by Garrett Caples
Luniz 10th Anniversary Special exclusive to hyphythizzgo.com
2005 marks the 10th anniversary of Operation Stackola (Noo Tribe/Virgin, 1995), the platinum debut of Oakland duo Jerold “Yukmouth” Ellis, Jr. and Garrick “Numskull” Husbands: the Luniz. Featuring fat tracks by the likes of Shock-G, DJ Fuze (both from Digital Underground), DJ Darryl, and E-A-Ski & CMT, Stackola is best known for the Tone Capone-produced “I Got 5 On It,” which a decade later remains the weed-smoking anthem of hip hop. The album also established the Luniz’s peculiar brand of outrageousness. At a time when the persona of the millionaire rapper became the norm, the Luniz portrayed themselves as small-time hustlers, usually broke, always on something. Their sense of humor, moreover, was bizarre and inimitable; who but the Luniz would begin their very first album depicting their own death, at the hands of a machine-gun-toting “playa hata” shouting “Fuck the Luniz!”? (About half-way through Stackola, on “5150,” the pair are killed again, floating up to heaven to encounter Jesus, Shock-G’zus, who promptly kicks them out, though in truth Shock would bring them into DU, both on stage and in the studio.)
But what defined the Luniz above all else was the chemistry between Yukmouth and Numskull. Friends since their early teens, the two forged a bond based on their determination to succeed in hip hop. “We was both sleeping on the park bench,” Num recalls, “because his grandma and my mom wanted us to get jobs, and we’re like ‘No, we want to be rappers.’” Such shared hardships infused the pair’s complementary vocal styles, for Yuk’s frenetic flow was a perfect match for Num’s almost talking style of rap. “In every great duo, one partner brings something the other lacks,” says Mekanix production team member Dotrix, who dj’ed for the Luniz on tour for their second album, Lunitik Muzik (1997). “Num’s flow sounds simple, though it’s actually complex, but with him it’s more what he says, rather than how. Yuk, on the other hand, is all style, like a NY rapper, more how he says it than what.” Such differences mirror the Luniz’s distinct personalities. Yukmouth, to invoke a song from his 2003 album Godzilla, is “stuntastic,” rocking jewels and platinum teeth, puffing high-grade weed, sipping Moet; Numskull, by contrast, is laid back and hood, sporting white tees with no ice, no longer smoking weed but still committed to Mickey’s malt liquor.
The history of the Luniz begins in the late ’80s when Yukmouth joined Numskull’s Brothaz Wit Potential as a non-rapping visual artist who quickly became one of the tightest rhymers in the crew. Forming a duo originally called Luni Tunz, their first break came in the early ’90s when they met Chris Hicks of C-Note Records, who was in the process of recording the debut of another Oakland sensation, Dru Down. Hicks put the Luniz in the studio with Dru, where they recorded “Rescue 911” and “Ice Cream Man,” a local underground hit. The Luniz also recorded “5 On It,” which was sufficient to land a deal with Noo Trybe, while Dru’s album, Explicit Game, was picked up by Relativity.
The international impact of “5 On It” should have paved the way for the Luniz’s future. Instead, as if presaged by their multiple deaths on Operation Stackola, the duo was dealt a series of setbacks of the career-killing kind. Hoping to replicate Stackola’s success, Noo Trybe chief Eric Brooks tried to steer the Luniz in a pop direction Yuk & Num stubbornly resisted. Lunitik Muzik thus ended up sounding like the biggest-budget street album ever recorded; lacking a pop hit, the album nonetheless went gold, though it fell short of the label’s expectations.
Industry pressures began to take their toll. Ensnared in bad deals with both Brooks and Hicks, as well as legal difficulties owing to wild behavior on tour, the Luniz began to grow apart, and when Yuk jumped at a solo offer from Rap-A-Lot, their days as a duo seemed over. Yet, though mostly leading seperate lives, the Luniz never really broke up, playing the occasional gig and making joint appearances on various projects, including each others’, as well as the West Coast Mix of P.Diddy’s “5 On It”-based “Satisfy You” (Bad Boy 2000). Gradually they renewed their bond and recorded what was to be their third album, Oakland Blaze. But new complications arose. Noo Trybe folded, leaving Hicks with the rights to the Luniz name, while Yukmouth remained under contract to Rap-A-Lot. Numskull, meanwhile, refused to do business with Rap-A-Lot, as he’d never been paid for his appearances on Yuk’s projects. As negotiations ensued, bootlegs of Blaze began selling all over Oakland, even spawning the underground hit “I’m a Raider.” After endless delays, the album was finally rushed out, with a slightly different track list, in the summer of 2002, as Silver & Black (Rap-A-Lot). Though previous bootlegging resulted in low sales, the buzz the project generated was undeniable proof fans were still hungry for the Luniz, and the Luniz could still deliver.
