The A-Side Build w/Kevlaar 7 of the Wisemen

“I got on late cause I’m ahead of my time...”
-- “Faith Doctrine” (Children of a Lesser God LP, 2010)



“I give you power with my words/ it’s a gift and a curse/ like nursing a dead flower back to life...”
--”Panic in Vision Park” (Children of a Lesser God LP, 2010)

2010 has already witnessed its greatness and the crowds of popularity and sing-a-long song smother the taste and fervor of the last proponents. The last people that are just Original, poor and oppressed and love a great break, beautifully captured sample and an ill lyric as the next meal. They now wait for Kanye to save them on Good Friday and contests to construct the Wu again.

The 2010 greatness is Wisemen’s new album, Children of a Lesser God. The Wu legacy has a family of contemporary family from Sunz of Man to Allah Mathematics. Yet, the evidence of the legacy’s continuation is in the success of discipleship. After Bronze Nazareth’s classic, The Great Migration, we have an superior MC preparing his own incredible beds of drums and soul. Bronze ushering in his peoples, The Wisemen, led to a debut, Wisemen Approaching, of respectable MCs that served as a well extended Greater Migration.

Like his mentor The RZA, Bronze MCs, produces and brings his family in. With their Children LP, we have a similar path but fresh innovations and the mandatory recognition as all six of the Wisemen are truly MCs of a profound caliber. We also receive a prelude to the next great musician, Kevlaar 7. A-alike his brother Bronze, they provide Children with music that succeeds in the direction RZA has oft articulated, a progressive hardcore sound filled with live musicianship. Children is what them ol’ great albums are---something to explore and thus be rewarded for.

Before Children’s release, I had the opportunity to build with Kevlaar 7 on the sciences of everything in life that now must include his burgeoning skills as the next great MC/producer, a Hip Hop musician with an ear for the perfect bass/melody/break assortment and the pen of a composing lyricist. Here are some of the snippets...

Sunez: I actually don’t see you all as beatmakers but MCs first even thought most may see it otherwise.

Kevlaar 7: Exactly. That did come after. Both of us started rhyming first. Bronze been making beats since ‘94. I was just an mc from 94 to fukn 2002. But eventually in 2001 I had a thought and even though I think I’m the illest MC I made beats. I’d send them to Bronze, Cilvaringz. They was like 'Damn. You got good quick as fuck!’ From then on I kept goin. I’m definitely a lyricist before beatmaking.
[Kevlaar 7 & Sunez building on Riverside Drive, NYC]
Sunez: What’s the mindset on this album?

Our mindset goin into making the record [starts] with the group we worked with, the live band, they from Seattle, Project Lionheart. They did shit on 60 Second Assassin’s album [Remarkable Timing]. We wanted to bring that rugged gritty Hip Hop shit but update it with real music. And a bigger sound as far as sound quality. You know how Dr. Dre’s sound quality is as far as the quality of the mixing and the mastering. We wanted to bring a crisp sound like that but at the same time keep the gritty shit in.

When I hear a sample I’m already formulating what I’m--- ‘oooh I want these drums. Man, I used these drums back in 03.’ Pulling them back out and seeing what I can do with them. That might sound good on that. It’s just shit like that and usually when I pick out I might pick some drums that I already did or pick up a new drum pattern and shit. Grab me a new snare, a kick from over there. [With Children of a Lesser God] we would make the beat first how we wanted it then we’d be like, ‘you know what do with this.’ Add a horn, c major. Whatever we thought sounded good this band would do it. This is how we enhanced the beats. Now I used to be able to read music. I used to play the trumpet and the piano but you know, life gets in the way.
[Kevlaar 7 & Sunez w/Paragone, designer of the Wisemen LP cover]
That was another thing too. Me and Bronze was talking about this too. We want our own brand, our own sound where muthafuckas hear you and be like, ‘That’s the Wisemen.’

Sunez: When you do the whole body of work, you have all the tracks on the album, do you go ‘I’m repeating drums’ and we can’t have a whole album with this repeated or that repeated?

Kevlaar: That’s like a process that happens like when we’re making the album. We’ll listen to what we got. We don’t have this type of song, or this type of joint. We need to do them type of joints but can’t nothing sound like anything else.

Sunez: Well explain that for me only cause people think when you say “that type of joint” or “this type of joint” they may be thinking commercial joint--insert here. What do you mean by “that type of joint”?

Kevlaar: We take it deeper than ‘we need a commercial joint, one for the bitches.’ We don’t really do it like that. Most people do it like that on some straight cliche ass shit. But we be like, ‘we need a real soulful joint,’ cause Phillie and Illah sound ill on that shit. They write deep shit on those. We need some hardcore, bring you some “what the fuck is you looking at” type shit. We do it like that. You can do it that other way and you might come out with some deep shit but from the start we take it deeper. This is not just a song for the bitches. We taking it deeper. We wanna know how they feel about whatever...That’s another thing. You gotta have four or five concept songs. Shit that’s about some shit.

