Some voices don’t just accompany a record—they become part of its identity. You hear them once, and decades later, they’re still right there. That’s Angela “Mecca” Redmon. Nearly 30 years after a 17-year-old singer stepped into a New York recording studio and laid down the ethereal vocals that helped give JAŸ-Z’s “Feelin’ It” its unmistakable feel, that voice remains woven into Hip-Hop history.
But back then, Mecca wasn’t thinking about history, legacy or platinum records. She was 17 years old, in New York, doing what she loved—singing. Sometimes you don’t realize you’re making history because you’re too busy living the moment.
Hailing from Danville, Mecca traveled to New York and recorded the now-iconic chorus for Reasonable Doubt. One take. One moment. One voice that would eventually become familiar to millions. What she couldn’t have known was that those few minutes in the booth would become a thread running through nearly three decades of her life.
As Reasonable Doubt went from JAŸ-Z’s 1996 debut to one of Hip-Hop’s benchmark albums, “Feelin’ It” grew right along with it. The record became timeless, the hook became instantly recognizable, and Mecca’s vocals became part of its DNA. Her work ultimately earned RIAA Platinum Certification, but recognition of the woman behind that voice took considerably longer.
Mecca wasn’t content to remain a footnote in somebody else’s history. She picked up the pen and reclaimed her narrative with her debut memoir, Feelin’ It: A Hip-Hop Memoir. This wasn’t simply about saying, “Remember me.” It was about saying, “This is my story, and I’m telling it.”
The memoir goes beyond the record—the young singer she was, the woman she became, motherhood, entrepreneurship, the music business and the experiences that shaped her along the way.
Then came the kind of full-circle moment you couldn’t script.
In 2026, Mecca returned to New York and stepped onto the Yankee Stadium stage with JAŸ-Z to perform “Feelin’ It” nearly 30 years after she first recorded it, in front of more than 45,000 people. With Blue Ivy adding her own musical touch, a song born in a 1990s recording booth suddenly became a moment shared across generations.
You can’t manufacture that kind of history.
And Mecca’s story doesn’t begin or end with JAŸ-Z.
Away from music, she built a life and career of her own—working in corporate sales, becoming a professional matchmaker with Single Atlanta and later launching AnnaBae Bakery, her Atlanta-based online bakery rooted in family tradition. She is an author, entrepreneur, mother and artist whose story stretches far beyond the few minutes of music that introduced her voice to the world.
That’s what makes her story worth revisiting now.
This isn’t simply about finally getting flowers for singing a classic Hip-Hop hook. It’s about time, contribution, memory and ownership—and the many women whose voices helped shape records that became part of the culture, even when their names didn’t always travel with the music.
For years, millions knew the voice without knowing the woman. Mecca changed that.
She told her story, documented her history, and put her name beside her contribution. And then, almost as if history wanted to underline the entire point, it called her back to the stage.
The voice was always there.
The history was always there.
Now the woman behind the voice gets to tell you what it all meant.
And after nearly three decades, Mecca is still “Feelin’ It.”
Parlé Mag: Before Yankee Stadium, before the memoir, and before anybody outside that studio knew your voice, you were just 17 years old singing what would become part of JAŸ-Z’s “Feelin’ It.” Take us back to that girl—what do you remember about the session, and did you have any sense that those vocals would still be following you nearly 30 years later?
Mecca Redmon: I was 17 years old, in D&D Studios in New York, just doing what I loved to do—sing. I remember Big L being there, and I remember going into that booth and singing “Feelin’ It” in one take. At that age, I wasn’t thinking about legacy, a classic album, or what Hip-Hop history would eventually call that record. I was simply a teenager having a moment.
There was absolutely no way I could have known that my voice would follow me for nearly 30 years. But that one session became a thread running through so much of my life. It introduced my voice to the world before the world ever really knew the woman behind it.
Parlé Mag: Reasonable Doubt went from an album fighting for attention in 1996 to one of Hip-Hop’s most revered debuts, and “Feelin’ It” grew right along with it. What has it been like watching something you contributed to become history while your own role in that history wasn’t always as visible as it should have been?
Mecca Redmon: It has been bittersweet. There is pride because I know what I contributed to. I know that voice. I know that moment. And I’ve watched “Feelin’ It” grow from a record we made into a record that generations of people love.
But there were also years when it felt like the record continued traveling while my name got left behind. People knew every word. They knew the voice. Some people even sang the hook right along with me without knowing who I was.
That’s a strange place to exist—being part of something historic while also feeling somewhat erased from its history. I had to learn that somebody else’s recognition of my contribution doesn’t determine whether that contribution happened. I was there, and I sang it. And eventually, I realized I had the right to tell that story myself.
