CHRIS FARAONE

Part-time villain

CHRIS FARAONE — Wed, 03 Sep 2008 16:09:55 GMT

Ill Bill gets nice
As much as Ill Bill eschews clichés, the Brooklyn rap goon is either a righteous friend or a torrential enemy.

ILL IS ILL: He’s not necessarily a changed man — his lyrics indicate that he’s still a conspiratorially aggressive “American who needs a blow job and a pizza.”

Get-along gang: Ill Bill has friends in fly places. By Chris Faraone.

As much as Ill Bill eschews clichés, the Brooklyn rap goon is either a righteous friend or a torrential enemy. Last week at Quad Studios in Times Square, he proved to be the former. Five years ago at Brooklyn club Southpaw, he was nearly the latter.

The magazine I wrote for at the time had given me a simple assignment: find Ill Bill before his show and ask questions about the new disc by Non-Phixion — his now-defunct white-rogue rhyme syndicate. What my editor had failed to mention was that Bill had issues with the publication after it went bourgeois and stopped regular coverage of him. Never mind that I was there to interview his crew, homeboy was unhappy. Usually I can weasel out of such corners, but Bill was not interested in my “don’t crack the middle man” reasoning. Even worse, as I stared up at his Jurassic 6’4” frame dipped in a black down jacket larger than my bedspread, I realized there was no fighting back. The situation had savage beatdown etched all over it.

But then Bill’s friend ran up with the news that they had a beef down the block. Like that, they bounced outside to settle scores, and I was saved by the bell. When they returned, I bought a round of Narragansett tallboys and made peace. I never got the interview, but I didn’t get maimed, either.

I’ve been afraid of Bill ever since, my fears being exacerbated when he knocked down a kid for throwing water on stage during a performance at the Middle East two years ago. His lyrics also sting. When 50 Cent raps, “I still kill,” the only ones who need to worry are his girlfriends and his bastard children; when Bill declares himself Brooklyn’s undefeated knockout champ, that’s because he might just slap you down. Along with his blood brother, evil rap genius Necro, Bill was one of the few white or Jewish kids in Coney Island’s Glenwood Projects, where his uncle shot dope, his parents fought violently, and, as Bill details, drug dealers snuffed the teachers while cheerleaders sucked dick under the bleachers. In short, he’s been tried and tested.

That’ll learn ya

CHRIS FARAONE — Tue, 26 Aug 2008 19:12:55 GMT

Kabir schools other MCs, little kids
In eighth grade, I decided that school and hip-hop should exist separately.

FOR THE SHORTIES: Kabir has carved a niche that few of his rap peers would be equipped to join him in.

In eighth grade, I decided that school and hip-hop should exist separately. It was spring semester, and my sexy music teacher tapped me to perform “a rap” at an Earth Day assembly. Like a pathetic horny adolescent, I obliged, not only to rap rhymes that were likely written by a 62-year-old EPA bureaucrat named Walter, but also to be dressed in her vision of what hip-hop looked like — a hooded sweatshirt and sunglasses — and to strike a b-boy pose as a finale. (Or, as she put it: “Do that thing like you’re hugging yourself.”) As I walked off stage, I detoured embarrassed for ashamed and suicidal.

Real classy: Math rap not especially dirty
On the low, we were so impressed by the integrity of some Rhythm Rhyme Results tracks that we felt like losers for bumping them. Really — how many sexual partners can you entice rolling down the street blaring lines like “When you’re adding two numbers and the signs are both the same/You add the absolute values and the sign doesn’t change”? To make ourselves feel cool about enjoying educational hip-hop, we picked our favorite classroom cuts with potential sexual or drug-dealing innuendos.

