Malik Stewart aka œMalik DOPE is a Washington, D.C. Native from the Uptown area. He started playing drums around the age of 5 years old, with inspiration sparked from african drum and dance and later began to take it much more seriously at the age of 12, starting on a 6 piece drum set playing DC œGoGo music, Hip Hop, R&B etc. As Malik continued percussion with GoGo music, playing in neighborhood bands and generating notoriety for his style of playing, he went to Northwestern High School, and in his 10th grade year took an interest in the schools marching band. Joining the marching band changed Maliks life, exposing him to a whole new world of percussion. By pursuing marching band in high school he fiercely progressed. While still being in a GoGo band and school band, Malik also had jobs here & there, forcing him to juggle all of these different worlds at once. As he strived to part-take in all this, it resulted in a lack of good school grades, making the process of graduating take longer but at 19 years old he graduated high school. After completing high school, Malik enrolled in Prince George's Community College and while in school he was blessed with the opportunity to be a part of Howard University's marching band once again exposing him to a more advanced layer of percussion. Gaining exposure all across the states, Malik advanced in Howard Universitys marching band, struck the internet with his skills as well, landing him shares and repost from all over the DMV & beyond. As Maliks rise continued online and in the DMV, in the year 2013 he began to form his own brand œD.O.P.E, Definition of Percussion Entertainment " (now LLC) ,created to provide entertainment, education, inspiration, motivation, innovation, artistic awareness & production through the live nature of percussion, ultimately displaying the brand as a positive influence on living life. At this time Malik shifted away from the Howard University band, taking the experience he gained and leaving the job he had at the time to fully pursue his D.O.P.E. journey. In the amount of 4 years from 2013 to now, he has participated in numerous events & live street performances all around the DMV and other major cities, states & countries such as New York, California, Atlanta, New Orleans, Virginia Beach, Baltimore, Philadelphia, Boston, Jamaica, South Africa, China and more. The result of Maliks constant grind has generated him a huge internet presence, going viral several times, gaining him a great following on his social medias landing at currently 120k+ instagram followers so far(still growing) & valued as one of the top influential innovative artist in this present time. Malik has also performed at multiple Concert Halls/ festivals/ events such as the Howard Theatre, Echo Stage (in DC), Warner Theatre (in DC), Tabernacle (in ATL), Saint Anns Bay (in Jamaica) œCharged Up Festival, DC Funk Parade, Broccoli City Festival, Afro Punk, SXSW, A3C, Made in America, Brooklyn Hip Hop festival, international festival œRebel Salute in Jamaica, One Love Massive studio & more. Malik has gained media attention being featured in the Washington Post, Time Magazine, Complex Magazine, Fader, Hypebeast, Revolt TV, Circa News, Fox 5 News, WUSA Channel 9 News, ABC Channel 7 News, TV Jamaica/Smile Jam TV, Americas Got Talent and more. Malik has performed and been scoped by popular, award-winning artists such as Usher Raymond, Erykah Badu, Swizz Beats, Wale, Mike Will Made It, Rae Sremmurd, BackYard Band, D.R.A.M, Pusha T, Swizz Beats, Ayo & Teo, Queen Ifrica, Tony Rebel and he was a semi-finalist on Americas Got Talent. As Malik continues to build this D.O.P.E legacy, spreading the creative awareness, creating products representing an innovative vibe through percussion worldwide, he does it in a unique way infusing education, entertainment & healing through mind body/ body/ soul, inspiring therapeutic actions with arts of all sorts in unison with rhythm, vibration & syncopation to help maintain a balance to our society and universe with art everywhere.
Malik 'DOPE''S SETUP:
1.14" HiHats - K Constantinople (top), K Custom Session (bottom) *
2.Stack - 9" FX Oriental Trash Splash (bottom), 6" Splash (top) *
3.19" K Dark Thin Crashes
4.22" K Custom High Definition Ride
5.10" FX China Trash
6.15" FX Azuka Latin Multi-Crash *
7.16" K Dark Thin Crashes
* May be prototype