To celebrate the Luniz’s 10th anniversary in the industry, I touched down with both Yukmouth and Numskull. With 3 solo albums, 2 United Ghettos of America comps, and 1 duo disc with C-Bo as Thug Lordz already under his belt, Yuk is promoting All Out War, Vol. 2 (Smoke-A-Lot), the second mixtape by his crew the Regime. Num, meanwhile, is preparing his first “solo” release, Caliban, named after his own new group, who are featured on the album. While the music on each reflects their respective personalities, it’s hard not to notice that both the Regime and the Caliban have adopted camouflage and fatigues, as if, even at a distance, Yuk and Num are attuned to the same wavelength. Both are optimistic about an eventual 4th Luniz album, but only when the conditions are right. “I wanna do it for me,” Numskull says, “not because of the Luniz name.” Yukmouth agrees: “We gotta build that bond back because that bond ain’t there right now. Soon as we can vibe together as the Luniz, then we can do it.”
(part two: Yukmouth: The Regime Declares War
part three: The Mystery of Numskull)
20061022
The Luniz: 10 On It!
The Mystery of Numskull
by Garrett Caples
Luniz 10th Anniversary Special exclusive to hyphythizzgo.com
Numskull is a hard man to pin down. When I first interviewed him in March, he was staying in Sacramento, shuttling back and forth to Reno to work on Caliban—his long-awaited first solo album—with producer C-Dash. Since then, we’ve periodically touched base by phone, at Digital Underground shows, or at the Garage in East Oakland, where former Luniz dj Dotrix and partner Kenny Tweed produce tracks as Tha Mekanix. One night in September in San Francisco, I bump into Num after a DU show, during which he brought down the house with a 3-song set from Caliban, backed by his group of the same name. Thizzing on a pill as well as on the crowd’s enthusiastic response, he gives me hug and tells me the album is done. Then he pulls me aside.
“This is important; you have to put this in the interview,” he says. “I was actually born in Mississippi; my mom moved to Oakland when I was a baby. And on my birth certificate, under race, its says ‘Negro.’”
He doesn’t elaborate further, but, only about a month after Hurricane Katrina, it was easy to catch his drift. Num was born in the ’70s, well after the peak of the civil rights movement when the term fell into disuse, but his birth certificate is evidence of the kind Katrina provided in abundance, that very little in fact had changed for certain black populations in America. If this seems like an atypical concern for the rapper who sometimes records under the name Drank-A-Lot, it does give a foretaste of what Caliban has in store for listeners.
“It’s gonna be Numskull’s solo album,” he says, “but I’m introducing the group so I got ‘em on a lot of songs. The Caliban is basically artists who don’t see the world like everybody else see it. We’re not worried about this club shit. Caliban—we took it from the Taliban, so we bitter about hella shit that’s going on. In the United States and overseas, all the shit. We hate Bush. It’s a Num album. And Num don’t really give a fuck about shit.”
The logistical details behind Caliban are still in flux. One minute Num is in talks with basketball players starting labels, next it’s supposed to be Koch, next he’s releasing it himself on the internet. Even the line-up of the Caliban seems to periodically undergo reassessment, though the core seems to be former No Limit soldier Don P; former Dangerous Crew member F.M. Blue, whose own long-delayed first album, The World Is Blue (FastLife 2004), is largely produced by the Mekanix; Blue’s younger brother Cheese Whosain; and DU member Esinchill, who just dropped his own C-Dash-produced project, a duo disc with King Beef called Choice Cuts (RCeason).
One thing, however, I can say for sure: the music Num played for me during our interview in Sacramento was some of the most advanced hip hop I’ve ever heard. Both Numskull and Esinchill hooked up with the newly-thriving Reno scene through Element, a trio who spent 5 years on the road as DU’s support crew and appear on Shock-G’s solo album, Fear of a Mixed Planet (33rd Street 2004). The beats coming out of Reno these days are wildly futuristic blends of the synthetic and the organic that sound truly like nothing else in rap. Clearly they inspired Num to take his own experimental approach to the vocals; the group tracks feature incredibly tight interplay between the rappers, as opposed to the usual structure of simply trading verses. As half of one of the greatest hip hop duos of all time, Num appreciates the power of group dynamics.
“I don’t like to be alone,” he confesses. “On stage, at home, anything. So I always bring people with me wherever I go. And these cats have talent, so why not put ‘em on?”
Such an attitude goes a long way towards explaining Num’s career in the years since Lunitik Muzik, for while Yukmouth has remained highly visible and productive—preparing to release his fourth solo album, Million Dollar Mouthpiece, in 2006—Num has kept a much lower profile. This has been partly due to circumstance; though he recorded a solo album in the late ’90s for NY-based K-Tel Records, the company folded before releasing it. Yet he also freely admits, “I didn’t think I was ready to do a solo album, at all. I was still into that Luniz shit. When I came out with my own album, I wanted it to be me, not people thinking he gotta make shit like the Luniz.”
Instead of pursuing a solo career, Num spent much of the period between Muzik and 2002’s Silver & Black on the road with the steadily-touring DU. “I was the animal on tour,” he admits. “I’m talking about drugs everywhere every night, drinking. And Shock was kinda coming along with me. But then he was like, we’re not going to take you and Clee on the next one. We understood. We were wild, acting a fool. I was still living out my Luniz fantasies. But Shock told me the reason we wasn’t making good music anymore was that we were partying too much. And I appreciated him for that.”
