Whilst hip hop has recently been described to me as ‘a sinking ship of which I must get off’, You Can’t Imagine How Much Fun We’re Having and Felt II were two albums of 2005 that convinced me to stay with Captain Hip Hop and go down in the sea of shit that was Juelz Santana, The Game vs 50 Beef and Sizzerp.
You Can’t Imagine saw many a former critic become an Atmosphere fan, the beats were brilliant and the rhymes diverse yet approachable. Ant’s production on Felt II filled a much needed quality void that was slowly turning into a black hole, combined with a conceptually dirty record Murs & Slug shined as tongue in cheek playboys that just want to have fun. It’s hard to hate an act who are just so likeable and keep bringing out such high levels of production.
Talking openly about women in hip hop, homophobia and Australian audiences there is no doubt that the Slug you get on a record is the same Sean you get in an interview. Following the success of Atmosphere’s appearances as part of Big Day Out 2005 and their sellout sideshows in Melbourne & Sydney they have decided to tour once again with their full band and fellow Rhymesayer Brother Ali and according to Slug it will definitely not be the last time we see Atmosphere down under.
What were the decisions behind returning to Australia for a solo tour?
I felt like I had neglected Australia for long enough and then when I finally got over there and saw what type of response we got and how many people were already familiar with us I felt really guilty that I had never come so I would like to make it a point to come at least once maybe twice a year until they don’t want me back.
Were you surprised when you did BDO at the response you received?
Yeah I was very surprised at how proper the response was at BDO and at a couple of our own shows. I was just surprised in general, it always freaks me out when people outside my own city know who we are much less around the world.
Are you received differently overseas than you are in the US? Why do you think that is?
In the US it’s a lot bigger but that’s because I’ve spent all my time running around here rapping, now I’m just going to start neglecting the US.
I’ve read in an interview that you think ‘it’s really difficult for a woman hip hop head to embrace gun rap’, can you elaborate on that?
I think that the industry and even society frowns on their embracing of it many times, even with the Gangster Rap stuff, it’s okay for women to like 50 Cent and it’s okay for women to like the ones that are cute like Cam’ron or Juelz Santana but for Bun B who isn’t necessarily the most attractive rapper you don’t see a lot of women going for it. So they’re not going for it strictly for the lyrics, a lot of times if they do they are considered to be far too aggressive women or they’ll be called dykes. Maybe not just necessarily hip hop but maybe if you look into hardcore rock and hardcore punk there are very similar feelings towards it, when a women does get into the mosh pit it’s kinda a novelty and a lot of the egghead boys want to beat on her more cos it’s a girl in the mosh pit.
The only reason I’ve ever been asked about it or brought it up was in response to people asking me why I have such a large female fan base and usually I steer people towards the fact its because music like mine is actually accessible to women, they aren’t going to get insulted by what I’m trying to say cos I’m not throwing around the words bitch or hoe or slut, I don’t speak negatively towards them at all and it’s an opportunity for them to like rap. So I think a lot of the time I just get lucky because of the fact that I’m rap that isn’t offensive, I do get a female fan base, maybe the same way Outkast have such a large female fan base because they’re not disrespectful towards women but I guess I think way too much about that kind of stuff.
I guess you must get asked about it a lot though?
Well people seem to think it’s an anomaly that I have a 50% female fan base.
I think another thing for females is that you have the courage to be personal and honest and make a meaningful record as opposed to some of the less mature or significant raps that we have access to.
I see that but I don’t see that as being something that should necessarily draw women over men or anything, people in general if they’re into personal stuff they can be into that and it’s not to say that maybe, Biggie his stuff was pretty personal as well yet Tupac had a much larger female fan base because Tupac was sexy and Tupac took off his shirt. Whereas Biggie was more of a man’s man kinda guy so women weren’t really allowed to like Biggie if they did it was like ‘What are you?’. I guess what I’m saying is that there is a genuine female rap audience who just wants to hear fresh lyrics and dope beats, it’s just kinda interesting that content of the raps or the package of the rapper seems to be such a tool used to market to women when a lot of the women I grew up with liked Dell or Black Moon and KRS One as much as I did. And you don’t see that as much of that anymore, you don’t see women who are ‘backpackers’ like you used to see in the day and it even extends to artists. You’ve either gotta be a slut like Lil’ Kim or you can be like Jean Grae who actually has something to say but her audience will never be as big as Lil’ Kim’s because the men would rather hear the slut. I don’t know what you can do about that but I hope for the day that all the little 14 year old girls decide that they like a rapper who’s dope as opposed to a rapper that takes off his shirt and has nice pectorals.
