It’s Ain’t Where Your At, It’s Where Your From…

Now I’m a stop to see what you got
Get off the mic before I get too hot
I want to see which posse can dance the best
It should be easy cause the beat is fresh
Now if you’re from Uptown, Brooklyn-bound
The Bronx, Queens, and Long Island Sound
Even other states come right and exact
It ain’t where you’re from, it’s where you’re at
Since you came here, you have to show and prove
And do that dance until it don’t move
Cause all you need is soul self-esteem will release
The rest is up to you, Rakim’ll say peace

— Rakim ‘I Know You Got Soul’

A person’s formative high-school years is a transitional time where many aspects of one’s life are shaped going forward. Among those aspects is a person’s taste in music, which I truly believe will be shaped for the rest of their lives depending on what genre(s) they gravitate towards. Mine was hip-hop. Then hip-hop and R&B. Then hip-hop, R&B, and jazz. Now it’s basically the African-American music canon in general. But hip-hop was my first love. And among those early suitors seducing my eardrums was Chicago-bred emcee Common Sense — now known as Common (aka the bald dude with the beard in those GAP commercials). The year was 2002. I was about to be a senior. And the artist formerly known as Common Sense released the soon-to-be universally loathed Electric Circus. Remember that album? Of course you don’t. Nobody does. Except me. And Erykah Badu. I mean, I understand why. Kanye West was still trying to tell anyone that would listen that he could rap in 2002 — let alone become the global music icon and GOOD Music creator who signs fellow Chi-towner Common and giving him the career resurregence he desperately needed at the time (to, you know, do GAP commercials). But indeed, I remember Electric Circus like it was yesterday. And actually, yesterday is when I first heard it again after probably a decade. ‘Aquarius’ came on my Macbook’s iTunes and as the Jimi Hendrix-esque guitar strings started wailing, I was immedietely taken back to Highway 4 on an early Tuesday morning, driving over the Martinez hills & through the valleys on my way to class. The sun is rising on the horizon. No — I havn’t discovered the miracle of coffee yet. All I needed back then to wake-up was a couple solid rap albums and a really loud stereo system. I didn’t really have the system, as my parent’s Volvo’s blow-out speakers obviously prove. But it didn’t matter — everything was so fresh, so new. I had never heard Common before, so I didn’t have any other material to sonically compare it to. At the time, the lead single ‘Come Close’ ft. Mary J. Blige was on the radio, featuring production from The Neptunes. The Neptunes were an early favorite of mine — ironically I owe the state of Virigina probably more credit than I give them (in terms of those early productions that earwormed their way to my heart — Timbaland, Pharrell & Chad Hugo, I’m eternally grateful to you guys!). I had heard the single on KMEL; which I was discovering as well via Chuy Gomez & DJ Mind Motion in the Mornings (R.I.P…); and was really diggng what I heard. I bought the album the next day, popped it into my parent’s Volvo CD stereo, and didn’t take it out for a month. Then I went and copped One Day It’ll All Make Sense and Like Water For Chocolate; and the rest is history. But it all started with Electric Circus. Because it’s not where your at, it’s where your from.