BTV Hip-Hop Godfathers Nastee and VT Union Honor DJ A_Dog

On Saturday, August 31, Burlington will celebrate the 11th annual A_Dog Day. The all-ages party honors Andy “A_Dog” Williams, a beloved local DJ and skateboarder who died of leukemia at age 38 in 2013. It raises funds for the Friends for A_Dog Foundation, a nonprofit that runs youth outreach and educational programs in his honor. A skateboarding clinic and music festival in one, the event unites generations of Vermont’s thriving hip-hop and skating scenes at the waterfront skate park that bears A_Dog’s name, in a testament to Williams’ enduring legacy in Burlington.

The night before A_Dog Day, however, a smaller, more personal celebration will go down at the Cellar, a makeshift venue in the basement of St. Paul Street watering hole Drink. That’s the home of Rap Night Burlington, a weekly hip-hop showcase and scene hub that local DJ and producer Nastee has been holding down for almost a year now.

On Friday, August 30, Nastee will transform the open mic into “an actual birthday party for Andy,” he said. (It would have been his 49th.) “We have a cake, balloons, giveaways and, of course, music.”

The evening will double as a reunion of VT Union, of which A_Dog was a founding member. Alumni of the seminal local hip-hop group will gather to honor him and mark the release of Legendary Volume 1, a retrospective collection of some of their best work.

“This is just the first in a series,” Nastee said. “Until now, none of the mixtapes we dropped from 2006 to 2009 were on streaming platforms or available commercially.” It was a very different era.

Back when Lil’ Bush was in office, VT Union was the crew, an 802 supergroup with a seismic run of influential mixtapes. The lineup varied, but the core players were rappers Nastee and Dakota and DJ A_Dog, all hard workers with natural charisma. They were multihyphenate talents, equally comfortable running the show on turntables and hyping the crowd front-stage. A rotating cast of MCs included Manus, B-Free, SINNN and Nastee’s brother Konflik.

VT Union helped set the standard for what rap music could be in these parts. When most 802 hip-hop acts were still recording demos in dorm rooms, VT Union were working with legends such as Sean Price, No Malice and Craig G.

With the launch of Legendary Volume 1, Nastee aims to introduce that history to a new generation raised on streaming services and viral videos. It is remarkable how fresh these songs all sound today. Anthems like “Rockstar Feat. R.A. the Rugged Man” and “On My Grind” could pass for new releases, and even club bangers such as “Handz on It” are just dated enough to be back in fashion. Then again, there’s a reason that hip-hop has been at the forefront of the music industry since the ’80s: The formula works in any and every era.

In their prime, VT Union were simply inescapable. They had genuine ground game, posting flyers and stickers from Bennington to Burlington. Their gigs warming up the stage for national acts such as Cassidy and Ja Rule were legendary spectacles. Even when they weren’t on the bill of big Vermont rap shows, you could find them in the parking lot selling CDs, dominating rap cyphers and introducing themselves to new fans.

This was back when Instagram and SoundCloud were barely getting started, and many of Burlington’s currently hottest hip-hop artists were rocking diapers and pacifiers. Since then, younger folks such as 99 Neighbors, North Ave Jax and others have made national waves.

You might expect an old-school hustler such as Nastee to resent those newcomers, but nothing could be further from the truth. He routinely works overtime helping to grow the scene, nurture talent and share his hard-won knowledge. Ask around, and you’ll hear that he’s a famously harsh but fair critic, a mentor and inspiration to dozens of up-and-coming local artists.

One of those is rapper Mavstar, a Rap Night regular who describes Nastee as a straight shooter and a world-class coach. “He tells me that the ball is in our court again as independent artists,” he said. “The games being played by the record companies and streaming services aren’t working anymore. People know what’s up, and there is a renewed sense of hope.”

That hope extends well beyond Chittenden County. Consider Brattleboro MC and producer Yung Breeze, who plays the coach role for his own team, Street Religion. He’s quick to praise Nastee as an era-shaping influence on the Vermont scene.

“When I look at the things he’s done, it makes me want to take it to the next level, every time,” he said. “You have to look at someone like that and learn.”

Any aspiring local artists looking to do the same are in luck. This Sunday, August 25, Nastee hosts a free educational event called How to Make It in the Game of Music. It’s a crash course in the current state of the business, featuring some heavyweight expertise: Nastee will be joined by Kwame Dankwa, programming director at 95 Triple X, and BTV’s own super-producer Es-K.

Don’t expect a convention of old heads telling stories from back in the day. All three speakers are seasoned industry professionals, especially Nastee. Before his VT Union run, he had already found success in New York City, where he earned platinum records as a recording engineer for Loud Records and, years later, became the in-house A&R for NYC collective Pro Era. He currently runs the upstart indie label AfterLyfe Music, which in recent months dropped a killer compilation LP and an album with Boston legend Termanology.

“He’s got a passion for hip-hop music at the highest level,” Yung Breeze said of Nastee. “I’m glad I have been able to work and continue to work with him. It’s definitely a blessing.”

When asked what keeps him going, Nastee shrugged off the question. “This is basically just how I live,” he said. “I don’t know how to do anything except be dope.”

That’s a lesson from his late friend Williams that he took to heart. “I strive for greatness every moment of every day,” he said. “A_Dog taught me to always be present in the moment … but to customize your life so that your present moment is dope as fuck.”

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