You’ve also been quoted saying that women as publicists and journalists are being ‘used sexually to entice these male journalists to write about these stupid bands’ Can you elaborate on that?
I don’t know what it’s like in Australia but I’ve been paying a lot of attention to Independent music here and friends with people, journalists, publicists and one of the things I’ve noticed is that 95% of rock and rap journalists in the US are men and 95%, maybe the numbers aren’t exactly right but this is just me trying to put it in perspective, but 95% of the publicists are women. Most of the record labels are run by men, most of the artists are men, most of the booking agents are men, most of the sound men are men, most of the tour managers are men, most of the club management are men but most of the publicists are women. So I see it as a record label saying ‘how are we going to get these nerdy rock critics to write about our band? Well I know we’ll get a female publicist who has a nice personality and a pretty voice cos when she gets on the phone with the journalist and is like “Hey I really want you to write about the Mars Volta” and the rock guy on the other end has a total phone crush and is like “I’m totally going to write about this band and I’m going to write about every fucking band she ever asks me to because when I go to South by Southwest I wanna meet her and see if I can fuck her”. It’s not a theory I carry on my own, it’s one I have come up with ,with some of my female publicist friends, they all kinda know what’s going on and it’s fun cos it’s just another example of how sex sells everything.
Do you have a female publicist at Rhymesayers?
Yeah actually we do. But she doesn’t work at Rhymesayers we’ve outsourced to a company in Chicago which happens to be run by a woman, my actual publicist is a man named Ben but he works for a woman. When we first hired the company the woman was doing it all herself but she has gotten big enough now where she hired people and she just runs the company but initially when Atmosphere first started making a splash on independent rock, journalists heads, well yeah my publicist was a woman with a very beautiful voice and a very beautiful woman that all the journalists wanted to sleep with.
Kayne West recently made comments about how hip hop is homophobic and needs an attitude adjustment, what do you think of hip hop that constantly degrades homosexuals?
I don’t really think it stops at hip hop, I appreciate Kayne saying that because it’s true but it’s kind of an American problem in general, it’s not just hip hop it’s everywhere, the whole country is pretty fucking homophobic. And really let’s see it for what it is, homophobia stems from ignorance and insecurity and it’s kinda like shit, if you listen to some of the rapper’s out there doing it’s obvious to see that they are most likely ignorant or insecure. And I’m not trying to diss anybody but I’m just saying that if you have to go on record and call somebody a faggot, it’s like ‘what are you trying to prove?, what was your point?, why did you even need to make that point?’
If you felt like you needed to waste four seconds of your legacy calling someone a faggot then it probably means you are pretty insecure about your own sexuality, either you’re not getting laid enough or there are not enough women that like you or you might just want to suck a dick. I’m not really trying to diss anybody I’m just saying American’s in general who feel the need to act like that towards anybody, whether you’re shitting on gay people or shitting on women or shitting on different races, it all stems from ignorance and insecurity. When you’re not happy with yourself it’s a lot easier for you to show distain towards people that you don’t even need to show it towards. It’s like “What did you gain from that? Did you gain a fan? And if you did is that really the type of fan you want?”
No disrespect to anyone that does it, my real question would be what is the point? Is it your religion that makes you think that it is wrong? And if that’s the case do you really think that whatever religion you belong to, co-signs you actually going on a record being mean to other people? It all seems a bit hypocritical to me. Let it be known I’m gay friendly, I got no problems with gay people, women, Australians, black people, midgets, I fucking love everybody. I will rap for anybody, if anybody can grasp what I’m talking about, not that what I’m saying is deep, but if they can grasp it and relate to it and wanna hear it, I will give it to them.
Atmosphere and Brother Ali will be appearing at the following venues in April, I highly recommend you check them out:
Thu Apr 20th – Melbourne, Prince of Wales
Fri Apr 21st – Adelaide, Fowler’s Live
Sat Apr 22nd – Sydney, Gaelic Club