TRACK | “(Pump Up the) Volume”
CHOICE LYRIC | “Now everybody feeling this/Because you know it’s not a myth/That we’re leaving flat shapes behind/Now we got cubes and cones and cylinders on the mind full-time”

TRACK | “Circumference (It Just Makes Sense)”
CHOICE LYRIC | “You know that every circle whether it’s big or it’s little/Has one single point that’s right in the middle”

TRACK | “Inversion”
CHOICE LYRIC | “If you have an integer put a one below/To find the multiplicative inverse you know bring the bottom number up and put the top one below”

TRACK | “Meters, Liters, and Grams”
CHOICE LYRIC | The whole song

Not till my move to Boston 12 years later did I re-evaluate hip-hop’s classroom value. I’m not referring to academics who negotiate the socio-political significance of G-Unit murder anthems — I still deplore that. No, I mean the incorporation of beats, rhymes, and attitude into grade-school curricula. Educators around here teach a remarkable number of rap-inspired programs, from Boston Youth Hip-Hop Shop after-school sessions to the 4Peace Summer Arts Workshop at the Grover Cleveland Community Center in Dorchester. Even more impressive is the number of Boston rappers who daylight as educators: Jake the Snake as a classroom aide in Dorchester; Lyrical, er, Dr. Pete Plourde as a professor at Lasell College; Kabir Sen, who’s running neck-and-neck with that dude from Summer School for Coolest Teacher Ever honors.

In the field of Boston’s hip-hop educators, Kabir is the anomaly whose roles as teacher and musician are not mutually exclusive; he’s the same dude at his desk that he is on stage (minus the Hefeweizen). The son of Nobel laureate and Harvard economics professor Amartya Sen, Kabir met the mic during Boston’s underground renaissance; those who frequented Western Front battles and sweaty Middle East shows circa 2002 will recall his riding the independent wave beyond the Bean alongside cats like Mr. Lif and Esoteric. But though he still drops sporadic enlightened albums (three so far, with another on the way), Kabir has carved a niche that few of his rap peers would be equipped to join him in. (Some might even be legally prohibited.)

King Syze

CHRIS FARAONE — Tue, 26 Aug 2008 19:04:36 GMT

Jedi Mind Tricks Presents: Labor Union | Babygrande
The Philly rhyme giant proves his worth with calculated lyrics that simultaneously touch topics and talk trash.

Rebirth of a prince

CHRIS FARAONE — Tue, 19 Aug 2008 19:59:20 GMT

Digging RZA in 36 steps
I recently took the Greyhound to Montreal for a RZA concert.

WU GOES THERE: As a producer, MC, and entity, RZA introduced architecturally underground hip-hop to mainstream audiences.

I recently took the Greyhound to Montreal for a RZA concert. In fact, my lust for Wu-Tang has led me to endure even fouler things than eight hours of lavatory stink: since the Clan usually bypass Boston, I’ve had to roll to Worcester for some shows. So when three weeks ago it was announced that RZA had booked a solo gig next Thursday at the Middle East, it seemed appropriate to spread some flower petals. In honor of the sacred Clan number 36, here go that many memorable moments from the career of a producer, MC, and entity who introduced architecturally underground hip-hop to mainstream audiences.

“GRITS” | BIRTH OF A PRINCE [2003] | Born in 1969, Robert Diggs grows up poor in Brooklyn, Pittsburgh, and Staten Island. According to the song “Grits”: “A one pound box of sugar, a stick of margarine, and a hot pot of grits kept his family from starving.”

“YOU CAN’T STOP ME NOW” | DIGI SNACKS [2008] | 1979: RZA and his cousin Ol’ Dirty Bastard begin hitting kung fu flicks on 42nd Street. An imagination blooms.

“LITTLE GHETTO BOYS” | WU TANG FOREVER [1997] | Around 1990: RZA, GZA, and Ol’ Dirty Bastard collectively call themselves Force of the Imperial Master, but they change the name to All In Together Now after their song by that name blows up around New York.

"OOH I LOVE YOU RAKEEM" [1991] | 1991: Before the RZA is born, Diggs signs to Tommy Boy records as Prince Rakeem. His lead single, “Ooh I Love You Rakeem,” hardly demonstrates his genius.

