>Street wise

Reality -- Live In Peace brings Worcester's rap scene aboveground

by John O'Neill

Run a quick finger down the current Billboard 200 chart and it's pretty obvious which genre rules popular music. Sure, a handful of movie soundtracks is selling great guns, Shania Twain and Garth Brooks will continue to keep country afloat, and Celine Dion seems spot welded to the cerebral cortex and to the wallets of middle-agers looking to replace the soft sounds of Bread, Barbra Streisand, and Bonnie Tyler. But the preponderance of the chart toppers, both in total number and in sales power, belongs to the hip-hop nation in general, and African-American artists specifically. From the soft and sexy sounds of Brandy and Maxwell to the dance-party goofiness of Will Smith to the harder leanings of Big Punisher and the ubiquitous Puff Daddy to the flat-out hoaky, non-threatening (and very white) BackStreet Boys, rap and hip-hop flavored R&B are carrying an otherwise-flat record industry. Jump into your car, roll down the window, and head down Lincoln St., hang a right to catch Main and keep on going straight out into Leicester or Auburn or Paxton -- go as far out as you want in any direction you please -- the result invariably will be the same. You'll hear it pumping from apartment windows, boomboxes, car stereos, and suburban bedrooms. Black, white, Hispanic, whatever -- the majority of today's kids are all on the same page when it comes to music. Hip-hop is ingrained in them just like disco is in their parents and ball room orchestras in their grandparents. Long past the point of passing fad, rap is not only going to stay, it's being absorbed by an entire world. So, with all that said, where the hell is Worcester's rap scene and why is it held so far underground of the mainstream?

"As far as [being] a performer there isn't much going on in Worcester," says rapper David Desinor who rhymes by the stage name Bandit. "Mainly it happens in the street because [clubs] don't want it. From what I've seen it gets a little hectic, a little wild, but I've been to rock shows and seen kids slam dancing. I don't understand the difference."

Desinor is the prototypical example of Worcester's rap artist. Though actively rhyming for years on the street, at house parties, and the rare live gig, he represents an entire genre and subculture that has been essentially locked-out of the public's perception.

"There's really an over-abundance of [local] rappers with no clubs to host rap, period," says David Westwood, who's band Tru Phynatikz have been toiling on the fringes of obscurity for the past seven years. "There's too much violence associated and that stereotype. I'd love to see [the scene] grow more where everyone gets what they deserve."

Salvation for Worcester's invisible artists may be coming from the most unlikely of sources by way of a CD sponsored by the Worcester Police Department and the Massachusetts Prevention Center. Titled Reality -- Live In Peace, the full-length release features 16 New England-area artists, including eight by Worcester-based performers. The brainchild of detective Dan Rosario, it was a natural extension of the work Rosario and the Worcester PD began two years earlier when city youth were tapped to star in and produce the anti- gang, drug, and violence video "Live In Peace." The video would go on to capture national attention and a nomination for a Cable Ace Award. It has since been used in the region's public schools as a teaching tool.

"We found that the video [message] was being heard, but it was being left in the classroom," says Rosario. "The CD offers the kids a chance to take something home. It's got a positive message, but it's real. The [artists] on this make no apologies because this is life as they know it."

The CD opens with Worcester's L da Head Touchah (a/k/a Larry Ansah), a man who's been rapping locally for eight years and has nibbled at success with a previously released single that received critical praise from The Source (hip-hop's Rolling Stone) and London's Trace magazine. With "Reality," he takes a brutally honest look at life on the streets, as well as a call for self-examination. "The street learned to plot and take us/Kill and bruise us/Though we were real, now we're real losers/Take a look at how the world views us." "Reality" is a cold, hard look in the mirror that demands change by dropping the ghetto pose and finding a better way to get by.

"Everything in life is a cycle and old habits die hard," says Ansah. "If you're young and stupid and selling drugs, you get arrested a few times, suddenly you can't get a good job and you're back selling drugs. You gotta be prepared for what reality is. A lot of [rappers] hide the truth.

"I'm trying to do [positive rapping] so people can get a glimpse. Kids won't listen to parents, but will listen to rappers. I know, I was a young knucklehead! If a rapper can say something positive, it may stick into their head."

Which is the selling point of the Live In Peace CD. It's 17 songs that stay well clear of romanticizing the gangsta world of drugs, violence, gangs, and misogynist messages. Though this project could have easily devolved into a 70-minute public service announcement, Live In Peace succeeds through its restraint. The rappers don't preach as much as offer up stories and situations. Bandit's "How It Is" reaches back to some old-school rhyming, where John Madden, Bill Bixby, L da Head Touchah, and the seven hills of "Wortown" all get referenced in Bandit's one-man war on street crime, and L'il Klep takes on all the "fake G's and parodies/Emcee's and wanna be's" who glorify the use of drinking and drugging in order to lay down rhymes. The four ladies who make up Testimony put together a perfect he-done-her-wrong love song that results in another single mother, while Kaz takes the grand prize for originality with "Shewanna Dog Biscuit" about a little girl who gets caught in a pitbull fight. Throughout Live In Peace, the general themes of staying true to yourself, following your heart, finding self-pride, and believing in a love that will overcome are put across in solid rhymes that would fit nicely on today's contemporary radio. It's proof that the area has a ton of untapped talent as much as an indicator of the lengths Rosario and company went to in order to keep Live In Peace both a viable statement and an entertaining listen. It feels real.

"The CD came out nice; Dan actually worked real hard to stay away from being corny," says Westwood. "The messages are indirect."

The next step toward the mainstream comes this Sunday, September 13, when the CD is released to the public at the Back 2 School Jam at the Palladium. The show will feature the same area artists who participated on the CD. For many, it will be their first show of this caliber, and it marks a turning point for Worcester's hip-hop. No longer relegated to the streets, it will now go down from the city's premiere stage. There really can be no turning back from here.

"The majority of Worcester kids listen to hip-hop," says Keith Napier, who'll perform Sunday as Klep. "I want to give this a shot. Maybe down the road we'll [attract] bigger bands, maybe even have a festival."

"It's like a dream. I don't care about the money, I just love to do it," Ansah says of Sunday's big moment. "I'm just trying to stay on my feet, live to be 60. I'm gonna continue [rapping] either which way, this is in my heart. I just wanna do music that touches people."