While the rest of DU embarked on tour, Num and Clee began hanging out in LA with producer Poli Pol, prior to his association with the Black-Eyed Peas. “The guy had a studio,” Num recalls. “We were just kicking it really cause we’d brought some other cats over to work with him. We were making songs that we wanted to hear. Shit that we were going through at that time. Like, you don’t have no pussy, so we made a jack off song. Shit like that. We weren’t even thinking about doing an album together at all. But then he’s like, fuck it; let’s do a whole album.” The result of these sessions was the brilliant but hard-to-find, label-less disc Good Laaawd That’s a Lot of Drank (1999), credited to Clee and Drank-A-Lot.
“That’s a classic album,” Num says proudly. “But we tried to put it out ourselves, and we didn’t know nothing about going independent. We pressed up 5,000 units and sold all 5,000 in stores. We would get the money back from the first sales, and we would try to put it into promotion. Then we’d have no money to press it up again when everybody’s asking for it. But I’ve never heard one person say that they didn’t like that album. I actually want to rerelease it.”
The duo eventually parted on friendly terms, but not before teaming with Money B for his Poli Pol-produced single “Putcha Thang on Me,” a Bay Area hit in 1999. Based on the chops displayed on his video for Good Laaawd’s single, “Knockdiesel,” Clee, now known as Cleetis Mack, went on to direct the successful Sex in the Studio adult hip hop dvd series (Metro Entertainment). Num, meanwhile, used Good Laaawd to help launch his proteges, Hittaz on tha Payroll, whose Mekanix-produced Ghetto Storm (Hitta) was one of the hottest albums in the Bay in 2003. The association continues, as Num co-hosts Sex in the Studio’s second episode (2004) and also features in the soundtrack single, “Drank-A-Lot,” with Money B and Eddi Projex of the Hittaz. Produced by the same Fifth who portrays “The Lame” on Yukmouth’s Regime mixtape, “Drank-A-Lot” generated a buzz earlier this year from numerous spins on BET’s late-night video show Uncut.
After years of crew-oriented endeavors, Num feels he’s finally “ready” to do a solo album, especially as he’s put together a powerful new crew to do it. The quality of the music on Caliban reveals the hidden perfectionism behind Num’s slow development into a solo artist
“Before I was just doing songs just to do them, and I don’t think that that’s my best work. A lot of those songs came from like me dealing with people and they’re like, ‘Num you should put this on your album.’ And I do hella songs by myself. None of it was worthy to me. That’s why I took so long. Out of 60 songs that I have, I’ll probably pick like 7 that I like.”
“I’m trying to make a classic album,” he concludes. “I don’t want an album with 2 good songs and 16 ok songs. I want an album that’s a classic all the way through, that you can just sit down and listen to. And I got something for everybody too. I have a song for this group, but other groups’ll want to listen to that song too. That’s the type of album I want to do.”
(part one: The Luniz: 10 On It!
part two: Yukmouth: The Regime Declares War)
20061018
Esinchill cuts
by Garrett Caples
San Francisco Bay Guardian October 26, 2005
Also performing with Digital Underground Oct. 28 at the Red Devil are Esinchill and King Beef. A relentless freestyler, inventive writer, and habitual stage-diver, Esinchill has one of the tightest flows in the Bay, and if he remains Oakland's best-kept secret, it's due to lack of exposure. After a show-stealing debut on DU's Who Got the Gravy? (Jake, 1998) and extensive touring with the group, E only made a handful of guest appearances, on discs by DJ Quik, the Delinquents, and so forth, before dropping the hard-to-find Everything to Lose! (Rceason, 2002). Displaying an unexpected metaphysical streak, as well as harrowing tales of a mysterious childhood illness, Everything is an astonishingly assured album showcasing E's versatility and eagerness to expand his range.
Having secured distribution for his Rceason label, Esinchill teamed up with childhood pal King Beef for Choice Cuts, Volume One, whose advance single – the Touré-produced "Hip Hop" – began generating a buzz with East Coast radio play earlier this year. Self-designated "hip-hop mood music," Choice Cuts is a frank genre workout of club/party songs that is less ambitious than its predecessor yet in many ways more accomplished. Much credit goes to the duo's main collaborator, Reno's C-Dash, who produced 11 of its 15 tracks, providing a unity of mood absent from so many rap albums. Dash's music is a dense mixture of synthetic and organic sounds with heavy R&B leanings – so crucial is he to the project that he warrants the rare hip-hop instrumental, which fits seamlessly into the album's flow.
As performers, Esinchill and King Beef display the deep rapport of classic rap duos, egging each other on to further audacity. Smooth-voiced and heavyset, Beef makes a perfect verbal and visual foil for E's rapid-fire staccato flow and compact frame. Sharing a disdain for rap's overreliance on guns, crack, hos, and bling, E and Beef concoct distinctive songs that should give less-adventurous lyricists pause. Their material is also untainted by the misogyny endemic to rap – they might joke about the perils of hooking up with the unattractive on a song like "Wing Man," but for the most part they adopt the Romeo approach, if only out of romantic self-interest. "It's just my attitude and gratitude and respect to a queen, and when respect exudes, then great sex ensues," E raps on "Mojo."
