There’s a moment in the new season of Netflix’s hip-hop contest “Rhythm + Flow” when rapper SeeFour stands alone in a stairwell, waiting his turn to compete. The Mattapan resident, born Calogano Chambers, shifts his weight and rubs his arms in anticipation.
As for what happens next — you’ll just have to wait until the show’s second season begins on Netflix this Wednesday.
Chambers is one of 33 contestants appearing on the second season of “Rhythm + Flow,” Netflix’s first original music competition program. From cyphers to battle raps, the Atlanta-based competition tests every aspect of what it means to be a solid emcee, with contestants assessed by a panel including Ludacris, DJ Khaled, Latto, and a rotation of guest judges that includes Big Sean and Eminem.
The winner walks away with a $250,000 prize, although the exposure to a worldwide audience might be worth more than the cash. Season 1’s victor, D Smoke, earned his first three Grammy nominations after his win, and is currently signed to the heavyweight hip-hop label Death Row Records.
But for Chambers — who’s 23 — the real prize was pushing Boston hip-hop into the mainstream.
“My hope was really, honestly, to just represent my city in a good light,” he said.
Born and raised in Boston near Blue Hill Avenue, Chambers got an early start in the area’s hip-hop scene. He began rapping at age 12, started participating in local cyphers around age 15, and released his first album, “Mature,” by age 17. He’s since released multiple projects, including last year’s self-affirming offering “Spirit of A Warrior.”
“I started rapping because I was that 12-year-old no one listened to, whether it was family members or people in school,” Chambers explained.
Dorchester talent manager Robert “ROB.” Kelley-Morgan has been following Chambers for much of that journey. As the creator of the independent media platform PUTINWORKTV, co-owner of Dorchester Art Project, and cofounder of Boston’s Future Forward Festival, his work as a manager and cultural facilitator aims to uplift local artists, particularly Black Bostonians.
Kelley-Morgan first spotted Chambers at the Middle East Downstairs, where the then-16-year-old emcee was participating in rap battles against adults. He was struck by Chambers’s stage presence immediately.
“When he performed, I got chills,” said Kelley-Morgan. “He can deliver a message [that] is reminiscent of James Brown, or just an old school artist. That’s why his nickname is ‘Spirit,’ because you really feel the spirit when he’s on that stage, when he’s delivering the message.”
“Rhythm + Flow” debuted in 2019, during the early years of Chambers’s career. He watched the show’s first season, but didn’t picture himself as a future contestant at the time. His attitude changed in 2023 while attending the annual National Association of Music Merchants trade show in Anaheim.
While attending the global gathering as a sales representative for the monitor company Augspurger — his day job — Chambers met Jazmyn Michel, a CAB Castings employee who was tapping potential competitors for “Rhythm + Flow.” Chambers says he and Michel “clicked” at Augspurger’s trade show booth, and again at an afterparty, prompting her to suggest that he try out for the competition’s second season.
Securing his audition in Atlanta was a lengthy process that involved submitting videos of a capella raps and his daily activities, writing a summary of his life’s story (four pages total, he said), and demonstrating his musical abilities live on Zoom calls. It wasn’t until this past winter — one year after that fateful conversation in Anaheim — that Chambers was on a plane to audition in front of Ludacris, DJ Khaled, and Latto.
Chambers arrived in Atlanta with the intention of competing against himself and his own skill set, and challenged himself to write new material every day. He focused on delivering bars that were “new and clean” — nothing that had appeared in his past work.
“My approach was: go in humble, go in grateful, and don’t ask for anything,” he said.
Looking back on the experience, neither Chambers nor Kelley-Morgan can recall a rising Boston rapper represented on a platform as large as Netflix, which boasts over 280 million subscribers. As the season’s only Massachusetts-based contestant, Chambers said he felt “good pressure” to represent his home state.
Chambers is well-aware that much of the country overlooks — or is totally oblivious to — the region’s hip-hop community. Last fall, a tweet referencing “Boston hip-hop culture” received over 2.5 million views, largely due to jeering comments that questioned whether or not that culture existed. Weeks later, Chambers used many of the remarks to make a tongue-in-cheek video promoting his album “Spirit of A Warrior.”
In light of these misconceptions, Chambers and Kelley-Morgan hope that SeeFour’s presence on “Rhythm + Flow” can demonstrate to a global audience what Boston’s hip-hop scene has to offer.
“This is going to cause some eyeballs on Boston, and we’re ready for eyeballs,” Kelley-Morgan said. “Hopefully this brings more intrigue to the entire community that we have here, because there’s hundreds of artists that work really hard and are making phenomenal music.”
Fans can watch Chambers’s story unfold as episodes of “Rhythm + Flow” arrive throughout November and early December, although the artist is already thinking beyond the show. Chambers and Kelley-Morgan agree that “Rhythm + Flow” is a stepping stone — not a stopping point — that nudges Chambers’s career towards the next chapter, and Chambers already has plans to reveal a deluxe version of “Spirit Of A Warrior” before the end of this year.
“It’s not an end game,” Kelley-Morgan said. “This is not gonna be the last time anyone hears the name SeeFour. This might be the first time a lot of people hear it, though.”
“Rhythm + Flow” premieres on Netflix on Nov. 20
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