Blue Scholars
  • Blue Scholars

What is your legacy? I started thinking this after a series of tweets—of all things—from Blue Scholar/the Bar MC Prometheus Brown. Last week was the 10th anniversary of the original edition of the Scholars' first album, he said. Its release party, he noted, was at a Filipino restaurant in Chinatown, and Gabriel Teodros, Ka.Lil (then still called Khalil Crisis, I think), some guy named Macklemore, and even I (as part of Cancer Rising) all played that show.

"Ten years!" [Jeremy Piven, Grosse Pointe Blank voice]. I just have to print his finisher: "And, for 10 years I kept quiet and never said this out loud to anyone who ever doubted us but: fuck you we still here and you aren't." Chuch.

I'm not at all advocating for a state of only Scholars-type "positive" content here, as most so-called conscious rappers are as formulaic and backward as the radio rap their fans demonize. Scarface's words bled. 2Pac bled (and we never bounced back). Freddie Gibbs's shit bleeds. I'm not some mid-2000's Pitchfork type, saying only "negative" street content is valid, either.

Anyway: legacy...

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