Parlé Mag: There’s a particular sting in hearing your own voice become familiar to millions while many of those listeners don’t necessarily know the woman behind it. Was there a specific moment when you realized, “I need to tell this story myself, because nobody else is going to tell it for me”?
Mecca Redmon: Absolutely. That realization is really at the heart of why I wrote the memoir.
For years, people knew “Feelin’ It,” but many didn’t know Mecca. And eventually, I understood that if I continued waiting for somebody else to tell my story, I was giving somebody else ownership of my history.
I’m a mother, a woman, an artist, and somebody who lived an entire life beyond those few minutes on a record. I wanted my children to know my story from me. I wanted Hip-Hop to know it from me. That’s when it became bigger than simply receiving credit. It became about legacy.
Parlé Mag: That ultimately became Feelin’ It: A Hip-Hop Memoir. Was writing the book less about setting the record straight and more about finally taking ownership of a story that had been living outside of your control for decades?
Mecca Redmon: Exactly. I certainly wanted the history to be accurate, but the memoir was never supposed to be 200 pages of “give me my credit.”
It was about ownership.
For years, one piece of my story existed in interviews, credits, conversations, and other people’s recollections. Writing Feelin’ It: A Hip-Hop Memoir allowed me to say: This is what happened. This is what I experienced. And this is who the woman behind that voice became.
The record introduced me to the world. The memoir introduces the woman behind the voice.
Parlé Mag: Memory can be complicated, especially when you’re revisiting something that happened to you as a teenager through the eyes of the woman you are now. What was the hardest part of writing about your 17-year-old self without rewriting her feelings with everything you know today?
Mecca Redmon: The hardest part was allowing that 17-year-old girl to remain 17.
It would have been easy to go back and give her the wisdom I have now or make her understand things she simply couldn’t have understood at that age. But I didn’t want to rewrite her.
I had to honor what she knew, what she didn’t know, what she wanted, and how she actually felt in those moments. Looking back, I understand the business, people, and myself differently. But she didn’t have any of that information yet.
So I tried to give her grace instead of rewriting her.
Parlé Mag: Then comes the chapter nobody could have planned: nearly 30 years later, you’re invited to Yankee Stadium to perform “Feelin’ It” with JAŸ-Z, in front of more than 45,000 people. When that call came, did you immediately understand the magnitude of what was about to happen—or did it not become real until you walked onto that stage?
Mecca Redmon: When the call came, I understood that something major was happening, but I don’t think you can fully process a moment like that over the phone.
Then I got to New York. I walked into Yankee Stadium, went through soundcheck, and started taking in everything happening around me. And it became more real with every step.
But walking onto that stage was different.
Nearly 30 years after that 17-year-old girl walked into a studio and sang that hook, I was standing at Yankee Stadium performing it with JAŸ-Z in front of more than 45,000 people.
And the part that still amazes me is the timing. I had already written the memoir. I had already decided that I was going to tell my story whether anybody validated it or not.
Then life turned around and gave me a chapter I couldn’t possibly have written.
Parlé Mag: And somehow, the moment became even more generational with Blue Ivy playing piano. Here you are revisiting a record you sang as a 17-year-old, now alongside Jay and his daughter. What went through your mind when you looked around and realized how much life had happened between the original recording and that performance?
Mecca Redmon: That part was incredibly full-circle.
I was 17 when I recorded “Feelin’ It.” Now I’m a mother myself, standing there nearly three decades later, performing that same song while Jay’s daughter is part of the musical moment.
You can’t manufacture that kind of symbolism.
So much life happened between those two moments. We grew up, became parents, and lived entire lives. And somehow, this record that we made when we were younger was still alive enough to bring generations together on that stage.
There are some things you don’t need to over-explain. You just recognize the significance and take it in.
Parlé Mag: There’s something almost cinematic about the timing: you write a memoir reclaiming your place in Hip-Hop history, and then life answers by putting you on one of the biggest stages imaginable to physically reclaim it. Did Yankee Stadium feel like validation, closure, a new beginning—or something you still haven’t quite found the word for?
Mecca Redmon: A new beginning.
I understand why people might call it validation or closure, but I don’t think closure is the right word for me because nothing felt like it was ending.
If anything, something was opening.
The beautiful part is that I had already validated myself by writing the book. I had already put my name beside my own story. Yankee Stadium wasn’t somebody giving me permission to belong to that history.
It was almost like God saying, “Now watch what I can do with the story after you finally claimed it.”
That’s why I keep saying this is just the beginning.