With a second single, "If You Want It," on the way, Esinchill and Beef are busy promoting Choice Cuts, as well as working in the studio on E's next solo album, Vigilantism, and Beef's first, The Swing Party, both tentatively slated for release next year on Rceason. Also look for Esinchill to appear on several cuts off Caliban, the long-awaited solo album from Numskull of the Luniz.
Make them party -- T.M.F., a.k.a. Tha Muthafuckaz, return to the Yay
by Garrett Caples
San Francisco Bay Guardian October 26, 2005
GIVEN THE TURN -of-the-century commercial drought in Bay Area hip-hop, a whole generation of rappers disappeared under the radar. Among the crews to reemerge now that the scene is flourishing again is T.M.F. (Tha Muthafuckaz), a trio whose members include Cool Ass Cris, Smoke G Ryda, and Chilli D.O.G. Best known for the anthem "Planet 62nd," referring to their home street in East Oakland's "Avenues," T.M.F. were a live threat in the mid- to late-'90s, headlining their own small club dates as well as opening for artists like E-40, C-BO, and Digital Underground. Their upcoming appearance with DU, Oct. 28 at the Red Devil Lounge, in fact marks a reunion with a group who played an important role in T.M.F.'s past.
"Digital Underground brought us into this game," Chilli recalls. "They gave us shows at Geoffrey's Inner Circle, in Reno, LA, San Jose. Now we're on our own. The parents have raised the kids, and it's time for us to become the parents."
The history of T.M.F. begins in 1994, when then-DU DJ and current Mekanix producer Dotrix was seeking acts to develop. While Chilli and Cool Ass Cris had each separately worked with Smoke G, "Dot basically put us together," Chilli says. "He helped us format hooks, a lot of stuff for our first project."
Smoke G also remembers the discipline of this formative period under Dotrix's tutelage. "We constantly practiced," he says. "Before we got the music, we had the lyrics down. We don't just sit down separately and write verses – we write together. We'll come up with a concept, every time."
Indeed, though it may seem straightforward enough, the name T.M.F. is conceptual. Smoke G drew the initial inspiration from the tag of a San Francisco graffiti group. "T.M.F. can be whatever – 'The Most Famous,' "The Most Fantastic' – but we are 'Tha Muthafuckaz.' It's a fitting name for three brothas." DU frontman Humpty Hump adds, "T.M.F. decided to represent us, like 2Pac did with Thug Life. 'I didn't create Thug Life,' Pac said, 'I just organized it.' To different degrees, we're all muthafuckas, right?"
Cris, for one, concurs. "We're not putting ourselves on another level from average, everyday people," he explains. "If we come into a spot to perform, we're not going to be hid backstage where can't nobody talk to us. You're liable to see us on the dance floor. We might be passing a blunt to you. That's part of the name. We're real muthafuckas."
In an age when 50 Cent needs to mobilize a small army before engaging in the most trivial pursuits, such an attitude is rare, if not outright unfashionable, but it conveys the peculiar essence of T.M.F.'s aesthetic. "We try to keep our music where it starts from," Cris says. "It's always had that real grimy, street touch, but it's not the same as what everybody else is talking about. It's not about getting hyphy or stupid, or shooting someone. We just bring it strictly from reality."
"They were like the Luniz, on some real hood shit," says former mentor Dotrix, who brought the group to DU's Money-B in 1995. As the first signees to his Bobby Beats Records, T.M.F. earned a spot on the compilation Folk Music, Volume One (1996). But despite the impressiveness of their Dotrix-produced theme song, "The Motherfuckas," and the string of successful gigs that followed, the trio had difficulty settling down to the business of making their album.
"We had our days," Cris recalls, "going to the studio, drunk and loaded. We needed to learn the work ethic – it's a job." By the end of decade, when Money-B wound up the label and moved to Los Angeles, the trio found itself without a deal or the crucial access to industry connections DU's presence afforded.
"We had problems that were greater than the group could handle," Chilli confesses, alluding to "vacations at Club County." Frustrated by a lack of progress at a time when Bay Area rap was tightening its belt, the group temporarily split. "I chose to do other things," Chilli says, "like go to work, but music was still in there." Cris began a solo career, while Smoke G, under the name Vulcangundalero, recorded two discs of Oakland Raiders-themed rap as a member of Stadiumkings. Gradually, however, the three realized they missed the tight vocal interplay that characterized T.M.F. Reuniting with penitent zeal, the group banged out a long-overdue debut, Chill wit Us, released this year on Cris's label, Contagiouz Entertainment. While distribution is largely "out the trunk," these days that trunk is also virtual – you can sample Chill on T.M.F.'s Web site (www.myspace.com/contagiouzentertainment) or download it from Artistgigs.com for $6. A stripped-down, street-style party album mingling the pimp talk and social consciousness that traditionally, if paradoxically, undergird Oakland hip-hop, Chill wit Us is hardcore rap unencumbered by the jewels, guns, and Gucci-obsessing of the average MC. While they're still a far grimier act than generally comes to the Red Devil – or to Blake's in Berkeley (Nov. 25) – T.M.F. are confident they can please any crowd.
