{ Category Archives }
This is French documentary called Hip Hop Vote. It looks at Detroit politics and the influence hip hop has on it (and vice versa). It features commentary and appearances by Kwame Kilpatrick, Khary Kimani Turner, BR Gunna, Slum Village, Baatin, Amp Fiddler and several others.
Featuring music from Slum Village and the Black Bottom Collective.
Despite some obvious similarities to the Wu-tang Clan, D12 really didn’t warrant comparison to the 9 man strong team as individuals.
If Detroit emcees were to band together and do a Wu tribute album (purely hypothetical) or form a parallel version of the group, this is how they would form together (like Voltron!).
RZA - The ring leader - Has to be none other than J Dilla. Aside from fulfilling both emcee/producer capabilities, it’s the actual similarity in the quality of production and the sometimes lacklustre emceeing (see RZA on Ras Kass’ “The End”) that makes this an obvious choice.
GZA - The wise leader - Another easy one - Less scientific but Phat Kat has been putting in work since the days of 1st Down with his old running mate droppin’ knowledge and schooling cats.
Method Man - The star - Stole the spotlight on the initial album without necessarily knowing he would (”M-E-T-H-O-D MAN”). That would be Obie Trice. Through all the hype surrounding Eminem and D12, Obie Trice ended up being the most successful of Detroit’s Shady Records recruits. The entire package you would want to see in an emcee.
Ghostface - If Method Man is “Star A”, Ghostface would be “Star 1A”. In Detroit’s case it would be Royce Da 5′9″. Perhaps the most prolific lyricist with respects due to Eminem, Royce like Ghostface is the underground’s king.
Ol’ Dirty Bastard - The unpredictable one - Baatin no question. Baatin doesn’t quite have the unintentional comedy of Dirt McGirt down, but maybe that’s something he can exploit.
The Wu-tang Clan: One of the, if not the best, hip hop groups of all time.
Raekwon - The storyteller - Big Herk. Easily. Both can whip up grimy tales of crime and street life and paint a picture through their words every time.
Inspectah Deck - Quiet but deadly. This would be Elzhi. Not the type to jump on award show stages uninvited (“Wu-tang is for the children!”) or constantly seek media attention, but no less deadly on the mic. One of the group’s best emcees and considered very underrated. Hopefully Zhi comes correct on his first solo outing. Deck didn’t quite live up to expectations.
Masta Killa - The unknown - Not many people could tell you a whole lot about Masta Killa. That fact along with the rhyme style/voice makes me think Billy Nix. The former D-Elite member is a stronger rhymer both lyrically and in flow but the subject matter and overall style are similar.
U-God - The relatively weaker link out of a strong crew - Not that he couldn’t deliver some fire (”Winter Warz”). He had the voice, but next to some of his group members, he had no choice but to be overlooked. This one’s a hard one. Success wise I would have to say Strike. Again, good lyrical ability but didn’t get the attention his peers did. Still goin strong after his role in 8 Mile, Strike should be alright as long as he doesn’t make bad career moves like U-God did - biting the hand that feeds him (RZA) and making a travesty of hip hop (”Bump” - I won’t even link to the video) a single on your cd.
Other thoughts:
Your thoughts?
The Detroit Free Press has an interesting sidebar to their recent article on Phat Kat. The Freep has listed Detroit Hip Hop talent who are well received worldwide. They might have done better naming those who don’t do well overseas as several other names could have easily been added.
Here’s the list:
DJ Dez: He’s worked with Slum Village, Lloyd Banks, Truth Hurts, Erykah Badu and Jurassic 5 and is heading to Japan in June to DJ a week’s worth of solo club dates.
Slum Village: Former members include James (Jay Dee) Yancey and Baatin. The rap group, now a duo, has been a longtime favorite on the underground scene, and has had national success but hasn’t reached household-name status. 2005 proved to be a big year for them; they signed on to be pitchmen for the 2006 Chevrolet Impala and 2006 HHR.
