Welcome to Atlanta: Southern Sojourn Day 1

Last night I roamed the streets of Atlanta with some kids who rap while receiving G Chats about Killer Mike wrecking the Nuemos stage back home. Let me rewind.

Shouts out to Big Rob of this MO organization, he and his new bride should be resting comfortably in Belize right now as any freshly married couple should. After that party I caught no rest but I did roll to the airport, hopped on a flight and after four hours of middle seat in the row awkwardness I stepped off the plane and had arrived. Hello Hotlanta.

My Southern interests go back far, but this current fascination probably has something to do with my 2011 trek to SXSW, G-Side, Dungeon Family and a longstanding disgust with anything that wasn’t music related coming from below the Mason-Dixie. A disgust with no cause isn’t helpful though and after getting a hint of southern life from Texas I had to change my thoughts.

Having long been a fan of a certain element of southern music I was one of many who rolled their eyes and waved the flag of eternal damnation in hiphop purgatory for the likes of Lil Jon and the rest of the over the top ignorance of early aughts southern rap.

Well, time has changed much.

I’ve found a place in my heart for nonsensical ignorance, but the South has also elevated its game. Sure you can still paint me a picture of absurd rappers coming out of this region but the new class is walking lines introduced by a varied array of artists.

And so here I am, exploring the South. I’m spending one more day in the A to pick the minds of the Two-9 collective as a whole, and will be shortly cruising into the Southside to chop with Scotty at a photoshoot. From there it’s time to hit I20 and cruise into Birmingham for a day and some education from K.L.U.B. Monsta. New Orleans will by my final stop before escaping this heat wave and coming back to the comfort of our chilly grey city.

The music won’t be the same though.

This entry was posted on Monday, July 2nd, 2012 at 8:06 am. It is filed under Blog and tagged with Atlanta, Dungeon Family, Graffiti, Killer Mike, Southern Sojourn, Two-9. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.