Do We Help Or Hurt Kanye?
Packs Shipment #003
Newsflash: Kanye is a super celebrity.
I bet you knew that, though, which means you most likely know of his most recent manic episode; which included crying uncontrollably during his presidential campaign rally as he admitted he almost aborted his firstborn, North, and was nearly aborted himself; tweeting his kids will never do Playboy as a dig to his wife, Kim Kardashian; and saying Kim and her mother Kris tried to “lock him up with doctors”; amongst other things. You didn’t need to be a therapist to know Kanye, who admitted he was diagnosed with bipolar disorder, was having a manic episode. The whole thing was hard to watch unfold on Twitter’s trending hashtags. It was even harder to realize how much we all play a part in enabling it to happen.
Kanye’s tag as a “super celebrity” means that the most likely way his manic episodes would happen would be super publicly. He isn’t the first iteration of super celebrity, though, which doesn’t even make him unique in a sense. Unlike the average American who lives with mental illnesses, Kanye, and many stars like him, have their shortcomings broadcasted on stream and trending on Twitter.
In 2007, Britney Spears’ manic episode was one of the most famous moments in pop culture history. Paparazzi cameras incessantly flashed as she shaved her head due to a breakdown from depression and drug use. Her actions were plastered across every major gossip magazine you can think of, the hair she abandoned on the salon floor was listed on eBay within minutes and bidding for thousands of dollars. Her face was shown across television programs for the world's entertainment.
Moments like Britney’s, Whitney Houston’s, Mariah Carey’s, and Kanye’s are moments that we live for. We’ve made celebrity mental health breakdowns seem like a Quentin Tarantino movie--they’re so messy and ugly and cool and disgusting that we can’t turn away. Now, we’ve gotten to a point where we fish for it.
When photos surfaced of Justin Bieber crying in 2018, imaginative rumors spread so quickly that he had to make a statement about it. Who else but celebrities have to make public statements about being emotionally vulnerable in public? Social media has started to become more open and honest about mental health, thanks to its celebrities. But the ability for a celebrity to be open and honest about their emotions without a prepared media plan surrounding it doesn’t exist, at least not in realistic ways.
Kanye’s recent manic episode is a look at what living with a mental illness can look like. Every erratic moment won’t have the grace and strategy of a celebrity machine with agents behind it. Sometimes it will be messy, ugly, and upsetting; that doesn't make it wrong. While the public has become more open to mental health issues in our stars, we still can’t let these people—who happen to be famous—have their normal ups and downs of living with a mental illness without judgment.
Now, this isn’t an excuse for Kanye and his erratic behavior. We can all agree he needs help, and he seems uninterested in seeking that help. The longer he puts off trying his hardest to help himself, the worse this gets. But we can’t ignore the fact that maybe, just maybe, the combination of his celebrity mixed with general public reaction and today’s current climate gives Kanye the idea that he might not need help.
Kanye is surrounded by ventures and people that are more likely to inspire more irrational manic episodes than not. His focus in today’s politics — which has become a conspiracy-laden biosphere led by a lying president and volatile political commentary — feeds into a paranoid mentality that can make him think “Get Out” was made about him. There shouldn’t be a scenario where Kanye can get on a stage and ramble for an hour, whether it's for a presidential campaign he shouldn’t be partaking in or for a promo for a new Gap collection drop. And he doesn’t need fucking stans who support his behavior and comment he’s “not lying, though” when he goes off the rails about his wife and Harriet Tubman.
Kanye’s team, who help set up a political campaign, enabled him. Reporters and politicians enabled him. Stans, who blindly follow him because they like his beats and clothes, enable him.
As a celebrity dealing with one of the most public mental breakdowns this generation has ever seen, he has no safe space to deal with every aspect of his illness. To expect him to go into a cave and come out healed is unrealistic. The public needs to give Kanye, and every other celebrity, the privilege of privacy, comfort, wiggle room to regress, and support when they regress. Until we can do that, we all have to assume some level of responsibility when we suffocate our most troubled stars with jokes, expectations, and an enabling environment.
Heat Packs
Koncept Jackson
I’m packing two mentions into one here.
First, I want to talk about Koncept Jack$son, another budding lyricist from the blossoming scene in Richmond, Virginia. Koncept has it, blessed with all the qualities that make raw, boom-bap great: great lyricism, versatility, and a distinct voice. His fast-paced rhyming style forces the slower beats on “Siakam-Tint Tesla” and “Moon” to catch up, but he can hang back just enough to let them work in unison. On “300”’s futuristic and experimental beat, Koncept maintains his traditional flow and still manages to allow the beat work as it's supposed to.