Ta’Raach: The producer and DJ is best known for working with other Detroit standouts, including Jay Dee, Dwele, and techno guru Carl Craig.Big Tone: The founder of Wasted Youth, he’s worked with many of Detroit’s producers and rappers.
Black Milk: He’s one of the city’s rising producers who also raps. He produced tracks for Slum Village’s “Trinity” album and worked on Lloyd Banks’ new album with Detroiters Nick Speed, DJ Dez and Young R.J. In March, the 23-year-old released his major label debut, “Popular Demand,” on the Fat Beats/Sony BMG imprint.Guilty Simpson: He inked a deal with Stones Throw Records, an L.A.-based label that also recorded music by Jay Dee. People are calling him one of the next great Detroit rappers.
The Black Milk inclusion may be premature at this point but its only a matter of time that he’s an overseas favorite. You can also add DJ House Shoes (coming off a recent European tour), Frank ‘N Dank and to a slightly lesser extent, D12.
The international connection is definitely there as many readers of this site are outside the U.S.A.’s borders (All of Europe and Japan in particular).
Part of 7 days of Proof at DetroitHipHop.net.
This piece has made the rounds on the ‘net and is a must read. Via a House Shoes blog, via the Okayplayer boards, via Hex.
“A story for my Detroit niggas…”
I wasn’t sure I would ever tell anyone this story, but I feel like it needs to be heard, because muthafukas need to really understand the power of music. I might even be posting it in the wrong forum, but I don’t give a fuck.
It starts over a year ago, on Feb 10th, 2006. I was in Fribourg, Switzerland w/ SV & we were eating pre-show dinner in the back of the venue. The European tour mgrs phone rings. Nobody pays too much attention, we just keep eatin’ & talkin’ shit. Howi (the EU tm) gives T3 the phone, & says “It’s Tim” (SV’s mgr). T3 listens for a minute, then gets a totally blank look on his face. Totally absent of any type of emotion. He hands the phone back to Howi & looks @ all of us (me, El, & Dez) w/ a blank expression, not saying a word, his mouth forming a small “O”. Finally I spoke. “What, nigguh? Who the fuck got killed THIS time?” He turned around to look @ me. & said, “Dilla just died”. Nobody said a fucking word for a few seconds. Then Dez said, “Man, I gotta smoke.” T3 went in the back to use the computer, Elzhi sat @ the table looking numb, & I went in the back to check on T3. Mind you, this is approximately 30-45 minutes before the FIRST date on this EU tour, I think it was about 12-15 dates. Howi asked me did we still want to do the show-no brainer-”YES”. There’s no way Dilla’s death was going to silence his music in any way, shape, form, or fashion.
The show must go on. We walk on to the stage, the venue is packed. Dez is on the tables, I’m punchin’ the buttons on the replay. I hit the first joint-”GIANT” from the self-titled lp. 3 & El come out, killing it. Next up is “SET IT”. @ the end of the joint, 3 tells me to hold up. He addresses the crowd, & informs them that J.Dilla has passed form. The majority of these kids don’t even speak English. As I peered out into the crowd, I saw people wearing, “J.DILLA CHANGED MY LIFE” shirts & other types of Dilla & Slum memorabilia, some shit that I hadn’t seen in the states in YEARS. T3 asked for a moment of silence, & some dude yelled out in broken English, “J.DILLA IS A GOD!”
The crowd screamed it’s approval, T3 said “Hit it”, & the show went on. The ride back to the hotel was quiet, nobody said much of shit. Everybody alone w/ his own thoughts, thinking about a fallen friend. The tour instantly became a Dilla tribute tour of sorts.
The next day in Zurich, one of the opening acts had a painter onstage. He painted throughout their whole set, & left it onstage when they got off. It was a portrait of Dilla. He gave it to us. (You can see it in my pics on my myspace page)
T3 flew to LA for the funeral & missed two dates, one in Belgium & one in Germany. Elzhi HELD IT THE FUCK DOWN, you hear me? & the crowds gave so much love, because they knew mufukas were going through SOME SHIT. A friend of ours from London flew into the Belgium gig to show support.