We gotta joint named “Lucy.” Illah Dayz came up with the whole concept. Bronze did the beat. It’s an old soul sample saying “Love ain’t what it used to be” and then the beat come in. We rhyming on some--Illah comes raunchy. Another called “Do It Again” That’s the one dude that made the album. He’s from Detroit named Supaa Maine. He did the beat. You probably never heard of him. He really ain’t got no name. We met him at a show. My man from Black Wall Street introduced us to him. He made some shit we would do so Bronze, Salute and Phillie jumped on it. Then I jumped on it. It might be a radio joint yet we keep our integrity. We still doing us but beat wise it has a mass appeal to it. It’s an old sample but its got the knocking drums that would appeal to the masses. We tried to keep the shit hitting from all angles. We got some shit, “Get U Shot” and basically...I’m telling a story on my verse about some dude who was a thug ass nigga and that’s what his life was about. He ends up shooting a block and accidentally hits somebody and the dude is a vegetable. Then how ill revenge is and his moms came back and killed him. But in between the verses me and my man from South Carolina, my brother in law, we be on some comedy shit talking like them ol’ niggas. Like “don’t go near them muthafukas will get u shot boy.” Shit is hilarious. We tried to inject some comedy in the shit too and everybody we let listen to it is like ‘you muthafuckas stupid man.’ [laughs] So we sounded like some Richard Pryor shit. We try to incorporate everything but at the same time not force it. To us, it’s always been a thing to us--everything has to come natural. We don’t ever force shit. It don't sound right when you force it.

Sunez: Now with Illah Dayz and June Megaladon coming back into the fold, how are tracks constructed? Who gets to be on tracks?

Kevlaar: Ain’t no yes men in the group. If five other niggas is telling you that you can come harder then you gotta look outside yourself because one person can’t always tell what’s goin on around them. Someone else will have to tell him or five other niggas will have to tell him. You can’t always take your own opinion and trust it all the time cuz the people that love you is gonna tell you the truth. That’s the first thing too. We’re family. Me, June and Bronze grew up together. I’ve only known Illah dayz since 2002 but the reason he wasn’t on the first album was because he was in an accident. He’s paralyzed from the waist down. It was after a studio night and that’s why he took a hiatus. He was going through therapy. June’s Pops got killed when he was seventeen and he was part of the Unknown [group] so he took a hiatus and became the man of the house. So he was at home taking care of his mom, sisters and all that shit so he kind of got away from it. But really they just came back to the cipher.

Izayaa (photographer): How do you put your lyrics? Alotta people in education and other fields say our people can’t write. How does your process of writing happen? I know it sounds high class but how do your lyrics come out?

Kevlaar: It don’t. I appreciate questions like that. Alotta people don’t really analyze shit like it needs to be. I be wanting to know what peoples’ deepest thoughts about the shit are. My writing process can go any number of ways. If I’m working on my own shit I already have beats picked out for my album or project I’m working on. Depending on how I’m feeling that day I’ll go through the beats and I’ll hear a beat that makes me wanna--it brings the shit out of me. Bronze’s beats do that. Some of my beats do but it be hard to write to your own shit. If I listen to my beats over and over it makes it hard. I don’t know why but Bronze’s bring it out of me. However, the beat makes me feel those are the lyrics that come out of me. Usually I write down the first line that comes to my head. I’ll write four bars first then I go back and I keep repeating it and repeating it. Then I’ll be like ‘nah, throw this word out. Put this word in. Place this word with that word.’ It’s like a puzzle. And I do that with however many bars I’m writing and by the end of the shit I’ll have it memorized.

Sunez: The use of the metaphor. How does that work in extending the metaphor so deep and extended?

Kevlaar: It might be a mental sickness [laughter] but seriously I just keep writing until I feel it in my heart I’m finished. We was influenced by RZA with the metaphors. You might say “we gon shoot you,” but he taught us to say it in a different way like “I’ll thread your needle, nigga.” You just say shit different and I might take one thing and think of thirty different ways to say it.

Sunez: You do a lot of word coupling and you’ll also double time your verses with the beats almost stuttering along.

Kevlaar: We do that with the beats so it’ll be more noticeable. We get that from [Kool] G Rap. Just take the last verse I heard from him amazed me. He rhymed every single word in the rhyme.

Sunez: Word. And the rhyme schemes are double timed. Like on “Associated.”

Kevlaar: Actually I’m a tell you the story. Bronze sent GZA like 30--just bangers. Turned all of them down. We let him pick the beat for our album. Bronze was like ‘fuck it,’ and just sent like ten more of them. Didn’t care which ones he threw in the folder, sent it and it ended up being that...We was like “that beat?!!”..Me and Bronze was like ‘there’s nothing wrong,” but we wouldn’t have picked it out for the album. We was like ‘fuck it, let’s do it.’ And it turned out sick.

Also interesting is that “Introducing” was really the first song we recorded for that album and “Wisemen Approaching” is actually the last track. Dreddy had wanted three more tracks--“Iconoclasts,” “Associated” and another track I forget. We had just moved out of our crib with a studio in the basement. Bronze moved with wifey and I moved in with Salute so we was like ‘fuck, we ain’t got no studio right now.' So we set shit up in the closet of the apartment. “Associated” and “Iconoclasts” were recorded in the closet.

