Meet Qween and Rabelle Highness

Today we’d like to introduce you to Qween and Rabelle Highness.

Hi Qween and Rabelle, thanks for joining us today. We’d love for you to start by introducing yourself.
We are sisters, Samaiyah Shakoor known as Qween & Vashti Shakoor known as Rabelle. We moved to Vine City, Atlanta, GA from Milwaukee, WI and started Highness shortly after. We started a rap career in a new city with our best friend as our #1 support managing us with no money and no connection to the music industry, but that didn’t discourage us from following our dreams. We captured audiences with high-energy dance moves, fierce deliveries, witty punchlines, and catchy tunes that turned crowds of strangers into instant fans. We have been songwriting, singing, and dancing together since childhood which built a chemistry that resonates effortlessly through our music and on stage. We draw some of our influences from many artists like Wiz Khalifa, Kendrick Lamar, Lauryn Hill, Lil Wayne, and the list goes on; we naturally fall into our own lane. Our sound is a mix of sub-HipHop genre dubbed “Trap Hippie music” described as a blend of creamy melodic tunes poured over banging 808s, trippy sounds, and lyrical 16 bars. After grinding hard in Atlantas underground music scene, we were able to touch some notable stages such as Bonfire ATL, Campn’ Trip, Bestend Brewing, Hype Magazine, Rosebowl ATL, Rap Plug and some other well-known stages like Atlantucky, Department Store, Apache Cafe, TakeOffATL, and Opera Night Club. We dropped our 1st project titled Kushite Smoketape and after connecting with more vets in the industry, we dropped our #1 single ‘Bucks (Run It Up)’ produced by grammy nominated Jeremy Reid and completed our 1st EP project named ‘Vanilla Skyy’. Recently we dropped our 1st music video to our single ‘Bucks’ where we had the honor of shooting a scene on the Champions home stadium court, and we will be performing live at SXSW this March 2022.

I’m sure you wouldn’t say it’s been obstacle free, but so far would you say the journey have been a fairly smooth road?
It most definitely hasn’t been “smooth” for us. We started our rap careers in Atlanta, being from Milwaukee so nobody new who we were starting completely from the bottom. It’s already harder for female rappers to gain respect in rap culture, but on top of that we don’t have the typical style that’s most popular in the rap industry today. The quote unquote, “bad b*tch” look, like long lace wigs, big butts, and designer head to toe placed us in a different lane. Us having a more down to earth, new age 90’s look set us apart as underdogs. Our musics catchy hooks and universal sound has helped us connect despite how different we are, but we still struggle with what’s popular in music today versus what we want to create so with balancing our message with authenticity, being ourselves, and creating something that can make everyone feel as good as it makes us feel can be an uphill battle. We’ve performed in countless empty venues gaining new fans with only the staff closing the place because we were placed dead last in a lineup of over 40 artists. We have felt robbed by crooked competitions after rehearsing a million times, we would come so prepared and kill it, dance moves on point, perfectly in sync, great stage presence, lots of energy, with a crowd of strangers totally engaged, and the host using our performance as an example of how to compete, yet we don’t even make it to 3rd place. So yeah, we’ve been salty a couple of times but at the end of the day, we see people randomly that still remember us from all kinds of shows and tell us how much they love and support us so throughout it all we are truly grateful for every experience.

As you know, we’re big fans of you and your work. For our readers who might not be as familiar what can you tell them about what you do?
Highness represents our ideals which is viewing ourselves and each other as Kings and Queens and higher beings, always reaching higher, and occasionally (or not so occasionally) getting marijuana high. We have been building a clothing brand ‘The Highness Closet aka THC’, creating clothes with unique art that speaks to our ideals. We are so proud to be embraced in this diversely artistic underground scene finding our Tribe here in Atlanta. We are known for our high-energy performances, unique style, and fun content. Our obsession with Halloween and playing video games made us known for being genuinely fun girls, curating events like gaming parties, Halloween Parties, and childish pool parties that bring like-minded, positive people together for high vibes, dope music and a good time is what we were specializing in before the pandemic, and hope to bring back soon. We do currently specialize in writing witty, lyrical, and catchy songs and giving well-rehearsed and high-energy performances and we believe that’s what sets us apart!

Any advice for finding a mentor or networking in general?
We don’t have too much advice in this department as we are still looking to connect with more people and are open to having more representation and management. It is true what they say about your net worth being your network and that the industry is really all about who you know. We have noticed that the best way to start networking is to go to the open mics, small venues, and shows to not only perform but more importantly to talk to the people that are a part of the event. Get to know the host, the promoters, the DJ and the people that frequented the event or the venue. If the event is thrown weekly, perform every week so people will see you often, hear your songs every week and eventually want to get to know you and connect. Best advice we’ve been given is, don’t be afraid to put yourself out there and be yourself at all times, people can feel when something isn’t genuine and don’t make everything about you, show love to get love.

Contact Info:

• Email: [email protected]
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/wearehighness/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/search/top/?q=highness&epa=SEARCH_BOX
• Twitter: https://twitter.com/HighnessMvmnt
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCCmpmuYv-2O_MIGnIuZ04UQ/videos?view=0&sort=dd&shelf_id=0
• SoundCloud: https://soundcloud.com/thehighnessmovement
• Other: https://open.spotify.com/artist/0QU0Ll8XcXcJISMdLC1hff

Image Credits
BJ Cam Kings Glewed Grphx