Imagine that shit.
You’re halfway around the fucking world, heart heavy as a mufuka, doing what amounts to a one person SV show & you see this funny lookin’, funny talkin’, scarf-wearin’ African dude in the middle of the crowd, w/ his hands up the whole night w/ a shit-eating grin on his face & @ that moment he becomes the most beautiful person in the world. We talked, kicked it about Dilla & he told us he’d see us in London.
Those first few days were some FUCKED UP DAYS, I’ll tell you.
A whole lot of internet & phone calls & red eyes & shit, you know? But the shit started to change. We incorporated a “DillaTribute” into the set. More & more fans were showing up wearing Dilla shirts & anyone who got a chance to talk to the group expressed nothing but love & respect for Dilla AND SV.
But the wounds were fresh, niggas were still hurt, & the press didn’t give a fuck. I had to monitor all interviews and give a limit to the # of questions that could be asked about Dilla.
Dilla was ALWAYS the shit overseas, & his death drove the music media into a frenzy. How many times can T3 answer “How do you feel about J.Dilla’s passing?” & what the fuck did they expect him to say? We could see people suddenly referring to Dilla as a “legend” or an “icon”, but he already was that to us. As a matter of fact, the day before he passed, me,T3 & Dez were in my room in London talkin’ about Dilla & if the world & especially the U.S. Would ever completely understand his genuis. I swear to God, Dez said, “Man, nobody’s gonna really realize how sweet Dilla is until he’s gone.”
We all agreed wholeheartedly. Foreshadowing for your ass, huh? Anyfukingway, tour ends, we come home. There had been all types of J.Dilla tributes & memorials & shit while we were gone, so obviously SV wasn’t able to be a part of them. We didn’t mind,though. Almost every night for a month we held our own J.Dilla tributes & memorials on the other side of the planet, & I believe those audiences needed to see SV & hear that classic Dilla shit just as badly as SV needed to give it to them.
Therapy.
After that first night in Switzerland, we never did “A MOMENT OF SILENCE” again. It was always a moment of NOISE & the crowd ALWAYS gladly complied.
Story doesn’t end here, though.
About a month after we get home, on April 11th, around 5am, I’m sitting up watching “PulpFiction” on onDemand @ this broads crib. All of my communication devices start ringing/buzzing/vibrating @ different intervals, so it’s sounding like non-stop racket.
I know this can’t be good.
The calls & emails are from various people. One text msg said, “IS IT TRUE”?
I reply, “IS WHAT TRUE?” The response comes, “ABOUT PROOF?” You know how it feels when you’re on a rollercoaster & you just start droppin’ over that first hill? My fucking heart fell into my feet.
Another msg said, “TURN ON THE NEWS”.
I didn’t.
I couldn’t.
A lot of that shit is a blur.
I remember talkin’ to 1stBorn & asking “IS HE GONE”? I remember Freddie calling & asking where I was, telling me to hold tight, he’s on the way. I remember going to the wrong St.Johns-the one I went to when Fats lost his little brother Sammie.
I remember the hospital parking lot. News trucks on the street. Camera’s set up. I remember Mike D’s wife telling me Mike was hyperventilating & asking me which hospital we were @. I remember P’s little sister Mschief hugging me so tight I couldn’t breathe. I remember Dolo running into the hospital w/ tears running down his face, & the police running in moments later. I remember what seemed like 100 police cars filing into the driveway in front of the hospital. I remember going to St.Andrews, @ about 11am & everybody getting fucked up & praying & shit. I remember clandestine conversations about the likely whereabouts of the shooter.
Leaving. Trying to sleep thru the incessant buzzing/ringing/vibrating of those motherfucking phones.
Going to NorthernLights.
BlackMilk telling me, “Dog, I can’t see you nigguhs like this-I’m out.” I remember Trk callin’ me @ like 5am, we talked, & yelled & screamed & cried.
Yeah, dog.
We cried.