"Even if they're not the type that would normally hear our music," Cris says, "people aren't intimidated by our group. I guess it's the vibe and energy that we bring. Even though it's on a street level, they feel comfortable with it. And once we on stage, we make the muthafuckas party."
T.M.F. play with Digital Underground (with Esinchill and King Beef) Fri/28, Red Devil Lounge, 1695 Polk, SF. Call for time and price. (415) 921-1695, www.ticketweb.com. They also play Nov. 25, Blakes, 2367 Telegraph, Berk. Call for time and price. (510) 848-0886.
20061016
Sex and the Studio climaxes with a -- video hit?
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Fresh for the Underground
by Garrett Caples
San Diego Reader August 25, 2005
Chicago-born Fifth (a.k.a. Derrick Stanton) moved to San Diego with his family a decade ago, settling in El Cajon and then Spring Valley. The 19-year-old rapper/producer is the latest addition to rap crew Digital Underground. Fifth met original members Shock-G and Money B three years ago at "Gutfest," a barbecue thrown by local Digital Underground fan club Da Noses (which refers to Shock's plastic-nosed alter-ego, Humpty Hump).
"We played football," Fifth recalls, "then I let them hear my music. They let me get onstage that night. It was a surreal experience. My first professional recording was with Shock-G on 'Cherry Flava'd Email' [from last year's Fear of a Mixed Planet]. I was still 16."
Since then, the Mount Miguel High School grad has produced 11 songs for Money B's Sex and the Studio DVD series. "Drank-A-Lot," a Fifth-produced single, has been playing on BET's late-night video show Uncut. Fifth recently showed for the third annual Gutfest, which climaxed with DU's August 12 performance at 'Canes. That night, Fifth delivered his own three-song set.
"[Money B] introduced me, 'This guy's from San Diego, you gotta love him.' I came up and did 'Down 'n Diego,' my big banger for San Diego, and everyone loved it. That was the song I originally played for Shock and Mon, so it was only right I started with that."
Fifth and DU are working on And Tomorrow, an upcoming 2pac album. Fifth, now living in L.A., plans to return to the area later this year to promote his as-yet-unreleased debut, Treason.
"We're still shopping for a deal, but we're going to release a single in San Diego, getting some airtime, giving it a buzz."
20061014
Behind the Nose -- Shock G steps out
by Garrett Caples
September 2005
Kev Kelley is excited. The Hunters Point emcee has been taken on as a protege by Shock-G, legendary leader of Digital Underground, who produces two tracks on the 23-year-old’s upcoming debut. It’s 3 a.m. Shock’s exhausted, having just wrapped a two-hour jam between DU and a funk band called Slapback, in celebration of his own “solo debut,” Fear Of A Mixed Planet. As we roll to the hotel for the interview, Kev insists on carrying Shock’s bag, despite its owner’s modest protests. “Fuck that!” Kev yells, zooming ahead with his treasure. “I’m doing what 2Pac did!” Shock accepts this with the habitual calm that contrasts so strikingly with his on-stage presence, whether as Shock-G or as his plastic-nosed alter ego, Humpty Hump. And Kev has a point. While never just a roadie — “We were producing and grooming and trying to get him a deal the whole time,” Shock says — 2Pac definitely lugged his share of equipment on the first DU tour in 1989. Shock’s ear for talent, moreover, is undeniable; through DU over the years he’s also boosted the careers of Saafir, the Luniz, and Mystic, among many others. As a producer Shock profoundly influenced rap’s development in the early ’90s. Two years before The Chronic had everyone jumping on the Mothership, Shock drew the blueprints for a hip-hop built on P-Funk principles. Tracks like “Rhymin’ on the Funk” (Sex Packets, 1990), “Same Song” (This Is An EP Release, 1991), and “The D-Flo Shuttle” (Sons Of The P, 1991) — all on Tommy Boy Records — laid the groundwork for much that followed. According to Digital Underground: Raw Uncut, a new DVD documenting the group’s entire history, “Freaks Of The Industry” remains, after 14 years, the #1 requested song on the Bay Area’s main hip-hop station KMEL despite never being a single. (#2? The Bay Area Ballers mix of the Luniz’s “I Got 5 On It,” also featuring Shock.) Such achievements and innovations have been obscured, however, by the huge pop success of “The Humpty Dance,” which led many to see the group as a bubblegum novelty. The beautifully eclectic, meticulously detailed, and deeply felt Fear Of A Mixed Planet is Shock’s ambitious attempt to finally step out of the shadow of Humpty Hump.
You ain't knowin' -- DU and 2Pac
| All roads lead back to the Digital Underground and 2Pac By Garrett Caples San Francisco Bay Guardian March 16, 2005 I CAN'T COUNT how many surprised responses I've elicited with the information that 2Pac started out in Digital Underground. To anyone first exposed to him through the movies or during his final phase on Death Row Records, the idea of Pac coming up under the plastic-nosed guidance of Humpty Hump is scandalous. Such skeptics are referred to the 2004 documentary DVD Digital Underground: Raw Uncut, which features footage of the future Makaveli rocking "The Humpty Dance" for all he's worth.  Atron Gregory, the group's first manager, introduced the young 2Pac to Humpty's alter-ego, D.U. leader and producer Shock-G, after the group completed Sex Packets (Tommy Boy, 1990) but before the album's release. As a result, Pac was on hand for the group's MTV-fueled explosion, making his recording debut on "Same Song," from their 1991 This Is an EP Release (Tommy Boy). Inevitably, once he blew up with the 1992 film Juice, 2Pac concentrated on his solo career, though he continued to appear on D.U. albums until 1996's Future Rhythm (Critique).