Finally, I want to show some appreciation for the OffTop series by Top Shelf Premium. "Genius" and "Colors" get the most views for their performance-style videos, but OffTop showcases some unheralded spitters and producers behind throwback gear. The series’ style is inspired by that same type of era, with VCR style transitions and filters, giving the viewer a raw, classic style to match its performers. Some of my favorites are Koncept’s, Mutant Academy’s, and Jay Royale’s.
Unbox Koncept Jack$on: 300; Siakam-Tint Tesla; Mulan
J A R J A R J R
I listen to a lot of Lo-fi, which means I listen to a lot of flips. For those who don’t know, a flip is when a producer takes a cappella from a famous song and puts it behind a different beat. The beat change, and any changes they may do with the a cappella, like slow it down or change its pitch, can bring new life to a familiar song.
JarJarJr seems to have found a specialty in Kanye flips. His flip on “Workout Plan” is the best flip I’ve heard all year. He brings Kanye’s Workout Plan to a yoga class, slowing down the original's fast-paced beat to a smooth stretch. Jarjarjr manages to make Kanye’s “Diamonds From Sierra Leone” kind of happy with “Vegas On Acid.” And I’m not going to describe what he does to Frank Ocean’s “Chanel” on “Tattoos in Shibuya.” Just click the links below and witness yourself. Oh, and listen to more flips.
Unbox JarJarJr: Workout Plan; Vegas On Acid; Tattoos in Shibuya
SINISTER
Last week I touted Big Burn-Na, a 1994 G-Funk rapper stashed away in Tulsa, Oklahoma. This week is Sinister, another G-Funk rapper, but from Watts, California. Representing the Green Meadows Blood gang and catching the attention of Suge Knight, Sinister earned a deal with Interscope Records. His first album, “Mobbin 4 Life,” dropped in 1994 and was a collection of somber tales from a street gangster in one of LA’s most dangerous neighborhoods.
“I Won’t Forget You G” is an eery, yet funky, introspective about losing friends and family to street violence. On “Young G” and “The East Side,” Sinister spits silky gangsta raps you’d expect from a mid-90s rapper from Watts. Sinister had undeniable talent, but “Mobbin 4 Life” didn’t sell well at the time of its release, and Sinister was dropped from Interscope Records soon after.
On Nov. 25, 2007, Sinister was shot and killed at the age of 37. In the years leading up to his death, friends and family members say Sinister, real name Timothy Johnson, was going towards a more responsible life after becoming a father of two children.
R.I.P Timothy “Sinister” Johnson
Unbox Sinister: Life of a Sinner; Young G; The East Side
Read Receipts
Juliana Collins—Why Now?: The Collective White Awakening
Conor Hebert—“The Breaks” at 40: Kurtis Blow, Crazy Legs & the Breaks That Bind
Why Blue Lives Matter
Shoutout Saxsquatch
Marc Rebillet has championed the new-age one-person band. In as little as a bathrobe and underwear, his porn mustache, midi keyboard, and dad voice pieces together funky, electronic musical puzzles right before your eyes. It’s actually fire. He’s currently on tour (a drive-thru tour) and did a performance with Erykah-fucking Badu that was equally fire. The whole thing is entertaining for the same reason the “let me suck yo titties baby” song is a classic.
Well, here’s the next edition of this growing phenomenon. Here's Saxsquatch, a saxophone-playing mythical beast that is single paw-ingly cooking heat in the middle of the woods.
Right now, Saxsquatch mainly performs sax covers of famous songs, which is cool, but I’d like to see it (I don’t know the preferred pronouns for such a thing) create some original stuff too. Saxsquatch doesn’t sing, which I’m sure holds back its abilities a bit, but still, he’s Sasquatch. Just do that shit. My personal favorite is obviously this cover of D’Angelo’s “Brown Sugar” because he has a fucking sax, and that just makes all the sense in the world. Oh, and this 15-minute stream it did helped me write parts of this newsletter.
I’m fucking with the concept because I’m a sucker for masked musicians. I thought the coolest thing about the Koreatown Oddity was his wolf mask. MF Doom is one of my favorite rappers not only because his raps are genius, but because of his fucking mask. And now I have Saxsquatch.
So shoutout Saxsquatch.
Welp, hope y’all enjoyed this edition of Packs. We back next Friday with a delivery.
Between Packs, follow me on all the socials: @Tribecalledni on damn-near everything.
Until next time, be cool.