We cried for P & we cried for the city. The rest of that week was a lot of bullshit. Mufukas on TV lying, nigguhs lying to us, a lot of fucked up shit. Snik & Hush coming to get me, we went to see Keyshia Cole, then going to Sevin, gettin’ fucked up, trying to forget the unforgettable.
I wouldn’t go inside the wake.
I sat in the car for about 2 or 3 hours. People came up to the car & spoke to me, some of them tried to get me to go inside. Nope. Uh-uh. Not me. I’m going to remember my dog like the last time I saw him. My man ForbiddenFroot told me, “COME ON, GO ALL THE WAY W/ YOUR NIGGA MAN. YOU GOTTA GO ALL THE WAY”. I’ll always love that nigga for sayin’ that, but that wasn’t P in there.
My dog was already gone.
This story isn’t about death, though.
It’s about the POWER OF MUSIC.
I didn’t go to the funeral.
SV had a show in Amarillo,TX that day & we were glad to get on that plane & get the fuck out of Detroit. It felt like the city was dying.
A couple months after Proof died it was time to go back on the road. Back to Europe-FestivalSeason. Started it off w/ a Dilla tribute @ the Montreaux Jazz Festival. SV, PhatKat, PeteRock, Baatin & Bilal. I don’t even need to tell you how ridiculous that shit was. I think there were 20-25 dates, but I’ll tell you about the two that stick out the most to me. In Dublin, quite possibly the whitest place on the planet (ask Snik) I saw some shit I will never forget. Standing in the very front of the stage, in the middle, right next to each other, where two twenty-something Irish kids, hands up the whole show, spazzing out, knowing almost every word-feeling it, you know? There were a lot of cats like that @ SV shows, but these two were different.
One had on a “J.DILLA CHANGED MY LIFE” shirt, pretty common @ SV shows, right?
The other guy had on a PROOF shirt. You know the shirt I’m talking about. Black W/ Proof’s face on it, BigProofForever on the back. We all had them. Marc LaBelle & Mikey made sure that cats had those black Proof shirts. There’s no telling how many they had made. I mean, w/ the internet & everything that might not have seemed too strange that some dude in Ireland was wearing a PROOF shirt.
But this shirt was different.
It was white.
So these two guys are there in the front row & @ the end of the show I grab them, & bring them backstage so they could take pics w/ SV. I gotta get a pic of these two Irish dudes, who got together to come to an SV show to represent, shoulder to shoulder, front row center reciting “FALL-N-LUV” like they wrote it, one rocking a Proof tribute shirt the other a Dilla shirt.
The two dudes didn’t know each other.
On the last day of the tour we were in Germany @ Splash. Splash is widely concerned the biggest & best festival in Europe. Everyone wore their “BigProof” shirts & Dilla NewEra caps. While I was doing the line check, I could hear the crowd murmuring… “BigProof…J.Dilla…BigProof…J.Dilla…” Kinda like, “Tastes great, less filling”. It was kinda weird. SV comes on, murdering that shit, & we come to the part of the set where they do the J.Dilla/BigProof tribute. Thousands of people w/ their hands up, shouting out our niggas names to the heavens,half a world away, showing love to Detroit’s finest.
I don’t think I’ve ever been prouder to be from this dirty muthafuka.
All because of MUSIC. You can concern yourselves w/ radio play, or street promo, or whatever the fuck you want to, but trust me, your music is going to reach who it’s supposed to reach. So whenever you rap niggas write a verse, or you producers make a beat, & you’re repping DETROIT CITY, remember that you’ve got a beautiful & wonderful legacy to uphold.
Make us proud.
Make THEM proud.
R.I.P.
BigProof & J.Dilla.
Forever.
Have gun, will travel.
An old interview with Elzhi of Slum Village with some great questions asked by Todd E. Jones.
Highlights:
T.JONES: “What is your favorite song you did with an emcee or group outside of Slum Village?”