Sunez: I would have never guessed that shit. I would have said the Unknown album was done in an apartment closet.

Kevlaar: Yeah! Exactly, we did that shit in a fuckin real studio. The shit is crazy how you learn to uplift the quality of the music no matter where you’re recording it.

Sunez: Any beats of yours peoples getting on?

Kevlaar: I sent Jay Electronica some beats. That dude is ill, real ill. I sent Rae a few. Me and Bronze sent Raekwon a few. I think he chose one of Bronze’s for the Shaolin Vs. Wutang.

Sunez: Rae should have you two do the whole thing.

Kevlaar: Word. That’s what we waiting for. When we rocked with Killah Priest in Detroit, we rocked a couple of shows with him. We brought him to the studio and he did the track that I produced. He jumped on it and it’s on Bronze’s album (School for the Blindman). That shit is crazy--”Sodom and Gomorrah.” Priest was like, ‘we need to do a whole album, just us three.’ We was like ‘Word. Let’s do it.’ We gonna make it happen but Priest is all over. He’s never in one spot for too long.

Sunez: For me, Detroit has the best new MCs. Are you all in contact with other MCs like Royce Da 5’9”, Black Milk or eLZhi or any other expansion?

Kevlaar: Yeah, it’s coming. Matter of fact, Bronze just did a joint with Royce last week for one of M-80’s projects. And I did a joint with Kurupt, Tri-State and Ruste Juxx.
[Peace to Kevlaar 7 and the Wisemen]
Sunez: How is Die Ageless, your debut solo coming along? What are you building on?

Kevlaar: I speak on a lot of issues, like inner city issues especially in Detroit--Gun Rule. The joblessness, homelessness, ignorance. The people that’s oppressing us ain’t the only problem. We do it to ourselves sometimes. I got a joint on my album called “My People” produced by J-Skrilla from D.C., DMV area. I think Reef the Lost Cauze is gonna jump on that. I got this song called “Solstice” where I’m telling a story but it’s a true story. Me and my man was playing basketball after school and a nigga got bucked right across the street at one of the payphones. Then I go into it on some enlightenment shit. We did go over there and look at the shit and see brains all over but I went deeper and made up some shit--”I looked into his eyes and this is what I saw/ 1995 early autumn I saw/ the fire from the hammer as soon as I bent/ the corner dropped to my chest/ this block is hotter than a sauna peered from a spot/ seen a nigga that was shot/ alotta, screaming and yelling and tires peeling out/ I lay for five minutes forever no doubt/ I rose up slowly, looked into his eyes/ and this is what he told me”-- There’s more but I wrote that like six years ago and I did the beat and it gets real deep. I gotta song for the women cuz you gotta address the Earths. It’s called “Losing Hand Gamble.” Basically what I’m doing is I’m comparing relationships in the past when I was wild and ignorant and it’s called “Losing Hand Gamble” cuz I gambled that shit. It was good for me but I didn’t see it. In the first verse I’m comparing one of my real relationships to a game of Bones. The second verse it’s another relationship in a game of chess. Then Brix, she’s from Boston, she’s gonna come in on the third verse and give the female perspective and compare it to relationship. She’s down with the Wolves--Krumbsnatcha and them. Bronze did the beat with a Ray Charles sample. It’s crazy.

Sunez: It’s mostly other producers working on it?

Kevlaar: Mostly it’s me and Bronze producing the album. I got a brother named Woodenchainz from Indiana. That’s my song about money called “Federal Reserve Note.” The evils of that shit but also the necessities. My man Central Intelligence from Albuquerque. I think that’s it. Other than that it’s me and Bronze. I haven’t gotten the exact date but it’s early Februrary. I probably have about 3 more songs to write. I also got a joint with me, Sha Stimuli and Ras Kass. I’m fans of them dudes so I was happy to do that joint.

“Everyones’ stressin/ expressin/ they fake knowing you heartless
Listen, pick apart this/ even my cousin of death heard me rhyme/
bleeding my brethren stealing my time/
it’s my second resurrection/ my lines are perfection
drop the needle, we need you to bring your lessons
so I grip the fifth/ swig my shot and spit/
and lifeless lifetimes/ I’m echoing this,
How many times/must I drop out the sky
and teach the lost how to fly/
How many times I gotta tip the bottle’s eye/
to quiet my tension, Pass the vodka dry”
--”Makes Me Wanna Shot” (Children of a Lesser God LP, 2010)

Wisemen - Children of a Lesser God Review

The flourishing of Wu discipleship is one of the greatest sights in the saga of Hip Hop music. That the root takes Earth when Bronze Nazareth is realized by The RZA is the revealing premonition that we will receive the innovations of versatile epiphany and expert expansion. After 2006’s classic debut, The Great Migration, Bronze presents himself as the focal point to introduce his extended Detroit roots with the whole Wisemen crew’s debut of 2007, Wisemen Approaching. A debut album that played as an addictive continuation of Migrations’s stripped down hardcore beats with more rugged verses from Bronze. To listen deeper to Wisemen Approaching one can see that great lyricists and unique voices lurk within the fold as brother Kevlaar 7 and Phillie.