“IN THE HOOD” | IRON FLAG [2001] | Wu-Tang are born from a rivalry between Staten Island’s Park Hill and Stapleton projects. RZA lives on the borderline between the two, and he pumps music from his basement studio to lure potential MCs on both sides.

“DRAMA” | DIGI SNACKS [2008] | Even with his career popping, RZA remains handcuffed to the block. Soon after the Rakeem video and EP drop, he does a short bid for gun possession.

“BACK IN THE GAME” | IRON FLAG [2001] | 1993: Following the success of the newly formed Clan’s jump-off single, “Protect Ya Neck,” Wu-Tang sign with Steve Rifkind’s soon-to-be legendary Loud Records.

“BRING DA RUCKUS” | ENTER THE WU-TANG (36 CHAMBERS) [1993] | Dropping the same year as Notorious B.I.G.’s Ready To Die and the Nas classic Illmatic, Enter the Wu-Tang (36 Chambers) emerges as the grimiest, most eclectic of the three iconic releases.

Backed the f*** up

CHRIS FARAONE — Wed, 30 Jul 2008 16:54:35 GMT

‘Rock The Bells’ 2008
I wasn’t the only one held back from “Rock the Bells” by fleets of ugly persons driving Chevy Avalanches.

Reks in effect

CHRIS FARAONE — Mon, 28 Jul 2008 22:28:24 GMT

Lawtown MC bounces back
Since jumping skills-first onto Boston’s rap scene seven years ago, Lawrence-born MC Reks has earned a variety of reputations.

NERVOUS REKS: “I allowed myself to get caught up in the idea of being a rap star without really being at that level.”

Since jumping skills-first onto Boston’s rap scene seven years ago, Lawrence-born MC Reks has earned a variety of reputations. He’s been known as one of the region’s lyric savants, a raging self-absorbed asshole, and an unwieldy stumbling lush. There’s a reason I say those things with no regard for my own health or for his feelings: Reks has spent the past half-decade exiting the darkness and ensuring that his legacy is tied to the former accolade and not the latter mishaps.

“I burned a lot of bridges,” he says about his relationship with the New England rap establishment, as well as with Brick Records, which released his infinitely respected debut, Along Came the Chosen, in 2001, but turned down his 2003 follow-up, Rekless (eventually self-released). “I was immature, and I made decisions that were devastating toward my career. I just thought that I was on top of the world, and with that mind state, I allowed myself to get caught up in the idea of being a rap star without really being at that level. I had no dues paid to warrant that kind of mentality, but I had that mentality. I learned real quick when things started to get bad.”

Hip-hop artists rarely come so clean, but Reks specializes in telling it like it is, and in the wake of slipping from Boston hip-hop’s top spot, he knew where he stood. Those who find it difficult to understand how an artist could feel so exalted on what amounted to underground scene might consider that around the turn of the millennium Boston hatched more critically fellated subterranean talent than any city save for New York, Philly, and Los Angeles. Akrobatik and 7L & Esoteric were attracting boom-bap fans from as far away as Germany. Mr. Lif and Virtuoso were introducing heads to a new breed of figurative consciousness. Edo G was resurrecting — and the list continues, from Made Men, OVM, and Ripshop to Insight and Edan. Reks’s brazen blacktop enlightenment and writing abilities enabled him to ascend the ladder quickly . . . too quickly.

“I allowed my head to get swollen. Everybody knows my issues with drinking, and a lot of that played a part in it as well — my inability to calm down on certain things was having a devastating effect on not only my music but also on my wife and my son. I had to take time off just to realize what was important and to figure out how I could grow.”

Fakts One

CHRIS FARAONE — Tue, 22 Jul 2008 20:05:05 GMT

Long Range | Greenstreets
Fakts never built a repertoire deep enough to secure his own specific sound, but on Long Range he proves he can dip into a variety of styles and cater tracks around any MC’s individual tastes.

