Youngstown rap artist and model use positions and talent with faith to help Youngstown

By Bruce Walton | February 13, 2017 at 12:05a.m.

YOUNGSTOWN

Marcus Boyd, 34, started out with nothing. He started without a family, living from group home to group home in Brooklyn and even got involved with gangs.

Before coming to Youngstown in 2013, he was passionately working on his music career for almost a decade.

Now, after just releasing his new second extended-play “Soul Food” a month ago, he says he’s never felt more fulfilled. In return, he wants to give back to the city he lives in with his wife, Martina Knight-Boyd, and 6-month-old son, Malakai.

Thanks to his faith in God and the gifts he has received from the world, he wants to use the talent and fame to help Youngstown. Since late 2015, Boyd has made an effort to help the homeless community with his wife through the Hands of Love Foundation.

Martina is a plus-size model who also uses her talent in the Hands of Love Foundation, a group she founded that helps the homeless in the Mahoning Valley. Martina said Hands of Love started on Thanksgiving 2015 when she went to help people living under the bridges in Youngstown.

“It’s not about a show or it’s not about pictures, it’s not about anything like that,” she said. “It’s about, if you’re truly hungry, then us, as God’s people, are going to feed you.”

Boyd has also volunteered at the Martin P. Joyce Juvenile Justice Center for the past few months as a guest of Rising Star Baptist Church member Fred Smith, talking to young men about turning a new leaf.

“I’m trying to talk to them and let them know that you’re not alone, that you can come out here,” he said. “You don’t have to hang with the same homeboys, you don’t have to do the same things, you can leave that and create your own legacy and destiny.”

He’s even caught the ear of Youngstown Mayor John A. McNally.

“Anytime anybody can use their talents while trying to teach young folks or folks who might need some guidance, you’re getting a chance to use God’s gift to move things forward,” McNally said.

“Soul Food” has an assortment of beats, live instruments, DJ’ing and soulful sounds that Boyd performs. He worked on it for nearly half a year. He said the lyrics and substance of the genre remain, but the sound is a more experimental and break-out approach.

“I wanted to be able to tell my own story of how God has blessed me in my life,” he said.

Boyd wasn’t always connected to his religion in his youth, but now he devotes his life, family and career to God, which he constantly enjoys. He and his family also worship at the Holy Trinity Missionary Baptist Church with his spiritual father, the Rev. Lewis Macklin.

In the future, Boyd would love to be able to build a recording studio in Youngstown connected to Youngstown State University, letting students make songs, and teach music seminars. In order for him to connect to the right people for his music career, he had to go out of state, but he wants it to be easier for more talent to be discovered in Youngstown.

“It’s not that there’s no talent in Youngstown; its just that the connections are lost,” he said.

You can find Boyd’s music on iTunes, Spotify and ReverbNation.