3 years pass and the waiting of the fan and the hustling of the artist is revealed as a diligent study of debuts that deepened in listener worth and MCs that have made the craft a profession. The sophomore effort of Children of a Lesser God must be understood as the success of mastered experimentation fortified by developed technique. With Bronze, Kevlaar 7, Phillie and Salute joined by members June Megaladon and Illa Dayz there is a reduction of versatility in flow and steadiness of track tempos as they seek perfection with exquisitely developed mid-tempo rolling breaks they accent with congas con tumbao and soaring soul wails all laced with seasoned rhyming.

In an age where Hip Hop seems scarred by a lack of skill as much as exploited gimmickry the Wisemen have an album that charges through with innovations of sincere musical exploration and a band of MCs that all have incredible mastery for syllable coupling and the imagery projection of their survivalist blues of enlightenment. Like the Wu-Tang Clan itself, each member of the Wisemen are brothers before they rhyme so their convergence on the mic has a completely unified sentiment that is compelling.

Bronze Nazareth is criminally unknown and garners the most respect merely as a great beatmaker. While this is as valid yet incomplete as understanding Michael Jordan as a great defender there is no rest in the earned respect. The tracks add live instrumentation with a band guided by Bronze and Kevlaar with the emphasis on unique snares, roaring bass lines and wailing vocals as if they are modern orchestrators with the spirit of Barry White in them. Whereas Wisemen Approaching may be seen as dynamic sampling from Love Unlimited Orchestra to Candi Staton to wonderful effect, Children... must be recognized as a distinct orchestration. As this is the epitome of the addict’s album, the innovations are felt with constant repetition. Bronze’s work this year has been with 60 Second Assassin’s debut, Remarkable Timing, where much like RZA with Wu’s 8 Diagrams, provided soundscapes that evolve with the inflections of the MC. 60 Sec, more the soul wailing orator of select terms like Greg Nice, was given hard tracks that isolated his verses (i.e. “Remarkable Timing”) or fluctuate with him like the oft kilter breaks on “Fizza Funky.” With Children..., Bronze, now with Kevlaar adding on substantially, offer hard breaks that ride with deliberate pausing that emphasizes on the MC’s rhythms and punchlines.

The marriage of beats and rhymes is exceptional and where we can understand the production advances. The Wisemen are all literally rhyming in a mastered tri-patterned flow that often has a punctuated rhymed syllable as the fourth word note. So many tracks achieve this synergy we can look at the Bronze produced “Corn Liquor Thoughts” where Kevlaar, who has a gift for the wonderfully chosen word, takes the verse from Bronze and on the isolated vocal hook begins, “Spin the cylinder/cyclical spitter/realer than lead spit at the White House pillars...” and on that tri pattern flow the break invites itself right on time. The amazing verse is followed by Phillie on the tri-pattern also going in with “Laser daggers piercing your skin...The power to devour whole cities, oh so Phillie, gotta Fo(ur) Fo(ur) wit me/ my bank rolls sickly/ pockets throwing up, regurgitating fifties/Long Beach ice teas/ chronic by the tree. it’s all I need to rock an m-i-c..” leading to the most deliberate use of the tri-pattern flow by June. June Megaladon, with a voice that has bass and command like the well featured Big Rube, goes in penning the song title to begin the flow, “My Corn Liquor Thoughts/ trouble I brought/ Liver than raw damage/you niggas fall famished...” The track is brilliant with a swooping bass line like a car engine churning and the break propping it up while the soul wails musically support the intentions.

And the tracks are where all this is immaculately attached. Kevlaar is literally the next great musician, with beats and rhymes. His reworking of the Charmels cymbal crash used on RZA’s “C.R.E.A.M.” has all the signature of his young stylings. With beautiful soaring vocals that chime in like the illest zombie Doo Wop group, the break has a marching crunch while that Charmel’s cymbal crash shines like a light in a dark attic finally discovered. Every sample, every type of vocal, every snare, every break, every bassline has a plan that promotes the MC intentions. Kevlaar’s “Faith Doctrine” epitomizes this where beautifully introspective lyrics on the enlightenment of honorable survival are led by a vocal sample of a lecture on principle that is then applied to their Black Detroit reality.

Beats like this make verses seem effortless but it isn’t easy to have six MCs have such concise timing, heavily employing that ill tri-pattern flow with fluid inflections, punchlines and introspective insights. Bronze’s work on the intro title track is filled with wild cymbals cut short or left roaming on the break and blaring horns constantly reintroducing themselves. The beat and rhymes marriage here is led by Bronze on a beatifully abstract, introspective verse, “Screaming bags of madness/ can it stop?/ Planet Rock/Motown, no manuals out/Fam is left to plan my route/ I vanish, iron chains/ surround my city’s canvas/ Brandish lanterns in overcast moments...” Kevlaar’s great use of congas on “Thirsty Fish” and “Victorious Hoods” or Bronze’s snare work on “Lucy” or “Panic in Vision Park” are more of the many notes on the illness.