Here we go, yo

CHRIS FARAONE — Tue, 22 Jul 2008 15:43:18 GMT

Rock the Bells: Q-Tip reunites A Tribe Called Quest one last time
No Rock the Bells tour would be official without a godlike headliner at the helm.

THE SCENARIO “This is it, man – all you’re going to get is this tour,” Tip says. “We’ll just be keeping it essence like we always did.”

On-point tips: A checklist for A Tribe Called Quest's reunion show. By Chris Faraone.

No Rock the Bells tour would be official without a godlike headliner at the helm. For the past five summers, the divine architects at hip-hop marketers Guerilla Union have delivered Public Enemy and Lauryn Hill, as well as reunion sets from Rage Against the Machine and Wu-Tang Clan, effectively making the hottest, grossest season of the year much cooler for hip-hop heads with receding hairlines. We don’t fearlessly nut-smuggle joints through security check points as often as we used to, but with acts like those, it’s worth risking our teaching licenses, Bar certifications, badges, visitation rights, and marriages.

This year’s reunions should be especially attractive to those nostalgic for boom bap’s sophomore renaissance, since Method Man and Redman, the Pharcyde, and A Tribe Called Quest will be rocking to remind us that the hip-hop we grew up digesting through commercial arteries was not only eternally catchy but also infinitely inventive, perilously entertaining, and any other excessively positive adverb-adjective combination you might use to define what mainstream rap once was. For those of us who were intravenous Tribe fanatics, and even for those of you who still say, “I don’t really like hip-hop, but I love A Tribe Called Quest, the Beastie Boys, and De La Soul,” this should be far more exciting than when Faneuil Hall pub DJs slip “Can I Kick It?” into Friday night medleys between “Caribbean Queen” and “Closing Time.”

If one-quarter of the Massachusetts residents who claim wet palates for Native Tongue linguistics show up at Rock the Bells this Saturday at the Comcast Center, then the number of hand-me-down Scandinavian autos in the parking lot may break the record set at every Phish show ever. That doesn’t bother Q-Tip, though; if he had a problem sharing fans with Dave Matthews, Cake, and Billy Joel, then he would have Schiavo’d the group eons ago instead of rescuing it like Baby Jessica every few years for a reunion tour. “I’m honored that those people [who don’t otherwise like hip-hop] listen to me,” Tip says. “Hopefully they’ve dug what I’ve done enough to open the doors for other hip-hop out there, whether it’s Large Professor, Biggie, LL or N.W.A.”

Gift rap

CHRIS FARAONE — Tue, 15 Jul 2008 16:33:04 GMT

Edu Leedz blows out the candles
Boston hip-hop promoter Edu Leedz celebrated his 29th birthday in carnal mediæval-king fashion. The only thing missing was a three-pound turkey leg for Leedz to gnaw on.

Future classic

CHRIS FARAONE — Tue, 01 Jul 2008 21:28:36 GMT

Here, sit down and check out Moe Pope
No problem — your crib was on the way to the racetrack anyway. We’ll be able to meet Erik at the Hot Dog Safari in 20 minutes if the traffic holds up.

MOE RESPECT: With beats by Headnodic (right), Moe Pope comes close to perfection — so why are Boston heads sleeping on him?

No problem — your crib was on the way to the racetrack anyway. We’ll be able to meet Erik at the Hot Dog Safari in 20 minutes if the traffic holds up. Your cousin told me to ease up on the music around you — something about your not liking a rap album since The Low End Theory — but I’ve got something I promise will restore your faith in hip-hop, my man. Did he tell you I’m a music critic? Yeah — everyone always accuses me of holding people captive, but . . .

