Yo-Yo Issue #36

Make way for the hip-hop legend’s mission of electing the next Miss Rap Supreme

By Jim Keller
Published: June 1st, 2008 | 4:26pm

Yo-Yo (nee Yolanda Whitaker) stomped into the ’90s with her 1991 debut, Make Way for the Motherlode, an album packed with positive, feminist messages previously unheard of in rap. The first single, “You Can’t Play with My Yo-Yo,” reached No. 1 on Billboard’s Hot Rap Singles chart, making Yo-Yo a household name.

Seventeen years later, a mother who still makes her living from music, Yo seeks to provide up-and-coming female musicians with proper resources. This fearless journey began with an identity struggle, which led Yo to host radio, start a company to help young artists learn the music industry, and co-host VH1’s ego trip’s Miss Rap Supreme.

“I felt I wasn’t evolving and was living a lie,” Yo says of her experience in the music industry, as she talks on the phone over a sea of L.A. sirens. “I needed to do more — I’ll be your sunshine.”

In 2000, Yo made her way to New Jersey where she obtained a liberal arts degree and studied acting at New York’s Lee Strasberg Theatre and Film Institute. Although she landed a role on the TV series Martin, two years later Yo was ready to shed her acting skin. “School taught me business, acting taught me truth — I can pretend, but I’m fooling myself.”

In talking about the strong presence of female rappers in the ’90s including herself, MC Lyte, and Queen Latifah — and the last decade’s scarcity of a similar crew — Yo says there needs to be more female leadership. “Women need to team up.” In 2005, back in her hometown of L.A., she got involved in her community. She began a three-year stint as a DJ for the Southern California radio station KDAY FM, and with MC Lyte, she co-created the Let Your Light Shine Youth Foundation to afford inner-city children camping and art excursions.

Yo-Yo also started Fearless Entertainment and Yo-Yo Music with the goal of producing young female musicians by taking them through the physical and mental aspects of artist development. As if that weren’t enough, last year Yo held the Best Kept Secret showcase, where undiscovered talents were taken through a music-industry boot camp in Los Angeles.

The success of the showcase primed Yo to co-host with MC Serch for eight episodes of the Miss Rap Supreme, a reality competition to determine who will become the next great female MC. “After watching, young women will see there’s a chance for women in music,” she says of the show that debuted in April. Twenty-five contestants will be dwindled down to 10, who will live in a house together; the winner will earn the title “Miss Rap Supreme” and $100,000.

Though Yo’s life revolves around music, she doesn’t have plans to release her own music anytime soon. “Music is my thing, but to release an album for bread and butter, I don’t think so,” she says. Yo-Yo is a committed voice for young, upcoming best-kept secrets of the world to whom she says, “Create a plan, set a goal, educate, and respect yourself. Remember to be fearless — when your hands are clean and your heart is true, you can never go the wrong direction.”