The Bay. Now, as a number of rappers (including Trackademicks) make music that harkens back to that era, we thought it'd be a good time to discuss how the big sun glasses, fun dances, and uptempo music of the Hyphy Movement came to be.

A Hyphy History with Producer Trackademicks

Dueñas Car Club is a sisterhood that rolls on 100-spoke rims. Founded in 2019 and based in Sunnyvale, the head of the club is Angel Romero. She's been cruising the strip since she was a kid as a passenger in her mother's lowrider. It was through her mother that Angel inherited her passion for cool cars, cruising through the city, and serving the community. Now, the members of the car club work with local organization to hold toy drives and distribute safety kits. They also pull up to events like car hops and car shows, stunting in full force. Angel says it's amazing to see the look on the people's faces when their fleet of dope cars driven by women pulls through, but it's the young women whose imaginations they really love to inspire. This week we discuss coordinating outfits with the color of your lowrider, the criminalization of lowriding culture, and how Angel is passing on her love of cars to the next generation of young women.

Roll With Us: A Sisterhood of Lowriding

Santa Rosa’s Randy Harlan and Bolinas’ Garnett Silver-Hall are known for using wheelchairs the same way others use skateboards-- grinding on rails and riding off ramps. The duo are both adaptive athletes in the "chair skating" community and founders of Northern California's Wheelchair Motor Cross-- WCMX. After connecting through mutual friends, the two have skated at parks in Northern California and competed in Southern California. Now Randy and Garnett teach other folks how to become involved in adaptive sports. This week we hear how it feels to drop into a bowl at the skatepark and the dangers of attempting a backflip in a wheelchair.

Roll With Us: Extreme Wheelchair Sports

Rightnowish digs into life in the Bay Area right now… ish. Journalist Pendarvis Harshaw takes us to galleries painted on the sides of liquor stores in West Oakland. We’ll dance in warehouses in the Bayview, make smoothies with kids in South Berkeley, and listen to classical music in a 1984 Cutlass Supreme in Richmond. Every week, Pen talks to movers and shakers about how the Bay Area shapes what they create, and how they shape the place we call home.

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