Children of a Lesser God has no immediate conclusion to its exploration. It is an album of six Wisemen that indeed create Hip Hop blues, the introspective lyrics of hardcore intensity and sincere awareness tailored with a unified flow, storytelling detail, abstract phrasing and superior word choices and phrasing. And all backed with some of the greatest music today’s Hip Hop has to offer. That these brothers can’t merely be children of a lesser god is the real jewel.

P.E.A.C.E. Course Lessons 2010: The Justice Build

The 120 Lessons are a complete tool of learning if one applies a complete body of disciplines to it. Below are 10 immediate disciplines and concepts to begin with. Each point will be related to the 1st degree in the Student Enrollment (1-10) (Who is the Original Man? The Original Man is the Asiatic Blackman. The maker, the owner, cream of the planet Earth, father of civilization and God of the universe.) The stratagem here may be applied to any teaching we come across.

1. Vocabulary
Before we even seek to explain the meaning of the degree, let alone get an understanding, we must know what the words themselves mean.
(i.e. What does Asiatic mean?)

2. History
The 120 Lessons are not structured chronologically and many become confused by the timeline. Throw in the Asiatic calendar, a calendar based on events more than astrological timing, and there can be extreme confusion. We must know the time we are studying and also the historical events referenced or the history it suggests we should know of.
(i.e. What is the history of Asia? How is the Blackman the father of civilization?)

3. Science
We must engage in the sciences that the degrees are referencing. The Honorable Elijah Muhammad taught as an evangelist sharing a fact based religion. He built a massive congregation off the dynamic sharing of unknown truths that he did not technically prove but overtly declared must be accepted. We cannot do that because these muslim teachings have become our 120 Lessons and so we must look for real scientific reasoning at every turn.
(i.e. The bio-chemistry of the Black man? Who is Black?)

4.Abstract Vs. Concrete
The language of 120 is a dialect we must learn and a way of speaking that is not overtly technical. We must understand the use of metaphor and abstract terms that are not to be taken exactly literal and other terms that are much deeper than they appear to be.
(i.e. the abstract term of "cream" and the deeper meaning behind "Blackman")

5. Titles Offered
We are learning a knowledge of self with this great aid. In it titles are shared constantly and we must note under what conditions and notice their worth, the activities and powers designated by them. We say we are God or Earth, the most important titles known.
(i.e. God, the maker, the owner)

6. Today's Reality
With these degrees written in the 1930's we must learn how to understand how this language fits this time and the people that are around us. How do they see it? What would they understand out of 120? How do I share the principles if I quote, paraphrase or explain in my own words?
(i.e. explaining Blackman is God to a yellow seed Dominican who is Christian Catholic?)

7. Common Ancestry
120 is a new arcane text of spiritual truth. It is important to note how our people learned this truth and what parts of it over the last 6,000 years and beyond. Without, we will not see the useful tools to gain from the past and often will strut around reinventing the wheel.
(i.e. the ancient texts of Islam, the Tao, Buddhism, Hindu, Sufi, Yogic, etc.)

8. 120 Reference
You cannot prove a degree in 120 by quoting another degree. That is the same as saying you are correct because you said as such last week. However, in the study of 120, referencing other degrees brings insight to the concepts in each of the degrees. They must be cross referenced to extract total meaning.
(i.e. the 10th degree in 1-40 asks "Who is that mystery God?" This lends insight to the 120 being one of the few spiritual texts to overtly claim who God is as opposed to other ancient texts that were far more subtle)

9. Supreme Mathematics
This is the language of our essence, the what and how the Original man and woman do? It is also the law and order of the universe and we must always be mindful of the degrees that the lessons highlight
(i.e. 1- knowledge, the number of the degree and 7 - God, mentioned in the lesson)

10. Your Understanding
Life is a developing understanding and you must articulate what you know so that you may figure how you may use it. Your understanding is a unique yet proven insight that propels your way of life. Your building with 120 is nothing without this.

P.E.A.C.E. Course Lessons 2010: The Justice Curriculum

The study of many disciplines does not make man righteous yet it greatly propels the ease by which they may realize themselves as such and build greater. Just as the most oppressive societies have fortified themselves with the study of many disciplines, our study of a versatile curriculum will develop our framework of ideas, potential and self awareness.
The following ten subject areas are a beginning in this broad range of study that are necessities of culture…

1. Hygiene - In a supposedly civilized advanced society, hygiene is often at its lowest. A possible reason for that aside from the awkward change it is for the Caucasian/westernized world, is that we do not view it as a constant study. We may adapt certain measures as they come to us or flow with social mores if say someone properly uses a tissue to open the bathroom door that reeks with diverse fecal matter particles. However, we must constantly protect ourselves from the environment through a developing awareness and knowledge of hygienic practices and study to fortify the home with less chemical pollutants and cleaner rituals.