"I couldn't have ever been 2Pac," Shock says now. "It's not my personality. By the same token, Pac probably couldn't have ever made it like I did as a producer-central figure in a collage of people. You gotta do you."
Though he moved out of the Bay Area – first to the Pocanos, then to Los Angeles – after the Oakland hills fire in late 1991, Shock has always turned to the Bay for new talent. Rap historians might note he was the first to tap Richmond, helping the duo Goldmoney score a deal with Tommy Boy and featuring them on Sons of the P (Tommy Boy, 1991). But Shock's most successful protégés after 2Pac are undoubtedly the Luniz, who appear on Future Rhythm and whose platinum debut, Operation Stackola (Noo Tribe, 1995), features production by Shock. That year Shock appeared on the remix of the Luniz' weed-smoking anthem "I Got 5 on It," alongside such local heavyweights as E-40 and Richie Rich.  In the late '90s, Shock continued to influence the Bay through his associates. D.U. members DJ JZ and Saafir joined Hobo Junction for the critically acclaimed Box Car Sessions (Qwest, 1999) as well as three classic underground discs on their own Hobo Records. While D.U.'s 1998 album Who Got the Gravy? (Jake) failed to make a huge impression, it introduced Esinchill (see "Breaking Down the Battle Lines," page 43) as well as Mystic, whose debut, Cuts for Luck, Scars for Freedom (JCor), was nominated for a Grammy in 2002. Now, with the release of his first solo album, Fear of a Mixed Planet (33rd St), Shock has finally begun to receive his due as a pioneer. He's been producing tracks for Hunters Point MC Kev Kelly, even as he's transformed D.U.'s live show with the addition of an eight-piece funk band called Slapback. "I think people saw Humpty as a gimmick," Numskull of the Luniz says, "but Humpty is just a part of Shock. Shock is our driving force. For real. He's a genius."  | ||||
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Breaking Down the Battle Lines: Frontline's Locksmith and DU's Esinchill
By Garrett Caples
San Francisco Bay Guardian March 16, 2005
ESINCHILL FIRST DROPPED on Digital Underground's Who Got the Gravy? (see "You Ain't Knowin'," page 44), honing his skills with the group for the next five years on the road, and he has the support of fellow D.U. members like Numskull, also of the Luniz. "Esinchill is one of the best artists coming out of the Bay right now," he says. "He's book smart, and that comes out in his rhymes."
He's also a ferocious freestyler, so I was impressed to learn the Frontline's Locksmith beat him in a battle on KMEL, 106 FM, a few months ago. "We went one round, and they was like, 'It's a tie,' " Esinchill recalls. "Then we went a second round, and I fumbled. I couldn't bring it back."
But E remains philosophical. "I think what the Frontline do best is battle. That's where Locksmith shines. But there's a difference between being able to rap and being able to make songs. I think I make better songs."
He raises an interesting point, insofar as the majority of the Frontline's verses are battle rhymes. The "realness" of the battle rhymer is almost inevitably gauged by "hardness," which we might provisionally define here as experience with, and stoicism in the face of, street life. As much as I dig their refusal to adopt the usual gangsta pose, the Frontline's emphasis on hardness limits their lyrics.
Take four bars of Locksmith on "I Gotcha," from the Richie Rich comp Grabs, Snatches, and Takes (Ten-Six, 2004):
You might see Lock on the block in some Tims and Nikes
Making motherfuckers duck when I extend my right
I'm an mc; I fight with pens and mics
You're a bitch; you fight for women's rights
Like many of rap's memorable moments, the third and fourth lines are at once clever and offensive. The repeated grammatical structure creates the expectation of a similar parallel in logic, which is then violated by the second half of the fourth line. (Remember your SATs: "MC" is to "bitch" as "pens and mics" are to "women's rights" is not the correct answer.) Though he might have shored it up with a better rhyme than "right" and "rights," the structure is complex and compelling, even if – for a UC Berkeley grad like Lock – the sentiment isn't very nice.
Here are four bars from the "Intro" to Esinchill's Everything to Lose! (Rceason, 2002):
Born sick and with seizures, massive head trauma
Bitch-ass doctors woulda killed me if it wasn't for mama
Took me off the medicine, didn't have no more falls
No more emergency phone calls and hospital halls
Though the difference in subject matter makes it absurd to compare these examples, each is representative of the rappers' respective concerns. With the notable exception of "Hennessy," Esinchill doesn't really stunt on brand names, and where Locksmith raps about being hard, Esinchill is introspective at the top of his lungs, eliding pronouns and breaking up syntax to pack a few years into four lines. On paper, "hospital halls" seems like a throwaway, yet on disc it leaps out, neatly condensing a kid's perspective on hospitals: boredom and waiting.
