How billy woods’ music reflects the grim realities of modern America
For a long time, billy woods was yet another name that I filed away in the back of my memory, to one day potentially investigate. However, after all the praise his album Hiding Places received immediately after its release in early 2019, I had to see what everyone was talking about. I was immediately confronted by a barrage of uncompromising instrumentals, raps that alternated between hard-hitting and incredibly subtle and cryptic, and a fascinating experience that kept drawing me back. There’s no way to truly understand every single thing that woods says on an album; his references shift from historical revolutionaries, to rappers he grew up on, to old and/or obscure sports figures, all in a matter of seconds. His writing style often doesn’t allow for complete comprehension. Even a line that he shouts multiple times throughout a song, loud and clear, such as “I don’t wanna go see Nas with an orchestra at Carnegie Hall,” (woods, “Spider Hole”) has so much meaning and so many layers to peel back. On the surface, maybe woods just isn’t interested in seeing legendary rapper Nas with an orchestra; maybe he prefers the real version of Nas’s celebrated album Illmatic, or a more standard live performance. But, in the context of the song, and woods’ music at large, it’s a commentary on class, place in society, and authenticity. He doesn’t feel comfortable seeing Nas, who got famous telling stories of poverty and violence in his Queensbridge housing projects, perform for a much wealthier and whiter audience. It’s not staying true to Nas’ roots, and billy woods decided this performance just wouldn’t be for him. Lines like these and all the potential interpretations are what makes billy woods’ music so appealing to return to, as the depth and meaning can only become clear after time.
billy woods’ career and life
billy woods is one of East Coast hip hop’s most pivotal modern figures — but his style is a far cry from what currently rules the charts and clubs. He works in abstract and underground hip-hop, storied subgenres with history that woods himself is a part of. Vordul Mega, of legendary New York duo Cannibal Ox, was the connection that got woods his first shots at rapping in an actual studio context (Okayplayer). However, woods’ career took a long time to get significantly off the ground. After founding backwoodz studioz in 2003 and releasing solo albums in 2003 and 2004, he bounced around a variety of group work before finally releasing his first widely acclaimed solo work, History Will Absolve Me, in 2012 (Backwoodz Studioz). Since then, he has consistently been putting out great, celebrated music, as a solo artist and with rapper Elucid as Armand Hammer.
woods primarily spends his time in New York City, but he was born in Washington D.C., a city that is also important to him. When he was 8 years old, he and his family moved to Zimbabwe, where his Marxist father had accepted a government position. He spent about 9 years in Zimbabwe, coming back to the United States after his father’s death (Biswas). References to Africa come up frequently in his music, showing the impact that experience had on him as an adolescent. Much about his personal life has stayed in the shadows, which lines up with his portrayal of himself on the internet, as woods always blurs out or obscures his face in photographs and videos. As someone who has spent significant time in Africa, Washington D.C., and New York City, and as as a rapper who has stayed solidly in the underground throughout his entire career, woods has real perspective on poverty and the struggles that people — others and himself — face, which have greatly informed his music.
Understanding billy woods’ perspective and place in the music industry
To get a better idea of the kind of career that woods has had in the music industry, let’s take a look at a standout song from his 2017 album Known Unknowns, Police Came to My Show (woods, “Police Came to My Show”). In this song, he raps about an experience at a show he performed at in Montana (The Village Voice), where some members of the local police decided to attend.
Police came to my show tonight
And I did it up
Police came to my show tonight
And I did it up
In the chorus of the song, woods repeats these two lines, showing the focus of the song: the police decided to attend his show, and that decision changed the outlook of how he performed. However, aside from the police, not many people decided to come see woods perform.
Empty venue and you gettin paid offa door sales
This line speaks to the struggle that many lesser-known musicians go through. Working incredibly hard on music for years, or even decades, and then not seeing the desired amount of support can be a crushing feeling. It also draws a connection to his money struggles, as he might have been relying on this show for his income, to survive. But, without many people attending, there obviously wouldn’t be much money to be made. His struggle to capture an audience here could have a real effect on his life and well-being.
Wanted to know if they got they money worth
But both slipped out after my last verse
Zero merch sales later I’m at the bar
Seltzer water omeprazole chaser
Original plan was pay the piper later
But as it turns out he bout his paper
Promoter insisted one for the road
“Thought folks would come out but you never know”
I replied, “So it goes”
At the start of this passage of lyrics, we see that the police didn’t end up stirring up much trouble, leaving before the end of the performance. However, it still would have been a more stressful performance for woods, seeing virtually no one in the audience except for a couple of cops, especially as a black man. As a continuation of his lack of success getting people to come to this show, woods was also unable to sell any of his albums or clothes, bluntly commenting, “Zero merch sales later”, again speaking to the struggle he goes through with his music and his financial situation. However, at the end of this passage, with woods replying, “So it goes” to the promoter, it seems he has reached a level of acceptance. It’s a depressing set of bars about the disappointments he faces as a musician, and the lack of outrage that he feels over it — how he is so clearly jaded — makes it even more depressing.
