I just felt like you guys needed another way to get to know me. So I’m doing this little project. Peep the video. I plan on covering other beat makers in the future. Maybe this will be a big ordeal at some juncture. Either way….
AFSB Season 1, Episode 1 from know:juander on Vimeo.
So after 3 failed attempts, a bit of frustration, a feeling of hopelessness setting in, and a failed trust in the good folks at Hickam AFB, I have now developed a fear of flying. Not in the natural sense of speaking, as I rarely ever do, but this… in explanation:
I woke up one morning and the only thing I could see was a grey mist setting over what seemed to had been a radiant, powerful purple night sky. I quietly finished packing up my things neatly; my shirts in show-room-like squares, condenser microphone in case, small number of fitted caps and headwear. I added enough socks, underwear, and tees to feel comfortable. In another bag I placed my Nike Dunks in neat rows where the toes altered; the matching shoe upside down as if it were in a shoe box, sole to the ground. In my carry-on; MPC and some flash cards, audio interface, and notebook.
I walked without interruption to the door after dressing in plain dark clothes, turning the knob. I’m leaving on a jet plane. I don’t know if I want to come back again. In my head I changed the words to add some sort of appeasement. My keys jingled at my side, hanging from my left-side’s belt loop. Venturing to my car, head hung low from the way life had treated me, my thoughts lingered between possible car accident and Madison Square Garden snakes. Various hues of emotion; I’m hooked to this tune and when they aint playing it right I’m the grouchy dude in the corner of a dimly lit bar. Short-story short my keys hit the ignition, turned and the roar from the engine reminded me of the Africa I imagined. Road signs, road signs… slow down. Road signs. Ah, finally; my exit.
I left the car unlocked leaving the keys under the driver’s side floor mat; registration and insurance in the passenger side visor. If somebody stole this car, they’d get pulled over, arrested… and I’d hoped for a high-speed chase or something to add to the home videos. To the terminal, baggage in-hand… this couldn’t be the end of the world…
to be continued…
NOTE:
• Check out the “MEDIA” section under the “PAGES” —> for music downloads, videos, and everything that we’re doing.
• Maybe one day people will stop trying to ‘understand’ me. Just be there for me, stop trying to understand everything. There are people in my life who ‘get’ me, but it’s not for everyone.
So there’s a lot of talk about the scene and what it is or means to be Hip Hop. Personally, and I’m sure many would agree, Hip Hop is a lifestyle and from that lifestyle we, (some of us) get to be able to translate that life into music. For other it’s poetry, graffiti, and even painting. I think that we get so caught up on being labeled that we forget the essence of it all is the actual lives the music comes from. And since I believe that, to know Hip Hop, there has to be some desire to learn its history and from that create its future.
So I’ve decided to at least be the educator on the inhabitants of this scene in Hawaii. Big ups to all of the local artists… support local art (…whatever it takes the form of). Peace. The first look into the Hip Hop scene HI calls home, is my homie Rhyme the Old. Of all the cats I’ve had the honor to know, this brother has the knowledge and the character to carry him.
Rhyme the Old Man…born Raymonte’ Leviticus Britt, in Brooklyn New York, waayyy back in 19?? (got to have some mystery), I was pretty much raised during the early stages of Hip Hop. I cut my teeth during those days but got really focused during the “golden age” of the culture during the 90-95 time-frame, the era of boom-bap. I had an older cousin who was considered the “Q” (like the character from the movie Juice) of East New York and I was his roadie. Since 1984, every block/basement party in the projects of Brooklyn, from 585 Blake Ave to 832 Ocean Ave over in Flatbush, you would find T-Rock and his little cousin “The Great Rockwell”. He would later change my name to Rhyme, which used to be spelled “Ryme” (RaYMontE). He said that “The Great Rockwell” carried a sound of expertise to it that was most definitely beyond my level of then wackness, and that there was room for only one person with the moniker “Rock” in their stage name, besides who was I to argue, as he put it “Ryme” was already built into the name my parents gave me, and here I am today.
From talking to some of the cats out here that actually view my site (thanks, by the way) there was a general consensus that I needed to post more… (sheesh, I get it – lol), so along with the Fresh Water segments I will begin doing the Knowing is Beautiful segments and though it sounds like I’d end up preaching about safe sex (think Common AIDS campaign)… I’m not. It’ll be a life study/education thing… to help the people get to know the… people. The scene and all of it’s glory and story will be the KIB segment… bios of local artists, music, and interviews… to add the ice-breaker aspect into the experience of seeing the local artists in their artistic habitats at shows. So with no further or due…
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