Donald-D

When Donald-D was asked to audition for The Mayberry Crew (Afrika Islam, LJ, Kid Vicious) in the late 1970s, he insisted his partner Easy AD get an audition too. When they only wanted him, Easy AD told Donald accept their offer anyway. Mayberry Crew split and became The Funk Machine (Afrika Islam, DJ Jazzy Jay, Superman) and Three The Hard Way MC’s (Donald, Kid Vicious and LJ, later adding Elroy and calling themselves Imperial Four).

When Funk Machine came to an end, Afrika Islam invited Donald to rap on his WHBI-FM radio show Zulu Beats. Tapes of the show spread across the US and eventually as far as Europe. Vincent Davis (Vintertainment Records) approached Donald to sign him and DJ Chuck Chillout as The B-Boys. They released three singles in 1983 that have been sampled hundreds of times by artists including Britney Spears, The Prodigy, Massive Attack, De La Soul and The Beastie Boys.

After a brief stint with Original Mark, Brother B was added to the group and two more singles followed in 1985, but things were changing at Vintertainment:

We were supposed to record a full album. Joeski Love came to the label and he recorded the ‘Pee Wee Dance’ and the song became big. Vincent Davis kinda forgot about us … We were having problems, Brother B started stressing out and did his own thing … I was looking for something else to do.

Donald released an indie solo single on Rock Hard Records in 1987, but Afrika Islam had introduced him to Ice-T a couple years earlier and Ice told Islam, now living in California, he wanted Donald as a member of his collective Rhyme Syndicate. Donald moved to LA and appeared on Ice’s “The Syndicate” in 1988 and “What Ya Wanna Do” in 1989.

Donald’s album Notorious dropped in 1989 and its lead single “FBI” reached the top 10 on the US Rap Chart that December. His follow-up album Let The Horns Blow came out in 1991. While recording his follow-up album, he also wrote “I’m Gonna Smoke Him” for the film Trespass, which came out in 1992. However, due to the controversy surrounding Ice-T’s song “Cop Killer” (released by his side project Body Count), Warner Brothers Records “got rid of their whole rap department” and the video for “Smoke” never saw release. Donald’s output has been sporadic since.