The true goal for any musician: supporting oneself through art
As we saw in Police Came to My Show, billy woods hasn’t had the easiest time getting a significant audience and financially supporting himself through music. On checkpoints (woods, “checkpoints”), one of his more energetic performances on his 2019 album Hiding Places, he goes further into this idea.
Win what? I’m just tryin’ to beat the spread
Quit my job to kick raps instead
So family meeting, everybody gotta start bringin’ in bread
The first line of this passage speaks to the low expectations that woods and many people like him had for their lives, since they were young. “Winning” might be defined as being happy, successful, satisfied, and financially secure, but for woods, all he wants to do is exceed expectations, even if he doesn’t “win”. “the spread” refers to the expected margin of victory in a sports game. In this analogy, billy woods might be a heavy underdog in the game of life — for example, let’s say he’s analogous to being roughly a 20 point underdog in a basketball game. If he only loses by 5 points, metaphorically in this game of life, he will have beaten the spread and accomplished his goal of exceeding expectations, even if he didn’t win. In the next line, he defines “beating the spread” as having music be his profession. Presumably, at this point, he works a normal job, to support himself financially, and also raps. However, because of his struggles to make enough money rapping, he tells his family that they need to start making more money so that he can rap for a living. It speaks to a dream that many musicians have but are never able to realize. They may be stuck at a job wishing they could be making music instead, but the reality is that they need that job for the money it brings in. woods hopes to break out of this, but the line is delivered very tongue-in-cheek, as it is likely unreasonable to take out a major source of income from his family and go on without issues, suggesting that this dream is not quite yet realistic for him.
Poetry and a poor kid’s dreams
Despite woods’ work not quite reaching the number of people he wished it did, he still writes and delivers some of the most thought-provoking and poetic rapping of anyone today. This is perhaps best exemplified in another song from Hiding Places, the enigmatic a day in a week in a year (woods, “a day in a week in a year”).
A army of fiends, she put chrysanthemums and daffodils in the burnt end of they crack stems
Tears stream down they cheeks, just really really weep
But in the end
They hit-They hit the pipe again
If I lose, it was rigged
I’m the man if I win
Before settlin’ on a narrative, I took ’em all for a spin
On black ice
Steering locked
Driftin’
Calm from the shock, oncomin’ brights hot
On the windshield it’s one particular raindrop
Caught strugglin’ in the incandescence
Took my hands off the wheel and cut the engine
Going from emotional descriptions of crack fiends processing and ultimately returning to the drug, to an extended metaphor on changing narrative based on results, using vivid imagery, this passage has always struck me as incredibly poetic. It becomes more impactful when listening to the song, but it’s rare for a song to have lyrics that are almost as fascinating to read through as they are to hear. These lines reflect on the themes of poverty and desperation, as well as dealing with the realities of his music career, and not always “winning”.
Stories of adolescence are particularly powerful coming from billy woods, with his intriguing childhood and ability to tell a story in the unique way that he does. This next passage of lyrics tells a story, or perhaps another metaphor, of him as a child, and is very relevant to the previously discussed theme of poverty.
Life is just two quarters in the machine
But, either you got it or don’t that’s the thing
I was still hittin’ the buttons, “Game Over” on the screen
Dollar movie theater, dingy foyer, little kid, not a penny to my name
Fuckin’ with the joystick, pretendin’ I was really playin’
Pretendin’ I was really playin’
Pretendin’ I was really playin’
woods starts this passage by introducing the idea that life is about money: the haves and the have-nots. He then transitions to a story that depicts him as one of the have-nots, tragically trying to become one of the haves, but the task is futile. woods’ repetition of “pretendin’ I was really playin’” gives the passage even more impact, painting a picture of a poor kid almost, but not yet, realizing the status he lives in that has limited him and likely will limit him every day of his life.
Death and violence as an adolescent American
When it comes to portraying young American kids, billy woods has depicted scenes far grimmer than anything that could be found in an arcade. His song Where the Wild Things Are, made as Armand Hammer with another rapper, Elucid, starts with a vocal sample of a woman talking about what we later learn is her son, who recently died in a violent fashion (Armand Hammer, “Where the Wild Things Are”).
I wouldn’t wish this on my worst enemy
This cannot… this cannot keep happening
This awful event that just transpired has this woman understandably breaking down and coming to tears. Elucid and woods work around this sample in this song by telling stories of similar youth violence.