Do you see it on the floor somewhere over there? It’s got a black-and-yellow cover — it says Megaphone. Yeah — that’s it. Word, so the dude rapping is Moe Pope; he’s a Boston cat who’s also in this group Project Move. The beats were done by a Bay Area producer named Headnodic, who played bass like eight years ago in this fresh Boston band named Mission that Moe fronted. After not seeing each other for years, they rendezvoused for two weeks in Cali last year to do this project, but don’t worry about all that. Just light this shit up, sit back, and marinate. And do me a favor, try not to burn the seat — my girlfriend already wants my ass for that hole in the dashboard.

I’ll start you off with this track “Burning Bridges.” I know — that piano loop alone is classic. The rhymes are basically about how despite his having dropped two of the highest-quality releases in Hub hip-hop history — Butterfly Theory with Project Move and Life’s a Struggle alongside Insight, Edan, Dagha, Anonymous, and Raheem Jamal as Electric — Moe lacks props on the local rap scene. People respect him elsewhere; he was the only Boston MC invited to South by Southwest this year, and he’s about to do eight stops on the Warped Tour, but Boston heads are sleeping.

We don’t have too much time, so I’ll jump to my favorite track real quick. There are three cuts where Moe swings a heavy sociopolitical sword; this one is called “Durty.” I know this is a bit annoying, but I spoke with him the other day, and I have my tape recorder right here. You’re better off listening to Moe describe it than me: “ ‘Durty’ talks about the things that everybody sees but doesn’t want to talk about. There are a lot of cats who want to talk about the hood, but what are they seeing that I’m not really seeing? There are a lot of guys out there with their shirts off acting tough, but they can’t raise their kids.”

Bigmouth strikes again

CHRIS FARAONE — Tue, 24 Jun 2008 18:18:50 GMT

Immortal Technique goes on the offensive
The few college students who don’t watch The Daily Show get their news from Immortal Technique.

If you don't have anything nice to say . . . Five outrageous Immortal Technique moments. By Chris Faraone.

The few college students who don’t watch The Daily Show get their news from Immortal Technique. An unfounded assertion, sure, but for budding activists from campuses to ghettos worldwide, the Harlem revolutionary hip-hop Goliath is the proven militant alternative to pacifist patchouli rap and lightweight political satire. Technique is more Stewie Griffin than Jon Stewart, a vehement opponent of hypocrisy who’s content with deploying shock-and-awe attacks, shoulder-loaded rockets, or whatever else it takes to mangle adversaries. He doesn’t joke about world hunger, irresponsible globalization, or Christian conservatives — and as it turns out, his approach is precisely what discouraged hip-hop fans and disenchanted liberals were waiting for.

“Hip-hop doesn’t have to be one extreme or another,” says Technique, who comes to the UnderGroundHipHop.com store on Friday for a free performance. “It doesn’t have to be socially conscious, non-threatening, crying on records, smelling like incense, and wearing African clothing that you don’t even understand the significance of. That’s just as fake to me as people who rap about being gangsters and who aren’t really gangsters. On the other extreme, it doesn’t have to be hardcore and ignorant to the point that we water down the lyrics like idiots and animals for the amusement of the public on some minstrel-show shit. That’s what hip-hop is suffering from.”

Technique owns his masters — and his publishing rights. He has for years been hip-hop’s most vocal and loco opponent of major record labels, at least four of which he’s told to go screw. With his own imprint, Viper Records, and through distribution deals with other labels including Babygrande, he’s sold hundreds of thousands of copies of his 2001 Revolutionary Vol. 1 debut and his 2003 Revolutionary Vol. 2 follow-up. Since he’s slung more than a few units out of his trunk and doesn’t trust Nielsen SoundScan for shit, he has no definitive sales numbers, but his resonance with everyone from pimps and players to professors and professionals attests to his widespread notoriety.

“I’ve always had respect in my own community, and I’ve always had a very large Latino fan base, but now I have the most diverse fan base in all of the underground,” Technique declares. “I have a large Middle Eastern fan base thanks to all of the support that I’ve given over there, and now I have a lot more Asians, too. I welcome all of that, and I think that it’s a positive thing to stretch out to so many demographics. Unlike some other people, I’ve never resented the fact that I have a gang of white fans.”