ELZHI: “A song I did with Royce The 5’9 a long time ago. This was when Royce’s crew was called Wall Street. Now, they are called The Elite (*D-Elite). The name of the song is called ‘The Heist’. Doc Seuss did the track and it’s one of my favorites just off of the fact that it was nothing but raw and uncut hip-hop. We were just spitting. It wasn’t for the radio or nothing and we all knew it.”
T.JONES: “What is the meaning behind the name Slum Village?”
ELZHI: “It’s a paradox. The words ‘Slum’ & ‘Village’ are two totally different things. It is basically bringing together different people under one roof to enjoy good music.”
Black Milk continues to receive good press in the media.
It’s this desire to walk the middle ground between the purity of the underground sound and the accessibility of mainstream hip-hop that characterizes the bulk of the album, which matches the new school’s intelligent lyricism with ol’ school subject matter (braggadocio, materialism, etc.) over infectious beats equally suited for Jeeps, clubs or headphone listening.
Lyrically, the remainder of the album hangs on by a thin thread. Black mumbles over most of the tracks, clearing the paths for Phat Kat, Ty & Kory, and One Be Lo.
Metro Times did a feature on ex Slum Village member Baatin last month. It’s a great read going beyond what we think we know with truthful insight from Baatin himself of the extent of his personal issues and illnesses.
From the article:
He nods his head, as if there’s a beat playing somewhere in his mind. “The sound in Detroit has a halo over it. The Motown sound and the riots left us with this ghost spirit. This is Gotham City right here. I just wanna make music that will stand the test of time.”
Coincidentally, I was also thinking of Detroit reminding me of Gotham City in the “Sound the Alarm” Video. It’s is on some Batman Returns shit.
The Slum Village of today is not what it once was. Jay Dee long ago had left the group to pursue other opportunities. Baatin, a member of the initial trio also left (depending on who you ask) while tending to personal and health problems. Jay Dee or “Dilla”, who sadly passed away just over one year ago had left on good terms however. He continued to be a frequent collaborator with his former SV group members. Baatin’s departure was not as pleasant. Todd E. Jones interviewed Baatin in 2003, in an attempt to get a more complete picture of the story.
Slum has continued on without missing a step with Elzhi and T3 forming a truly dynamic duo. Although Slum fans have continued to enjoy the offerings brought forth by the group, a bad taste from the past still remains as a result of the Baatin issue.
That’s why hip hop can be thankful for Black Milk. The young producer/emcee who honed his craft under the tutelage of Slum Village has brought Elzhi, T3 and Baatin together for the track entitled “Action”. This track can be found on the upcoming Popular Demand album, due the 13th of March (2007). Todd E. Jones (once again) brings us the story of this reunion on wax in a recent interview with Black Milk.
From the interview:
TODD E. JONES: “On the ‘Popular Demand’ LP, Baatin reunites with Slum Village (Elzhi & T3) on the song, ‘Action’. There were some problems between them, but you got them together for a song. How did you do this?”
BLACK MILK: “I don’t know, man. I did the track and the track was crazy. I wanted to spit on it and then I wanted to have Slum on it. Then, I thought that I wanted to have Baatin on it too. Elzhi, T3, and Baatin have not done a song together since the ‘Trinity’ album. That was like 2001 or 2002. I had Baatin come to the lab and bless me with a verse. We made it happen. There it is! All three of them on one record. It was crazy!”
TODD E. JONES: “Do you think that Baatin and the rest of Slum Village will ever be back together as a group?”BLACK MILK: “The Slum is doing their thing. Baatin is still trying to get himself together.”
TODD E. JONES: “Baatin did have some health problems. How is he doing health-wise these days?”
BLACK MILK: “He’s doing cool. Basically, I haven’t talked to him in a little while, but the last time I did talk to him, he was looking alright. He’s doing cool. Once Baatin handles whatever problems he has, he will be all good. I would love to have all three of them dudes back in the studio again to do another Slum Village album.”
Audio: Elzhi addresses Baatin on this J Dilla track - Slum Village “Reunion” from Detroit Deli (2004)
Detroit Hip Hop in the news