Here's the conclusion of both verses – Locksmith's, then Esinchill's:
Lock: Nigga, me no singer
I'm from the Rich where them boys like to keep those things
And they stay with their ring on bling
And they wear more gold than a Chinese ping pong team
I rap instead; I notice I'm at peace when I rhyme
I think with my dick so let me give you a piece of my mind –
Suck it; me in a nutshell, forever passionate
I'm through with this control; I gotta go, I got some ass to get
We've already heard Lock "stretch metaphors like a Chinese jump rope" on Who R You, so the use of "Chinese" for mere verbal flashiness begins to pall this time around. E's ending crushes it. To hear "passionate" rhymed with "ass to get" is exactly what I turn to rap for. The other rhyme is nearly as pleasing, and the second line's combination of two shopworn phrases leads so inevitably to "suck it," you can admire its formal invention even while declining its invitation.
Esinchill's versatility in style and subject matter is what makes Everything to Lose! so accomplished a debut. And just as the Frontline's run of luck began with Locksmith's questionable 2003 battle loss on MTV, so Esinchill's buzz has picked up since losing to Locksmith. He's in talks with Hiero Imperium to release his next album, a duo record with partner King Beef called Choice Cuts, while the advance single – the Touré-produced "Hip Hop" – has been bubbling up in Funkmaster Flex's record pool. Maybe losing is everything.Is There Really a New Bay Rising?
The post-2Pac pack
Did the death of Tupac Shakur throw Bay Area hip-hop into a tailspin? And is there really a "New Bay" rising?
By Garrett Caples
San Francisco Bay Guardian March 16, 2005
You can pick me up; I'll be posted on 10th Street
'Cause you know that's where I'll be
Stuck like a telephone pole.
SO SINGS YOUNG rapper J-Stalin – a DJ Darryl discovery and former Richie Rich protégé – on a hook from his recent first mix tape, R-N-B. And it's true. As I roll up 10th Street in West Oakland's Oak Center, I see the short, wiry MC in the distance, standing in the middle of the street, talking on his cell. On the other end of the line, next to me in the car, is Dotrix 4000, a.k.a. Dontrell Mayfield, a former Digital Underground DJ turned MC-producer as half of the Mekanix. We've just driven from his house in East Oakland to pick up Stalin and bring him back to the Mekanix's studio, where they're finishing Stalin's debut, On Behalf of the Streets, for the duo's new label, Zoo Entertainment.
I live downtown, in a neighborhood no one calls Lakeside, about 20 blocks from where Stalin's "posted." In effect, I've spent my day doing a citywide doughnut. But Stalin's hood is worth it. A post-WWII black community inhabiting the structures of a middle-class Victorian past, Oak Center is funky as hell, beautiful blocks of houses in all shades and states of repair, dotted with buildings of a more recent vintage.
According to the fall 2003 Oakland Heritage Alliance News, the entire neighborhood was slated for demolition by the Department of Housing and Urban Development in the early '60s to make way for vast, anonymous housing projects. Only stubborn local resistance thwarted the plan.
'New Bay' vibed
Like Oak Center, Bay Area hip-hop is characterized by stubborn resistance, epitomized by 2Pac and still evident in Stalin's provocative choice of namesake. And that same spirit animates the community's reception of the catchphrase "New Bay." 
Coined by Oakland MC Balance but popularized by Richmond duo the Frontline, the term "New Bay" has led to press in national publications like Vibe and XXL. The latter forecast a "resurrection" of Bay Area hip-hop based on Virgin's 2004 success with the Federation (from Fairfield) and Ryko's signing of the Frontline on the strength of their EA-SKI-produced hit "What Is It." Since the single broke into the rotation of the notoriously local-leery KMEL, 106 FM, the radio exposure has helped the group move 10,000 copies of Who R You (IMG), their 2004 independent debut, which will be updated and rereleased by Ryko as Now U Know.
Yet the phrase has also sparked a firestorm of controversy in the Bay Area hip-hop scene.
"I guess people are like, we done worked too hard to let people come in and say, 'We're the New Bay – fuck all the old shit,' " Dotrix 4000 says. "Those cats screaming, 'New Bay' – they ain't connected. But the underground is all connected. We've been connected."
As if cued, G-Stack of Oakland's Delinquents calls Dotrix 4000's cell. "I think it's bullshit," he says of the New Bay concept. At the same time, he lets it be known his gripe isn't personal. "I think the Frontline does have talent, and I wish them well. But it's about public perception. 'New' comes right after 'old.' "
Therein lies the problem. Like most forms of popular entertainment, hip-hop is extremely susceptible to the cult of the new. Careers start young and end early, unless you can adapt to rap's ever-changing circumstances. It requires indefatigable effort to stay on top of the game, the type of effort that's driven the Delinquents to record not one but two mix CDs – Have Money Have Heart volumes 1 and 2 (Dank or Die Records) – addressing the New Bay controversy. In a gesture of defiance, G-Stack and fellow Delinquent V. White enlisted the aid of Too $hort, Oakland's ultimate OG, for "Say Bitch," the lead single, which disses the New Bay in no uncertain terms.
