Hey! Whatever Happened to the MCs? (Time done changed for the MCs...)

Though urban poverty is known the world around, the 1970's New York version of it spawned what is now known as Hip Hop culture. Starting as block parties in neighborhoods facing poverty, domestic fallout from the Vietnam War, loss of blue collar jobs from deindustrialization (and the economic crisis of the early 70's), limited realization of promises of the Civil Rights Movement, backlash against the Black Power movement, and a popular music culture increasingly glitzy, Hip Hop would be put on record, promoted, popularized, and exported as both culture and music to other parts of the world. Its international reach seems amazing. Many rappers who are relatively obscure ("underground") here testify to the ability of Japanese audiences to recite every word of their songs. South African cab drivers from rival syndicates used to identify themselves with 2Pac and Notorious BIG. A friend was doing doctoral research on Hip Hop in Cuba. Far too often reduced to mere music--the most popular of which is often thought vulgar and limited--Hip Hop seems more a way of seeing the world. It involves listening to the stories of the folks that, for one reason or another (though often those reasons are race or poverty), reside on the margins of society. Hip Hop centralizes, through words, dress, sound, murals, dance, film, attitude, and politics, segments of worlds that are popularly ignored.

While I may have internalized this centralizing tendency of Hip Hop culture, the music does not play a central role in my social life anymore. I used to spend several hours a week either improvising or writing rhymes. Now, I don't. I used to spend hours talking about lyrics and beats and engaging in silly arguments and discussion with friends. Now, with only one or two people I can really talk about it with in law school, I talk mostly with myself, pondering the music on my nightly walks, one thing amongst many. I grow excited for the latest release from a favorite artist in a bubble. I haven't had enough moxy, motivation, or time to create my own little Hip Hop zone in Seattle. It, like the best friend (not a Hip Hop head) who is busy and lives elsewhere, is influential, but peripheral, and thus so dearly missed.

Thankfully and surprisingly, I found a couple of American Hip Hop heads with me on the program, and we'd trade occasional thoughts. But, I didn't encounter any Brazilian heads. Those that knew or liked Hip Hop were only familiar with the most commercially successful artists who, while not necessarily bad, don't well represent the depth of the music or breadth of styles. Their familiarity with Brazilian Hip Hop was limited. I, of course, had the relatively stale route of asking for good Brazilian Hip Hop in a music store. There, too, I was given a name or two, but not any enthusiasm for the music.

I arrived in Salvador in the middle of a huge, week-long festival celebrating John the Baptist. I do not know if heavy drinking and empassioned dancing were part of the ancient baptism rituals, but I'll assume they were and thereby see this festival as a conservative rebellion to overthrow sanitized tenets of modern religion and restore those of an exalted past. Whatever the meaning of the festival, I grew accustomed to the varied rhythms of forro, axe, and samba. One night--Wednesday--tired of both partying and trying to acclimate to foreign sounds, I relaxed in my hostel bed and read of the coming of the Third Reich, enraptured by the tale. At some point, I noticed that I was bobbing my head slightly, rhythmically, without thinking. My mind left my eyes and arrived at my ears. Sure enough, not 100 feet from me, speakers were blasting some Hip Hop. Disregarding my style-less clothes, I threw on my shoes and went out to find the music. A Brazilian Hip Hop trio (two MCs and one DJ) was rocking the crowd. I didn't understand a damn word, but I knew the beats were dope, and I could follow the universal command to "throw your hands in the air" (in Portuguese, it's "ao cima," e.g. up, or to the top). My body went into dope-concert-mode, not quite dancing, but definitely gesticulating. The show ended with the group inviting up a lot of the Bahian (the state where Salvador is located) Hip Hop community who was in the crowd up on stage for the last song. The crowd appropriately showed its love and dispersed.