Talk the talk

CHRIS FARAONE — Tue, 17 Jun 2008 20:28:37 GMT

A local hip-hop critic puts his money where his mouth is
Music critics can’t win.

"It’s the second time that day someone has used 'worst ever' to describe my rapping."

Seven easy steps to battle-rap supremacy: Spitting prattle that’ll rattle. By Chris Faraone.

Chris Faraone battles a Jam'n 94.5 intern (mp3)

Music critics can’t win. As far as civilians are concerned, if we’re not wanna-be musicians exacting revenge on those who rejected us, then we’re complete failures who lack the sack and the talent to step in the arena. It’s flawed thinking — by that logic, readers should demand that Dan Shaughnessy have a killer crossover — but it’s a prejudice we accept in exchange for promo discs and front-row seats. I always fell into the latter category; despite imagining that a rap career would be sweet, I never wrote rhymes, recorded tracks, or rocked open mics. But that all changed last Friday night at Harpers Ferry, where I entered myself in the Leedz HeadQuarters MC battle (sponsored by the Boston hip-hop production juggernaut), crossing the divide from critic to artist.

Before describing the hip-hop boot camp I went through to train for this event, I’ll answer some questions I was asked by the post-collegiate Caucasians I told about it. What exactly is a rap battle, or an MC battle? It’s a traditional rite of passage in which two rappers face off — whether in the street or in a club — with the sole aim of demoralizing each other using improvisational — or freestyle, as the kids say — lyrics. How does one win a battle? Much as in electoral politics, you bury an opponent by exposing him as gay, weak, fraudulent, or, preferably, all three. And finally: By “battle,” do you mean like that scene in 8 Mile? Sort of, but Eminem’s rhymes in 8 Mile were scripted and therefore not freestyle. The Harpers event would be judged by a knowledgeable crew: former star battle rapper Jake the Snake, producers J-Hunt, Stu Bangas, and Matty Trump, and Leedz Edutainment in-house photographer Sam “Sly” Young.

Before this endeavor, my own freestyle experience was limited to rhyming among friends during late-night blunt sessions. In high school and college, I was always the kid who could rap, but only in the way that a kid at Newton North whose parents net an annual $1.2 million is the poor kid. Lately, my freestyling has been limited to occasional Friday-night blackouts. I had some serious practicing to do, so one week before the big dance I ripped my favorite instrumentals — from “Still D.R.E.” to “Nas Is Like” — to my iPod for the gym, car, and crib. I rapped in traffic, in the shower, at my desk, and, to the amusement of many at my health club, on the Stairmaster. I ordered Burger King drive-through in near-Shakespearean end-rhyme couplets. After two days, I was able to recap my day’s activities and communicate Law & Order story lines in raps.

Wu where?

CHRIS FARAONE — Mon, 02 Jun 2008 21:51:14 GMT

Wu-Tang Wednesdays at Tommy Doyle’s
To be among 100-plus heads who rhyme along when the song asks “Remember when we licked the cream out of Suzy Qs?” induces straight-up euphoria.

Qwel and Kip Killagain

CHRIS FARAONE — Tue, 03 Jun 2008 21:03:38 GMT

The New Wine | Galapagos 4
Not only does he have that Midwestern Ewok look, but the Chicago rhyme icon Qwel is also the most linguistically developed cat in modern hip-hop.

Braille

CHRIS FARAONE — Tue, 27 May 2008 20:19:04 GMT

MC Braille at the Undergroundhiphop.Com Store, May 11, 2008
Only the blessed shall see him.

All together now

CHRIS FARAONE — Tue, 20 May 2008 20:16:32 GMT

A Boston Unity Fest sampler
Most Boston rappers who are talented enough to succeed beyond the Bean have been collaborating for a minute.