Parlé Mag: What was the exchange between you and Jay like surrounding that reunion? After nearly three decades of “Feelin’ It” belonging to the world, was there anything said—or even left unsaid—between the two of you that carried particular weight?
Mecca Redmon: For me, what carried the most weight wasn’t necessarily a long conversation. It was the fact that I was there.
After nearly three decades, we were standing together performing “Feelin’ It” again. Sometimes an action says more than a conversation ever could.
That stage held decades of history and growth, representing nearly 30 years of life between the original studio session and Yankee Stadium.
And I think some moments are powerful precisely because you don’t have to force words onto them. The invitation, the performance, and that moment itself said a lot to me.
Parlé Mag: Hip-Hop history has countless women whose voices, writing, ideas, and contributions helped make classic records but whose names weren’t always carried forward with the music. Do you now see your memoir and this full-circle moment as part of a larger conversation about who gets remembered, who gets credited, and who gets to tell the history?
Mecca Redmon: Absolutely.
My story is personal, but it isn’t unique in that regard. There are women throughout music history whose voices, writing, ideas, and creativity became part of records everybody knows, while their names weren’t always remembered with the same enthusiasm.
That’s why telling our own stories matters.
History isn’t only the superstar standing in the center of the photograph. History is everybody who helped create the moment.
I want my story to remind other women that you don’t have to wait for somebody to write you back into history. Pick up the pen. Tell it yourself. Document your contribution while you’re here to tell the truth about it.
Parlé Mag: The fascinating thing is that your story no longer ends with “the woman who sang on ‘Feelin’ It.’” You’re now an author documenting your own life while simultaneously creating new chapters worth documenting. How has that changed the way you define yourself beyond one legendary record?
Mecca Redmon: That’s probably one of the biggest transformations for me.
I’m extremely proud of “Feelin’ It.” I will never run away from that record. It changed my life and connected me permanently to an important piece of Hip-Hop history.
But I am not four minutes of music.
I’m an author, a mother, an entrepreneur, an artist, and a storyteller. I’m a woman who has survived things, built things, lost things, rebuilt things, and kept going.
“Feelin’ It” may have introduced my voice, but it doesn’t get to define the limits of my story.
Parlé Mag: If you could somehow put the 17-year-old Mecca from that original session in the front row at Yankee Stadium and let her watch the woman she becomes walk onto that stage nearly 30 years later, what do you think she would say to you?
Mecca Redmon: I think she’d look at me like, “Girl, you did all of that?”
And then I think she would be proud.
Because that 17-year-old girl couldn’t see what was ahead. She couldn’t see the difficult chapters any more than she could see Yankee Stadium.
I would want her to know that the road wasn’t going to be easy, but her voice would survive every part of it.
And nearly 30 years later, she’d hear that same voice echoing through Yankee Stadium.
I think that would blow her mind.
Parlé Mag: Now that the memoir is out and the Yankee Stadium moment has given the story an ending that actually feels like another beginning, where does Mecca go from here? Is there more music, more writing, speaking, film—or another chapter you’re finally ready to claim?
Mecca Redmon: All of it is possible.
The memoir created a foundation, but I don’t see the book as the finish line. I see opportunities in film and television, speaking, more writing, and absolutely music when the right opportunity presents itself.
What Yankee Stadium showed me is that I don’t have to decide that the best chapter already happened just because it happened nearly 30 years ago.
I’m creating new history now.
That’s the chapter I’m most interested in.
Parlé Mag: Bring it all the way home: for years, millions of people knew the voice even if they didn’t know the woman. Then you wrote the book, put your name back beside your contribution, and ultimately stood beside JAŸ-Z performing “Feelin’ It” again nearly three decades later. After spending so much time fighting to make sure history remembered you, what did it feel like when history finally called you back to the stage?
Mecca Redmon: It felt full-circle—but bigger than anything I could have planned for myself.
For years, people knew the voice. Then I wrote the memoir because I wanted them to know the woman.
What I couldn’t have known while writing it was that months later, I would be standing at Yankee Stadium beside JAŸ-Z, singing “Feelin’ It” again nearly 30 years after I recorded it.
I spent years wanting history to remember that I was there.
And then history literally called me back to the stage.
There is something powerful about that because I didn’t have to rewrite the past to get there. I simply had to finally own my story.
I don’t see Yankee Stadium as the ending. It was proof that sometimes an ending is really the beginning of a new chapter.
The record introduced my voice to the world.
The memoir introduced the woman behind the voice.
And Yankee Stadium reminded me that my story is still being written.
Get Connected with Mecca
Instagram: @officiallymecca