2. Music - While we may enjoy the latest pop craze and shuffle 500 diddies on our ipod, music is a language of resistance and expression that our people, oppressed the last 6,000 plus years have developed wonderfully. To love music is to learn of it, to expand the palette of sounds we here also broadens the ability to hear and develop new ideas. In the societies we live in with so many Original people from all over the world, we ought to know these other languages they have expressed themselves with, beyond the radio's narrow dialect. In New York City, we have at least Dominican meringue and bachata, Puerto Rican Salsa, Bomba, Plena, Cuban Son, Jamaican Roots Reggae, the so-called African American Soul Music, Jazz and the for all these Original people the most lyrically expressive musical genre to date, Hip Hop music. Rakim, Donny Hathaway, Miles Davis, Johnny Ventura, Willie Colon, Bob Marley should all be heard.

3. News - From the politics of your immediate residential area to the world stage, we must seek out legitimate news sources and study them. We must know more than the paltry 15 minute broadcast at 11pm of tabloid specials. This is one of the ways to understand the people we love and seek to build with.

4. Science - The sciences of bio-chemisty, quantum mechanics and mathematics are key to a knowledge of self. Working to study sciences slowly and usefully will always give more sense to the universe we have created. This is the study of our inner workings. How can we not study this daily?

5. Health - The diet is something to constantly from the inner to the outer. If the proposed healthier lifestyle is adopted, a vegan/living foods diet, is embraced then one can no longer eat ignorantly. One must be a student of ingredients, preparation and recipes. We must learn what things we may be putting in our body, how to prepare them so that we may have supreme control and learn to express ourselves through our food with recipes that make food taste great to us.

6. Training - The training that one chooses must be studied. Brothers must study how to increase their muscle mass without loads of whey and sugar to merely mold fat. If we engage in a sport we must learn more of the sport and what its benefits are. We must also learn to strengthen our bodies and avoid injury.

7. Identity - The study of identity is a key to a successful knowledge of self so that a title of God and Earth and a righteous name are not merely fancy claims. We must work on noticing belief and letting it go with truth and become aware of the clichés we have labeled ourselves with and let them go. This is a lifelong study.

8. Pedagogy - The science of teaching is also in the science of learning. Learning how to teach we must also learn how we actually learn. What pitfalls we may be prey to become more evident the more familiar we are with the many techniques. Also, learning to share sincerely is in the judgment of what ought to be shared. This is to be studied.

9. Talent - We must engage in many disciplines to find and hone our talents. It is through out talents that we will create sharings for the betterment of all. We must be aware of our talents with a humility that does not overrate them yet does not underplay them as well.

10. Love - The relationship of family, the creation of God and Earth is the reality of all things. We must study whom we share our deepest intimacy with and not merely expect to be loved but develop self into a person worthy of love. This is done with studying the ideas of intimacy, relationship, care and sincerity.

Peace Course Lessons 2010: Power Bat (Build Awareness Square)

Your work is to discover your work and then with all your heart give yourself to it.”
- Hindu Prince Gautama Siddharta, the founder of Buddhism, 563-483 B.C

These select lessons personally composed are to reinforce the nature of this year's particular theme that has been focused on: Work. The learning of a knowledge of oneself coupled with the natural development of virtue through sincerity must be channeled through Work. That there becomes a Love of Hell as no Hell can be imposed on the true and living; it is merely work that we have developed for ourselves. This Course will never guarantee the success of the engaged student. There are no riches and fame; rather, there is an awareness of what oneself, one's cipher and the talents one may use to create works to share.

These said lessons are to begin to have an awareness of all the work we naturally, must and can be doing and ultimately able to work with the 120 Lessons with greater ease and ultimate usefulness.

POWER BAT (Build Awareness Square)

The core to a knowledge of self is that there really is only Creator and Creation in the Universe. Once this is realized then what is only sharing, the giving and receiving of the fruits of Creation. Even the teacher, naturally poor and righteous is engaged in an overt sharing of forums for the student to draw up their understanding, talents and nature. As Creators then we must become aware of all we do as vital to the development of self. One's square is the surrounding reality of one's awareness of truth that one protects and uses to build and destroy. To develop this powerfully and stand on one's square one must build awareness of one's personal status at all times. With this one may progress powerfully in their endeavors.

1. EAT:
The diet proposed is of the highest refinement and thus able to allow us to project the most power in all our undertakings. Yet, while a vegan/living foods diet is ideal, the nature of awareness is most key. There is nothing that we deliberately take with us and have the most power in deciding how that the food we place in our bodies. We may love our family and even cherish our possessions but none of that is inserted inside our body as much as the food we eat. To begin, we must learn to note the foods we eat, the conditions we dine in, the reasoning behind our eating and how each and every food feels within us. In doing this we may better decide how to use our food as a deliberate energy source and solve countless problems often not attributed to diet yet truly are (i.e. difficulty reading, lethargy, lack of emotional control, lack of desire, etc.)

2. TRAIN:
The P.E.A.C.E. Course may reach a point where you may reach and decide to train martially the art of Shaolin Kung Fu. However, athletic achievement, notoriety and making punks jump up to get beat down is not the heart of the awareness here. It is that our bodies are the outward composition of our thoughts and will only be equipped to do what we train it to do. Just as the mind drives the body, the body well trained inspires the mind, thus the interplay of creation in mind and body of Bian Xing San Bao (Metamorphosis of Three Treasures Kung Fu).
The root of training is to track your exercise, study the many outlets of interest (i.e. sports, martial arts, etc.) and work on scheduling a personal protocol for consistent training.