The accidental gangsta

CHRIS FARAONE — Wed, 21 May 2008 21:52:33 GMT

Elemental Zazen has been through some shit
Elemental Zazen wears Sauconies on stage and has “World Peace” tattoo’d on his forearm.

ON THE REAL: Honest introspection makes for better hip-hop than insecure bullshit every time.

Elemental Zazen wears Sauconies on stage and has “World Peace” tattoo’d on his forearm. He doesn’t pack toast, flip bricks, or engage in any other euphemistic roughneck activities, and to his knowledge he has zero illegitimate children. But despite all of those stereotypically upper-middle-class characteristics, the Cambridge rapper might be the most gangsta motherfucker on the Boston hip-hop scene — depending, of course, on how one defines gangsta.

Over the past two years, Zazen has endured a raw helping of adversity, from losing his closest cousin to watching his apartment burn down to having doctors discover a raging tumor on his melon. Before that, he lived in his car, beat a heroin addiction, and was diagnosed with manic depression. His newest, The Glass Should Be Full (Gnawledge), hardly resembles a Mobb Deep project, but given the pain that moved his pen at such agonizing angst-addled angles, his sophomore release is as hardcore an opus as Tupac’s Me Against the World.

Thug life began at the International School of Beijing, where the US-born Zazen’s parents taught and where he graduated in 2000. At the time, he was completely uninterested in academics; apart from an interscholastic soccer career that took him through the Orient and an H-sniffing habit, he focused his attention on OutKast albums that were surfacing in China. “When I came to the States in 2001,” he says, “all I wanted to do was make music.”

Following some severe culture shock, Zazen enrolled at the Art Institute of Boston, and soon after at UMass-Boston, where his rap dreams often slipped farther out of reach. “By senior year I was living in my car, starving, and smelling like shit, and I figured I could go to UMass for some mercy. They called me a week later and told me that they were giving me $1000, but on my way to pick up the check I got pulled over with no license or registration and almost ended up in jail.”

Finally settled in a Dorchester apartment, Zazen milked enough credit lines to record his Adolescence Weapon debut, a catchy anti-establishment rookie Mass-terpiece that moved more than 4000 units without distribution. By 2005, he was showcasing with iconic underground outfits including Glue and Non-Phixion while plotting his second album. And then the shit hit.

Moe Pope + Headnodic

CHRIS FARAONE — Tue, 20 May 2008 14:43:39 GMT

Megaphone | NatAural High/Koch
Megaphone is my favorite murder-free rap album since Talib Kweli & Hi-Tek’s Train of Thought.

Calling for back-up

CHRIS FARAONE — Mon, 12 May 2008 22:05:24 GMT

Slick Rick gets fly with a little help from his friends
Of all the tumult and talent swinging through town in 2006, I cherish most my memories of Audible Mainframe backing Slick Rick at Harpers Ferry.

THE RULER: This is not another burnt-out legend packing an iPod — this is Slick Rick.

Last year I would have said that 2006 sucked. That’s just my style. But backtracking through my pre-iCal day planner, attempting to place myself at the end of that summer, I’m tearfully nostalgic. For two years ago. That August, Gnarls Barkley smacked Avalon so hard that I held my piss for the entire set. On the first weekend that September, Brooklyn’s Boot Camp Clik reunited at the Middle East downstairs, where Jedi Mind Tricks, Kool Keith, and Lupe Fiasco played the same month. And on September 22, Jam Master Jay’s mother dropped her own needle on the record when, in front of more than 1000 people at the Berklee Performance Center, she scolded DMC for never calling with condolences after her son’s tragic 2002 passing.

But of all the tumult and talent swinging through town that summer, I cherish most my memories of Audible Mainframe backing Slick Rick at Harpers Ferry. I stood with my crotch against the stage that September night as Boston’s organic hip-hop ambassadors heroically tweaked old-school instrumentals while the Ruler guided a swollen crowd through his eternal catalogue. It was a cross-generational adventure; as “Hey Young World,” “Children’s Story,” and “Mona Lisa” spilled back-to-back-to-back, rap fans young and ancient sang along. This was not another burnt-out legend packing an iPod stuffed with instrumentals; this was Slick Rick — pimping a mint’s worth of platinum splurges on his neck, wrists, teeth, and fingers — reanimating some of hip-hop’s greatest cuts with a little help from some local boys made good.