The "2Pacalypse" Theory
To fully understand why a phrase so small could generate a reaction so extreme from a vet like G-Stack, we must invoke the "2Pacalypse" theory. Believers argue that Pac's death in '96 triggered an artistic decline that left Bay Area hip-hop incapable of attracting a national audience or major-label interest. Thus, the Frontline's bio on www.thefrontlineonline.com offers, "In the past six years, the Bay Area hip-hop scene has become stagnant, passing off replicas of established artists as new talent." Add a couple of years to account for the age of this blurb and we're back at 1997, without even mentioning Makaveli directly. The New Bay clearly presupposes the 2Pacalypse, insofar as there must be a grave from which to resurrect Bay Area hip-hop.
But the 2Pacalypse theory has at least two major holes that make it an unsuitable foundation on which to build an understanding of local hip-hop. For starters, it holds the artists responsible for the behavior of major labels. Yet even before 2Pac's death, major labels were getting cold feet in the Bay. On his Web site, www.guerillafunk.com, for example, Paris is vocal about his problems with Tommy Boy and then Priority regarding the political content of his work, which effectively stalled his career in the mid-'90s.
Or take the case of Ray Luv, 2Pac's partner in the Marin City group Strictly D.O.P.E. In 1993, Ray scored an independent radio hit with "Get Your Money On," on Mac Dre's Strictly Business Records. In 1995, with Dre in prison, Ray signed with Atlantic (once part of Time Warner and now with Warner Music Group), through Khayree's label, Young Black Brotha. Atlantic, he tells me, "put out my album about six weeks before Time Warner was about to fire Interscope over Death Row and 2Pac. So every record like Pac's basically got shelved because they didn't want you to blow up."
"I'd be in L.A. – I'm getting walk-ons on the biggest shows," he says. "Shows they couldn't get me, I'm getting. Atlantic moved me from there and sent me to Kansas City for five days. And I'm like, what just happened? Once we pissed each other off, they were sending me to hotels where my window faced a brick wall. It got weird, so I quit. I took from '96 to '99 off."
If this sounds like the paranoia of a could've-been contender, consider the source. Handsome and charismatic, Ray was already a proven hit-maker, as was Khayree. The label exec who couldn't exploit so close a connection to Pac for at least gold in 1995, when he was already the biggest-selling rapper ever, strikes me as an underachiever at best.
The second hole in the 2Pacalypse theory is the fact that the creative decline of Bay Area hip-hop never really occurred. With the major labels increasingly reluctant to sign acts, much of the scene went underground. 
If you generated huge numbers, like E-40, whose 1993 EP, The Mail Man, debuted in the Billboard Top 20 with no distribution deal, you could force the majors to deal with you. (E-40 was quickly signed by Jive.)
But it grew increasingly apparent that you could do without them. Indie scenes sprang up around artists like Blackalicious and the Soulsides/Quannum collective. In Oakland, Pam the Funkstress and Boots reinvigorated political rap on a national level as the Coup. Artists like Del tha Funky Homosapien left labels like Elektra to establish their own companies, while others, like the Delinquents, built huge followings from the ground up.
New bosses
By 1999, the revolution was in full swing, as independent tunes began to infiltrate the airwaves. 
Among the local hits on KMEL that year was "That Man!," by the Delinquents, who went on to move 50,000 copies of 1999's Bosses Will Be Bosses (Dank or Die). By the end of the year, however, Clear Channel had bought KMEL, and G-Stack says he's been unable to get airplay since. (As of press time, KMEL musical director "Big Von" Johnson was unavailable for comment.)
The Delinquents maintain a sizable fan base. "They are Oakland," Dotrix 4000 says, "in terms of selling records and reppin' our city. They can't throw a party and it's not sold out." But while successful acts like the Delinquents have countered the lack of radio exposure and label support through relentless hustle, it's unclear whether hustle alone can withstand the effect of the media actively promoting other artists as New Bay hip-hop.
On the phone, the Frontline are more conciliatory than they come off online. They seem genuinely nonplused by the furor the New Bay catchphrase has provoked. "Without the veterans," MC Locksmith of the Frontline says, "you have no Frontline, without the Too $horts, the E-40s, the Delinquents, the Luniz, without any of these cats." His partner, Left, concurs: New Bay was meant to be "a fresh way of looking at Bay music" rather than an attack. "Let everybody come up. Let's all make good music and all come up together."
I brought this statement to a number of rappers, and responses ranged from "They should've said that first" to "SKI should've known better" to "Fuck them niggas" – disappointing, but you can see their point. We're talking about a scene that still produces entire albums dedicated to Rappin' Ron of Bad Influenz, who died in a car crash in 1997. Most Bay Area rappers I've spoken to have real reverence for the tradition on which they build, and the New Bay concept offends their sensibilities.
Like the residents of Oak Center, they're proud of their community and don't want it wrecked by decisions made outside. In that light, the resentment provoked by the New Bay concept and the flurry of accompanying diss records shouldn't be ascribed to envy. They signify, instead, the stubborn resistance of a community that has survived without assistance and that refuses to cooperate, or be co-opted, except on its own terms.