3. READ:
What are we reading? What are we watching? What do we see more often than not because we are drawn to it? What are we absorbing? The concrete reality of the knowledge of self means that there we are in a society adverse to our growth and development. There can be no such thing as a non-reader for those that understand the nature of war our lives are bred in.
We must begin by learning to choose what we read and make real goals to complete the reading of books, articles and writings. We must then extend this to all that we knowledge.

4. WRITE
What do we write? What are we saying? What are our ideas? Who and what do we write for? Writing is a forum of sharing understanding for those who will not always be around. Writings are your sharings absorbed away from you. How developed is our projection of our ideas? It is that the idea is the foundation of the great writer.
We must begin to write our own personal journals and catalog our understanding, increase the amount we write so that just as we speak and/or share writings to the world they are most sincere, willingly useful and best understanding.

5. SHARE:
The genre of self help literature is vast, designed to accept life as a rat race and then lace the right shoes for the finish. While the sincerity of the student can never be received from a teacher or teaching, the development of virtue can be engaged in to develop an awareness of one's sincerity. That is that no one in this society will judge us wrong for transmuting our greatest energies to think and grow rich and let all those around us sink and we switch. However, when one asks oneself, 'Once I have found my talent and it is able to survive me then what is the nature of truly thriving?'

We must then take note of simply sharing. Are we sharing disingenuously for profit and fame? Are we sharing truth out of anger or resentment? Are we sharing with a hidden agenda to receive something in return? It is difficult to gauge what must become natural. To try to log what one shares is not a technical activity but a personal retrospection. That in this we may actually judge our talents and the worth of what they can one day aid others. This is why the best part is the best part.

ILLUMINATI TO GODFOLLY: Quick Analysis of Bullshit Lyrics

"Big ballin is my hobby
So much so they think I’m down with the illuminati
my watch do illuminate
my pockets are naughty
but I’m Godbody better ask somebody
I was born a God
I made myself a king
which means I downgraded to a human being
you was born a Goddess I made you my queen
which mean we upgraded to Louis the thirteen"
-Jay-Z (from Usher single, "Hot Toddy")


No, there ain't no use to build on the disgust of the beat. It has the 808 cleavage to pop clock radio speakers and the synth variations to sound classical on ipod headphones. It's hot trash that everyone will be starving to feed their craze with in clubs this very Friday. However, the real build is the way people follow lyrics in Hip Hop. To understand Hip Hop lyrics is the same as following the words and writings of any man. You need to know who they are by studying what they have truly presented over the years. No, we won't travel to Queensbridge to see if Cormega was really pitching on the corner or check Vinnie Paz' gun collection personally. But the details of the lyrics themselves over the years give insight into the validity to the titles they claim and the sincerity most necessary. For some it is consistently simple where the understanding shared in an entire career of verses offer principles and ethics to the making of art as a representation of their actual sincerity and realness.

For Hip Hop music now, the confusion is much greater. As I have self-penned it, we now live in the era of the Pop MC. There are countless new and upcoming rappers that dominate sales with no skill but masquerading gimmicks and superior sales pitches. So Drake goes from Nickelodeon to the streets smoothly with nothing to offer. His album succeeds with a bowing to the weak rappers of the day (Lil Wayne) and quick homage to the MCs of yesteryear (NaS) fooling them as to their relevance to such shit bars. These aren't MCs but rappers. We ain't talking bout this shit.

The Pop MC of the last decade was and still is Jay-Z. He is no rapper packaging gimmicks and the hot style of the day. He uses his actual talent to package himself as a the trend and just as Biggie before him, has given us tablespoons of the hardcore under the table while force feeding us gallons of pop shit. Street talk real. Cars real. Hoes real. Cleverness sure. Charisma sure. Sincerity? Fucking questionable. The Pop MC is a deeper discourse than this simple blog that will be shared yet it must be noted that the consistency of the Pop MC is a manipulative use of skill, their own subtle innovations and the derivative grafting of the greats of the era along with a content that offers only the sprinkling of insight for validity and support of their only principle--success by any means. Jay-Z' most insightful theme of content is ultimately that one must master devlishment in a devilish world. And so I wonder how the fuck is anything he says supposed to be real the way Realness is supposed to be? The way Guru rhymed and Premier makes beats or the way 2Pac sincerely lamented or the way RZA came with the Wu or Doom with his mask or Thirstin Howl with the Lo Lifes. I don't see it but I expect it to be seen by others. This shit is sold and no longer told. Now onto the Toddy lyrics for tots…

Look, if I say, off the lyric, he's God then I'm brainless. If you do then you're his nameless consensus. No, Jay-Z is not in the devil worshipping Illuminati but he has power and influence our people don't have. He also is as American as the worst best in that he has gotten his millions and following minions as a crafty rebel. The excessive denouncing of him being in Illuminati is because that's the buzz on him. Answering it on the Rick Ross track (He said he was amazin' not a mason, bitch) wasn't enough. He has to use the knowledge he has to show depth of insight that is only used for the rude invite back into the underground. The underground is the underlying ethic, complex dialect and deeper spirituality of the streets that bred Hip Hop--The Nation of God and Earth. Actual Fact. Doubt it? Show and prove otherwise and you'll only uncover the true A-Alikes that confirm it from Kool Herc to KRS-One to 9th Wonder. Or do you need media like XXL's news sections and see the grafting in their titles. So with "Hot Toddy" he says he was born God and that he's Godbody. That is the most surefire way to prove that he is not Masonic--claim that you live the truth they keep secret--The Original man is God. There ain't no mystery in the sky.

