circles of hell

My sophomore year at school was a dark time. I spent most of it either cooped up in my dormroom or in the darkroom trying to make pictures of walls that looked like this:

I only had a few allies, mainly two oversized Philips speakers and Limewire. So this is something of an ode to them. I felt like I was in the beginning of Clan In Da Front, when you can hear RZA's voice from some middle distance, reverbed to high hell, belting, "UP FROM THE 36 CHAMBERRSSSSS" as if he were caught in some dungeon, currently escaping. That's the place where I was: dungeon-chamber #36, surrounded by empty walls, in the ad libs before the music even starts.

Wu-Tang was something of a lifeline, so I made a project of systematically combing through Wu affiliate albums. So this is something of an ode to Wu. The further out from the Wu core I got, the darker the music seemed to get. And then I found Killah Priest's Heavy Mental ('98), orbiting in the Wu solar system somewhere out near Pluto. Priest got on the map with a feature verse on "B.I.B.L.E." off GZA's undisputed classic Liquid Swords, but it was his solo albums that really reached out and grabbed me by the throat. See I found something in those early tracks that I identified with: deep thudding bass drums, crunchy snares, and melody samples that sounded like murderers whistling in empty alleys or Egyptian snake-charmers.

Guns, shootouts and crack sales, black males in packed jails, trapped in hell, no peace, cold streets, surrounded by po-lice this whole week, buildings with no heat, low lights and gaspipes with slow leaks, dog fights, lowlifes, throw dice the whole night...

Now I'm not gonna front-- I'm a white dude that grew up in a well-off NJ suburb, in comfort. I don't profess to know the experience above. I have not been systematically oppressed based on my race, I didn't grow up with drugs on the corner, or face economic depravity in the form of an an under-cared for housing development. These are issues that Priest speaks so eloquently about, but they are not my story. And yet, I turned to these recordings when I was depressed, and found music that spoke to me.

Underneath Priest's covert politics is a raw emotion, unfiltered by notions of popular culture or what rap music "should be." Priest puts the inherent conflict and violence of personhood under a spotlight, expounding on it as a means of catharsis. His method involves synthesizing contemporary stories of plight with ancient imagery derived from mythology, history, religion, etc... This world of antiquity acts as a vector through which the MC interfaces with the present. In other words, the violence and zealotry of, say, a Mayan sacrifice, has a particular relevance to the world Priest encounters around him:

I saw Bill Clinton, Ronald Reagan, and George Bush

Barefoot suckin from the titties of a wolf

Upon the brazen altar, six men

Offer their only daughter/ splashin holy water

I ran for the camcorders, now I'm plagued with curses

I roam the Earth's surface, snatchin purses

Allergic to Catholic Churches, what's the purpose?

Religious worship is worthless

I visit ancient sanctuaries, where the saints were married

But now they buried/ Cause of Satan's fury

I faced the jury

Held in court, like Christ nailed to a cross

Confront my knowledge, like Christ in front of Pontius Pilate

Days of violence, standing in a haunted palace

The government wants my wallet

(From "If You Don't Know")

And this worked for me. It spoke to pain, pressure, politics... the things that were weighing me down, and will weigh me down again. He seemed to understand the feeling of a restless desert search, pocked with mirages of success, friendship, $, love. So I turned the volume up, despite the complaints from hallmates. I shut the door. I did push-ups. I drove around with the windows up. And things started to turn, a slow viscous stirring in the soul maybe. Or just better housing and better friends. Or maybe just a little Killah Priest. So this is an ode to him.