“I felt like I was 10 years old all over again at that first show,” says Audible’s MC Exposition, who plays hype man when he’s on stage with Rick. “I used to rap those songs in the mirror to myself as a kid, so to be on stage doing the callbacks with the man who wrote them was crazy. I have a shit-eating grin on my face in every picture that I’ve seen from that night.”

Although fans might have expected the Harpers debut of Audible and Rick to roll smoothly, wariness prevailed backstage. The band had had no rehearsal time with Rick, who till that night had never performed with so much as a rhythm section, let alone a horn-and-keyboard-studded outfit like Audible. “Preparation” consisted of Rick’s management sending Audible a list of songs two weeks before the gig, with little supplemental instruction, so that when judgment day arrived, the whole thing still seemed unbelievable, if not unfeasible. “Rick showed up like an hour before the show, and even he was a little skeptical,” said Exposition. “We knew the songs, and obviously we knew that he knew the songs, but neither of us has ever done this before.”

In with the in crowd

CHRIS FARAONE — Mon, 28 Apr 2008 20:16:38 GMT

LA’s Time Machine lose the zeros
I knew a girl named Juliette who moved to Queens in her junior year of high school.

QUANTUM LEAP: Time Machine have graduated from stank rap shows to swank gigs.

I knew a girl named Juliette who moved to Queens in her junior year of high school. She was foxy; homegirl pulled off white lipstick and hoop earrings like she was auditioning for a Cool J video. Only problem was that she spent her first few months banging losers. By the time Juliette realized her mistake, she had to service a parade of jocks and thugs to arrive atop the social stratosphere.

Time Machine remind me of Juliette. After toiling for years on underground hip-hop’s stylistic and thematic fringes — and seducing lame beat and rhyme aficionados like myself — Jet Set Jay (formerly Jaysonic), Biscuit (formerly Comel), and Mekalek realized that to win popularity contests they needed much cooler friends.

But even though there will be far more candy-colored Pumas than oversized white T-shirts at Time Machine’s Middle East show next Thursday, the group have not attitudinally assimilated with their arrogant dance-happy hipster contemporaries. They prove as much by offering me a glimpse of how it feels to graduate from stank rap shows to swank gigs with the likes of Yo Majesty, the Cool Kids, and Roxy Cottontail.

“Scenes change rapidly, and now more rapidly than ever,” Jay explains by phone from Time Machine’s Los Angeles compound. “The fact that the music we’re making now is appealing to a broader audience is great, but at the end of the day it wasn’t designed for anybody in particular.”

Mekalek, who handles Time Machine’s sophisticated bouncy backdrops, is still negotiating the upgrade. “I think it’s great that we’re finding people outside of that core traditional hip-hop audience, but by the same token I’m personally a hip-hop dude, so I’m hoping that it appeals to those kids too.”

A few spins of Time Machine’s new Life Is Expensive reveals that the trio haven’t tripped far outside their know zone. On the OutKast-caliber “Something We’re Becoming,” Mekalek remains one of the few hip-hop purists who can juxtapose Beat Street æsthetics and progressive flair. And on topic-heavy cuts like “We’re Making a Video” and “Survival Kit,” Jay and Biscuit still juggle arcane and existential concepts like George and Jerry, Freud and Jung, and Harold and Kumar.

“When we made Slow Your Roll, we were meat-and-potatoes hip-hop kids, and it was our first time cooking up an album,” says Biscuit. “If I’m going to stick with the kitchen analogy, I guess this time we were comfortable using different spices and endive and all of that shit to make our own flavors.”