Blogarhythms

Yesterday afternoon I spent a couple of hours engaged in discourse with fiber artist m. Cody and her homegirl, visual artist Christine Hajjar. Topics of discussion included art, music and all sorts of other good shit. Both ladies have recently set up shop in new locales, so the conversation turned to the communal qualities of a given city (particularly that of it’s artistic community) and the influence it holds, whether positive or negative, over the artists who take up residence there.

Living in an age where life imitates art more than ever and art seems to reflect life less and less (while simultaneously providing escapism which is increasingly more degenerate than fantastic) this symbiotic relationship between community, artist, art and society at large is explored embarrassingly infrequently by both artists and so-called critics alike. But coming up in conversation as it did reminded this cultural documentarian of a record I came across only a few short days earlier which is largely concerned with just such matters.

The album — from Rideout & Terry Cole, an emcee from Ohio by way of Detroit, and a Middletown, Ohio-based producer/musician respectively — is called, appropriately enough, The City. Both a rumination on modern urban life and dissection of Rap music, the disc ponders just how a genre which grew out of a Hip-Hop culture based around reflecting reality and escaping it through artistic expression (art, dance, music, etc) which functionally improved ones lifestyle could become a glorification of all that’s wrong with society, feeding negativity back into itself.

Four songs in particular encapsulate the thematic heart of the disc. Two outline the problems facing Hip-Hop as an art as wells as the community it grew out of and is supposed to serve. While two more provide sincere (albeit naively simple) solutions designed to bring about a positive resolution.

The title track finds Rideout opining the urban decay occurring in the city he loves, expressing his desire to utilize his intellectual & artistic gifts to affect positive change and praising graffiti artists whose illegal expression can offer cultural commentary and provide visual beautification alongside Wild Style samples. “Can’t Understand” details his struggles with the way “the Hip-Hop game” pigeonholes emcees and forces them into stereotypical roles in order to obtain commercial success, claiming disgust to the point of physical illness at emcees who “pump evil in the veins of the public.”

Rideout & Terry Cole “Can’t Understand”

“Talk to ‘Em” implores practitioners of the art of “two turntables and mic” to “take it back to the essence” as an expression of karmic cleansing, using samples of Afrika Bambaataa to drive the point home. And album closer “We Got to Live Together” wraps things up on a feel-good note, emphasizing the intertwined fate of all who reside on the planet called Earth regardless of race, religion or geographic location & taking time to pay lip service to things that make us hopeful because “it might look gritty, but there might be something pretty in between.” And those “pretty” moments are worth fighting for.

All this occurs over backing tracks built around familiar breakbeats, eclectic vocal bits, crackly samples and lush live instrumentation orchestrated by Terry Cole and a team of musicians affiliated with his Colemine Records label. Fueled by blistering organs, bell-toned keys and warm & gooey live basslines courtesy of Cole himself, the sound is a unique amalgam of digital cut-n-paste and traditional analog musicianship that puts a new spin on the crate-dug vibe of the vintage Soul and Jazz we turn to as sample fodder.

Which wouldn’t matter a lick if there wasn’t a competent master of ceremonies controlling the microphone. Thankfully Rideout conducts himself expertly, with a clear, fluid delivery, and accessible guy-next-door personality that allows his passion to show through without making him sound preachy. He’s a regular dude who loves Hip-Hop, loves his city and wants both to be as healthy as possible because if they’re healthy, he’s healthy, and I can appreciate that. And if you’re at all appreciative of the artistry of emcees like Blu, Lupe Fiasco, k-os, and Wale, you’ll probably appreciate this cat too.

And who knows, if communities appreciate and support artists whose art is itself supportive and appreciative of the community, it just might benefit everybody involved!