I killed a few minutes while the performers and their friends were backstage. Then, I saw a couple of the dudes who were on-stage for the last song--they weren't performing, but they had been called up there by the performers. So, I figured they were part of the local scene. I approached them and in a limited but oh-so-enthusiastic Portuguese, introduced myself, told them I was American and was a huge Hip Hop fan and wanted to get to know the Brazilian scene. They were real cool and responded well. They started telling me how Hip Hop is really a niche genre in Brazil and that a lot of folks don't really know anything about it. One guy told me some of his favorite artists. When he mentioned Common, I told him (again, in broken Portuguese) about the time I got to rhyme on stage with Common in front of 10,000 people at the Greek Theatre at Cal. We all chatted for a few minutes. Two of the guys, both MCs, gave me their phone numbers and told me to call them tomorrow. I left giddy and roamed around trying to burn off the excitement. I shared the story with any hostel-mate kind enough to listen.

After a day or two of telephone wrangling (not having a cell makes it difficult to get in touch; then, when in touch, it's really difficult to understand what someone is saying), I was invited to come out to the home of one MC, Calibre. He waited for me at the point the bus dropped me off, a solid 35 minute ride from the tourist area. The area looked like favela, which doesn't necessarily mean danger, but it does mean poverty. The nicest building in the area was the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, a beige building undramatically steepled with the proud distinction of being fully painted without having any paint visibly peeling. (much love to my Mormon friends reading this).

He took me to a friend's place, where they all smoked (I always "just say no," a lesson for which I must undoubtedly thank the committed efforts of Nancy Reagan and the irrefutably successful War on Drugs, which has helped the U.S. achieve the enviable position of having the highest incarceration rate in the world), and soon thereafter we left and chopped it up about music and life.

Unlike me, who had a friend's older brother around to introduce me to the music, Calibre had only the relatively slow trickle of American Hip Hop provided by Brazilian MTV and radio. Liking the style, sound, and attitude of artists like Jay Z, DMX, and Dr. Dre, he started rhyming and making beats around 1997 or 1999, at about the age of 15 or 17. After a few years, he started performing and has been doing so off and on since. His next show was to be a week after I left Salvador. However, here, Hip Hop is mostly a hobby, with very little chance (even less than in the U.S.) of making a full career from music. Thus, he is committed to his regular job of being a capoeira (a Brazilian martial art) instructor. The two interests merged nicely when he was invited to Italy to teach capoeira and made a cool, if basic, music video out there.

I wanted to hear some of his music--and he wanted to play it for me-- so we went to his place and he started playing me his recorded stuff, all made on Fruity Loops or a similar program. He was particularly excited because he had made a beat that incorporated Brazilian musical styles (pagode and axe) into a Hip Hop context. He said nobody had done anything quite like this and that this would be the way to break Hip Hop to a wider Brazilian audience. The percussion on the song was crazy and unlike anything I had heard before. I recommended listening to some Timberland for crazy drum patterns. Other than this song, most of his music was heavily influenced by the recent years of the South. The beats sounded like Lil' Jon or T.I. or Ludacris might rhyme over them. He kept them interesting by changing up the beats in little ways. There were a couple beats that were really dope and I could imagine myself rhyming over (that is, if I still wrote rhymes…). The lyrics, to the extent I could understand his explanations, were varied, with songs ranging from heartfelt stories about favela life to some catchy joints about money and women.

Music shared, we went to the local beach, a narrow strand of sand with kids playing, a middle-aged guy swimming, and older folks walking by. One of Calibre's friends, Guido, is a vocal instrumentalist (i.e. he can play a trumpet sound with just his mouth), and played some music live for me. He also sweetly sang me the lyrics to his most recent Reggae song, a nice little bit about children renewing the world. With that in mind, and the beach positioned on the bay to allow the sun to set over water (because Rio and Salvador are situated on the east coast, the sun rises over water and sets over the land in the west), we watched the day die. They then took me to the bus stop and waited with me. We traded hugs and thanks, and I hopped the bus back to my headphone world.