Meet The Cranberry  Show. The alternative hip-hop duo from Milwaukee comprised of MCs Young Focus and Arcane. Their unique name along with their unique sound is getting them spins around the country and even overseas.

Thanks to SEAL, UW-Whitewater students will have a chance to witness TCS perform one of their live shows at 8 p.m. tomorrow.

On Oct. 26 the duo was on campus trying to sway students to vote. I had a chance to sit down with them and ask a few questions about their style of music and their upcoming show at UW-Whitewater. Just from meeting them, their exuberant attitudes gave me a pretty good idea of what the show may be like.

RP: So, how did you come up with the name?

Young Focus:  The “Show” part came [because] we like to be known for our live performances. Plus… our life is crazy like a reality show. The “Cranberry” part is just because cranberries as a fruit clean out your system, so we want to kind of clean out the system of hip-hop with good and alternative music.”

RP: You mentioned your music is cleansing hip-hop. How is your music different from other hip-hop?

Arcane: Well it’s different in the fact that it’s already alternative hip-hop. I mean it’s hip-hop and were still spitting lyrics and everything, but we also have that very fun, high energy feeling to it, and that kind of what seperates it because people don’t really have fun anymore when it comes to music.

YF: It’s more in tune with pop and rock too.  So that’s where the ‘alternative’ really comes from, it’s more than just hip-hop. We have hip-hop / pop songs, hip-hop / rock songs, it’s more eclectic.

RP: Your album is called “Sex and Pencil Shavings” another fun name, how did you come up with that?

Arcane: “Well we pretty much picked it because it symbolizes the beginning and end of everything. Sex is the birth, the start of everything and pencil shavings is the end, like what you leave behind. The album is like A to Z, everything you need, all different kinds of sounds and all different kinds of music, so we figured it’s like two totally different ends of the spectrum.”

RP: What are some of the singles on the album?

YF: “Girlz Like” is the first single, it’s pretty much about which genre of music will get you the most chicks, and we figured out that it’s rap and rock… so we kind of fused them together.

We also have another single, it’s actually called “I’m Horny.” … We didn’t pick that as a single, the colleges actually kind of picked it. It’s going crazy on college campuses right now. We’ll get calls like every Friday and Saturday night saying like “Oh you’re song is going crazy.”

Arcane: From everywhere, California,  Atlanta, all over we get calls from people we don’t even know.

RP: How long have you two been performing together?

Arcane: We’ve been an official group for about two years now, but we’ve been pretty much best friends since like sixth-grade. At first it was just Young Focus as an actual MC and I was his hype man, and then one day we got an actual track that I could do good on. So we did it and then I kept growing as an artist and we formed a group and made The Cranberry Show.

YF: In school I was his bully. I made him like carry my lunch tray and open doors for me. And I got him kicked out of class. Yea, and I made him let me kiss his girlfriend all the time.

RP: How did you feel about that?

Arcane: It sucked. (Laughs). It was the worst years of my life, but you know what you grow and now I love him. (Laughs).

YF: Now we both kiss his girlfriend. (Laughs).

RP: What can fans expect to see from one of your shows?

YF: We often get labeled as the ‘black Beastie Boys.’ So if you think about a Beastie Boys show, it’s like that times five. We crowd surf. I usually end up without a shirt … and I did a front flip into the crowd one time and no one caught me.

Arcane: I feel like we have the most unexpected shows because sometimes we don’t know what’s going on. Sometimes we’ll have the DJ just spin and drop different  songs in the middle of the performance.

RP: What are you guys looking forward to about your first show at UW-Whitewater?

Arcane: I’ve heard Whitewater gets pretty wild, and I’m excited because that’s just how we are just every day. I want to see if we’re going to get Whitewater to come out to the show, and with everyone there is gonna have a super, sick, crazy show, and no one is ever going to forget it. That’s our goal.

While The Cranberry Show is becoming known for their alternative party songs and wild shows, they respect the foundation of hip-hop as well.

“We can make a party track, but then there is also tracks where people swear that no one can out rap us,“ Young Profound said. “You actually have to know how to rhyme, how to break any beat…at any given time as an MC first, and then be able to make the party records and the fun records. We have that certain respect aside from The Cranberry Show thing. We’re respected as just ill MCs.”