But Jay is an African American only--better said an American Afroman. Like the best capitalists they self-deprecate themselves with the honesty of dishonor. So he decided to be less than God, a human, so that he can be the ruling King. Adding a trophy piece, a Goddess demoted to Queen, he either upgraded to a bisexual, devilish Kingship of 17th century France that ascended upon the assassination of his father (B.I.G. followed by Jay-Z?) or that they just did all this dumbing down to buy $3,000 bottles of Remy Martin. WTF?!

Enjoy Pop music with MCs, rappers, auto-tune aided R&B singers but don't start listening to the shit like it's Hip Hop. It ain't ever gon fuckin' be.

"And why is it everytime that a multiplatinum artist/always use the underground to make a comeback?/ Is it fair to the hardcore niggaz that rap?"
Redman - "Basically"

"Rap is not pop if you call it that and stop"
- Q-Tip of A Tribe Called Quest - "Check the Rhime"


-Sunez

Popa Wu: A 5% Story (NGE Edition) Review

Popa Wu building at classic GZA concert at New York's Knitting Factory in 2007 (Earth Izayaa Allat)

Beyond the musician, the performer and the businessmen vehicling the arts to us are the minds that inspire, direct and re-ground these expressions of art. Hip Hop is often called a culture often narrowing the way of life that produces the expressions it is categorizing. Seeing Hip Hop completely is to see and hear those great minds that are behind the artistic geniuses we admire. With Popa Wu: A 5% Story (NGE Edition), we learn of one of the fathering minds of the Wu-Tang Clan, Hip Hop music’s most powerful cult empire ever. Khalik Kuro, the burgeoning director of the best gritty Wu videos of the last decade from Hell Razah’s “Hood Love” to Darkim Be Allah & 36Zero’s “Change,” naturally offers the story of the Wu elder statesman.

Told in the freewheeling narrative will chosen by Popa Wu himself and directed in a cut/paste fashion of excellent imagery and shot selection we learn of our subject by his naturally engrossing character simply living. Named the NGE Edition, there certainly is a focus on Popa Wu's reality as Freedum Allah of the Nation of God and Earth. As expected of Khalik, he details the roots of Freedum Allah's NGE upbringing well with narrative commentary and audio interview excerpts. With little footage for this backstory, Khalik still ably engages visually with clarifying transcription and excellent photographs of the old times. The greatest attribute to a director like Kuro is that, like the raw street Hip Hop video, he often lets the subject tell their own story. While this method has its faults in probing questions left out, Popa Wu giving a chronology of his Medina/Brooklyn blocks he grew up on and the East New York subway station they ciphered in adds clarity with intrigue about him and the entire Wu-Tang Clan.

The successful portrait of any Hip Hop work is that insightful presentation of realness. As one of the many Gods of the Nation of God and Earth, I personally attest to the ideal representation of Freedum. Building with him years ago with Dasun Allah in a project apartment deep in Mecca/Harlem, his understanding captured on the Cuban Linx and Ironman albums are really his own. They are so profound for the world because it is consistently revelatory to him. When we learn to build an understanding it is by living the knowledge we learn. That wisdom draws out a true revelation of purpose within. It is special to oneself and is shared sincerely. This sincerity is the culture's power and ultimate path to equality shared. On the aforementioned albums to Lord Jamar's 5% LP and the A-Alikes I Eat You Eat album, Popa Wu is dynamically sharing what Freedum has truly seen and lived. As an elder, Khalik captures an incredible build that RZA offers to Popa Wu that starts as a sincere conversation on the plight of the Original peoples of the world and the natural weakness of the Caucasian man that becomes a powerful build on the weakness leading into wickedness. It is the question, "What is a Real Devil?" deeply explored.

While the only pitfall of the dynamic individual is that there are mysterious aspects to his legacy left untold when they are left to tell it. The latter half of the film Khalik shows how chronicling Popa Wu was no easy adventure revealing the rarity of what we have and what we also may be missing. Taught orally and personally, the teachings of the NGE and its brothers and sisters, are deliberately hard to capture through the broad based and insensitive media. Here, Khalik captures the sincerest elder, among the youth, bombing them up when they stumble foolishly and listening intently when they show and prove their best parts. It is no exaggeration to say that Popa Wu's life explored lends insight the Wu-Tang Clan, Hip Hop music and culture, the streets of Brooklyn to Harlem and the deepest thoughts of the Nation of God and Earth. Thus, the Popa Wu Documentary is a vital and necessary film.