Download PDF Version Revolt Magazine, Volume 1 Issue No.4

RB: I think it’s very natural. Until very recently hip
hop as a whole has been very stagnant it’s been
in this bit of a drought I feel like and until just
recently, younger artists are emerging and without
even really meaning to are sort of bringing back
this early 90s golden age of hip hop sound. The
way that I see it is that it’s not even a conscious
situation but it’s also very natural it’s like this wave
– they go up, they go down.
EL: WORD – yea a lot of people are like “I want to
rap like the nineties I love the nineties, nineties this
nineties that - ”
SF: It’s not even about that.
EL: I can’t tell you I make nineties music. I listen
to Led Zeppelin, I listen to Anthony Santos I listen
to Tribe Called Quest I listen to Lil Wayne I listen to
Kanye College Graduate.
SF: I listen to Chance the Rapper
EL: I listen to Jay Z good music era y’all gonna -
SF: Open Letter, all my niggers like 3 Hunna
EL: I listen to GBE - you know!
SF: Pretty Flocka
EL: And some cats be like that’s not real hip hop
SF: What you talkin bout! What is real hip hop?
EL: I just like music I like all types of stuff.
EL: Yo there was wack rappers in the 90s. There
was a stagnant era in the 90s you know you had
Biggie and Tupac but you also had Too $hort. You
had all these other people that were sayin some
bullshit too. Even Biggie, Biggie wasn’t sayin much
of anything positive. You had Tribe Called Quest. On
the west coast you had people rappin slow on the
east coast you had people rappin fast down south
you had people rappin, say com’on what’s real hip
hop? People in New York are gonna say rap from
New York in the 90s is real hip hop people in the
south are like that shit is wack!
past 30 years. Do you feel part of a cohesive Hip
Hop Nation that is - as Afrika Bambaataa would say
- “speaking truth to power?"
SF: People can call it what they want. I’m not really
for being against or rejecting another thing, I try to
either understand it or overlook it. As far as being
a part of a cohesive hip hop nation I’ll say hip hop
is cool right now, very diverse, it’s a platform where
everybody can be themselves. I just play my part in
that.
KC: Where do you situate yourself and the
iLLUZION crew in relationship to the global hip
hop diaspora? Can you talk about the evocation of
style and guts in hip hop as a type of transnational,
spiritual swag politicizing youth and raising
consciousness worldwide?
SF: Through hip hop? Yeah I mean that’s great. I’m
working with a few artists right now in other countries.
I think it’s dope to expand the connection - the
consciousness - and everybody’s working together.
As far as politics I don’t really include much of that in
my hip hop. My music is all my artistic expression of
truth. I don’t look to attack or limit the expression of
the government or whatever might be behind it. That’s
being spoken about by others. I stick to my task, which
is just being the light.
Somebody spiritual they’ll call it that, somebody
not spiritual they’ll say “in the zone” or something
but it’s this trance state where something does
come over you, or go in through you. It happens to
me all the time freestylin’ there’s a certain zone
of comfort where the message and the words just
seem to come out almost as if I’m watching it
happen. It is a state of mind, a form of meditation.
I’m sure it’s like the same vibe or frequency that
people are getting into in African dance or it’s
whatever some people call it. Sometimes I say it’s
the vein, like getting in the vein – it's God flowing
through you. It’s being able to let go of everything
and just move – woosh! As far as lyrics and the
creation process of the art and unraveling truth, it’s
funny to watch. Writing or making something with
such concentrated thought or energy, feeling that
you’re creating that world manifesting from inside
to out. I understand myself more going over the
things I come up with because it’s more than me,
when things are at their best. Because you
know when you’re like looking for some inspiration
or thoughts you’re digging, you’re digging from
options, things from right there to pick from and
then when you stop digging it’s just coming. It’s a
spiritual experience - this is life - it’s always there
that vibe it’s just if you’re present to it. God is
always PRESENT
KC: And how is illUZiON pushing the borders of the
genre and carving out a new space in today’s hip
hop?
EL: It’s authentic, and we don’t even try. If I were to
try I could make some 90s shit I could make some
west coast shit I could make something trill. I could
make some trap shit, I could make a trap album,
what? Trap Supastar! But I don’t try to make “some
shit” I Just do what im inspired to.
SF: I don’t even like being narrowed in to only
being looked at as a hip hop artist. A lot of rappers
put themselves in that box and limit themselves.
They become album after album, mix tape after
mix tape, uh-uh son, niggas want to write plays!
This is where we at right now, the foundation of
where we started. We started out rapping well, we
started applying thoughtful things about life to our
ability to rhyme and now we gotta push it further.
Rap is too easy now it’s not just about rapping or
rhyming a word. So we not tryin to carve hip hop.
Hip hop is what it is and we a part of it because
we’re artists that emcee and we’re doing our best
to become better artists and have that be a part
of the influence and the identity of our culture,
nauuughmean??
KC: The Hip Hop Nation has been called a ‘couterrepublic’
within the United States, it’s also been
said that hip hop has been at the forefront of every
youth social justice movement worldwide for the
Salomon Faye, photo credit Dakota Blue Harper.
KC: You do put messages in your work and that’s
political, you just don’t talk about politics is what
you’re saying?
SF: Yeah
KC: I like to think about hip hop in terms of earth
and sky awareness. The drum beat is about our
roots, breakdancing draws energy up from the
earth through the feet. Hip Hop also links back to
the practice of “possession dance” in Africa where
to dance is to literally transcending human form
and becoming one with source. I like to think of
rappers, particularly the freestyle or the flow as a
type of cosmic verbal divination. Salomon I noticed
you dropping some pretty nu age bars, talking
about the sun god, the sky, the third eye and
rapping as your “divine purpose” or as you called it
before “unraveling truth” – can you say more?
SF: It’s about being so wrapped up in something
you love that the force - that will power- it drives
through you to where it is a spiritual experience.
EL: You got to get lost in it, right? Even the first time
I write a song you know you got everything you want
to say and even at that you know I find out months
later the shit that I wrote made so much sense…
that shit just came out and now I listen and I’m like
that shit so dope. You got to sing “If you wanna vibe
with the rebel God Tribe” like 5,000 times and you
almost forget what the song is about… I may have
not even gotten it while creating it.
SF: The message is not just hidden in the result
but also the creation process. Yo, that shit is God’s
language to me, art is just an analogy to be able
to bring together how this higher consciousness
that some people call universe, higher force, I call
God - this is how it communicates - within and
through, outside, around, what is. What isn’t. We
understand what it is whenever we come to that
point of understanding.
KC: I’m interested in the significance of the party in
hip hop and in your video. There is this apocalyptic