Yesterday, I had the pleasure of joining some of west coast hip hop’s legendary emcee’s in the village of Leimert Park in South Central Los Angeles. Myka 9, Chali2na, Pigeon John, Ava DuVernay and Ellay Khule gathered to take some photos for URB’s feature on This is the Life; a film that documents the cultural mecca we know of as, The Good Life Cafe. To sit back and watch these incredibly talented, influental emcees interact and exchange stories years after writting on the first pages of west coasts rhymebook was simply amazing. After taking some photos at the park we continued on to Earlez Hot Dogs on Crenshaw and Exposition; literally kitty-corner to the famous Good Life Cafe, where I interviewed the director of the film, Ava DuVernay.
When an artist drops two very strong projects within the span of a few months and one of them isn’t a mixtape, it is a sign that the artist is in his/her creative zone. For Freestyle Fellowship cofounder and freestyle assassin Myka 9, this zone isn’t new found but rather is a result of 40 years of maturation. 1969 isn’t merely a reference to an end of an era of free love, rock, and war, it is the birth, literally, of a hip-hop pioneer and fittingly the title of his most recent project. Following up his concept project with JtheSarge, The Magic Heart Genies, Myka 9 returns only a couple of months later with 1969, an album grounded in nostalgia for a past era that demonstrates an MC who is able to continue …
The forgotten pioneer of alternative L.A. hip hop is back with another heavily concept-driven effort. The album is dedicated to the year of Myka's birth, and it chronicles some of the many period influences that formed his eclectic style as an MC. As always, Myka steers toward jazz, funk, and soul oriented production, although in this case he leans more heavily toward the latter two for obvious reasons. He even throws a bit of disco flavor into the retro sound stew with 'To the Sky,' where one of the ...
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