Now they hand you gun and knife, said
Do The Thing Right
Banana in the tailpipe
Eyes squeezed tight squeezing off
In this passage, woods talks about an undefined “they”, likely drug leaders, war leaders, or the government, giving young people dangerous weapons. The young people, perhaps not knowing better, willingly use the weapons to the desires of the undefined “they”, although with stating that their eyes are squeezed tight, woods also suggests the young people may be somewhat scared or too guilty to see the destruction they are causing. Later in the same verse, he tells a brief story of being at unrest after a murder of a child, potentially the same son of the mother in the vocal sample.
I’m wired
Can’t sleep behind a fade someone caught last week
King of the Wild Things
Made it home for supper
You should see the other kid
He’s a dead motherfucker
At the start of this passage, woods states that he is wired, or tense and nervous, and unable to sleep, which makes sense considering a young person has just lost their life. He then connects it to the famous children’s book of the same name as the song, Where the Wild Things Are. In this book, a child, Max, gets angry at his mom and sails to a new land, with new and strange creatures. He becomes the king of these “wild things”, but then as he is unhappy with this life, preferring the love of his mother, he returns home for supper. In the story of this song, billy woods has made it home, but this is set up in juxtaposition to many young Americans who never make it home, like the son of the mother in the vocal sample. The “other kid” in this passage was stuck in the land of the wild things, likely the drug world, where violence rules, and even a king can quickly fall to his death.
Change — or a lack of it — and the passage of time
What makes billy woods’ music so incredible is how he uses these themes, such as poverty, and beautifully describes scenes that say something meaningful about those themes, without relinquishing any quality in the music. His song The Wake (woods, “The Wake”), from his album History Will Absolve Me, is the best example of this, and is also what I consider to be his best song.
I stand in this booth of the moment we call now
At the same time pedalling to school as a child
Under a canopy of jacarandas, it ain’t change much
Colorful trees still surround us, L’s get touched
Baby-faced, staring out the window of the school bus
Twenty years later, same wistful look but shackled up
Bearded down, momma kissed his forehead good luck
Tears anoint the crown
In this passage, woods draws multiple parallels between his life as a child and his life now, as an adult. He first recalls the lavender jacarandas that he would see while going to school on his bike. He then states that he is still surrounded by colorful trees, but the colorful trees now refer to marijuana. This shows the difference in his life as a child and as an adult, as he is now more concerned with doing drugs than looking up at beautiful flora, a serious reminder of how life has gotten more challenging as he has grown up. woods also recalls another memory of childhood, looking out of a school bus. He then says that he had the same wistful look twenty years later, but this time, instead of a school bus, he is riding a prison bus. Like the earlier example, it’s a tough reminder of how his life has changed — woods has come to an understanding that the world is not an easy one, and positive memories can get tainted by parallel but worse experiences. He expands on this theme of change over time with this passage later in the song.
Money comes and goes
Broke today, but tomorrow who knows?
Ten years ago she was just some ho
Five years after that, I’m in love
And if you ask me today, I could give a fuck
However, this time, the end result is not one of change. woods suggests that any day, his financial woes could come to an end, but in reality he knows this is wishful thinking. He then goes on to talk about a woman who was a significant part of his life, at least at one point. He went from feeling indifferent toward her, to being in love, to again having feelings of indifference. Although throughout that timespan of 10 years, she meant wildly different things to him, the final sentiment is the same as the original: she means very little to him. The Wake speaks on many things, but the ideas of change as we age, and how some things never really change are the most potent to me.
What we can truly gain from billy woods’ music is a better understanding of how people live their lives when faced with difficult situations and tough decisions. Poverty is ruthless, and near-impossible to escape. People will alter their entire lives to get out of poverty, perhaps turning to the drug world or working as hard as they can at a skill, like music, but as billy woods shows, it’s not easy, even with all the talent in the world. Violence and drugs often overtake entire lives, and shape them in ways that only entrench them further into poverty. It really is a vicious cycle, often ending with little to no change. billy woods’ music touches on all of these ideas, and so much more, in ways that do not compromise the music. It all comes with a slow-burning massive force of impact, as the meanings are slowly revealed until everything comes together. And it all sounds great.
Just when you think it won’t, it will
Just when you think you can’t, you’ll deal
Work Cited
Websites:
“Billy Woods Is The Underground Rapper Chekhov Would Listen To.” The Village Voice, 31 May 2017, www.villagevoice.com/2017/05/31/billy-woods-is-the-underground-rapper-checkov-would-listen-to/.
“Billy Woods.” Backwoodz Studioz, backwoodzstudioz.com/profile/billy-woods/.
Biswas, Joel. “Hope in a Hopeless Situation: An Interview With Billy Woods.” Passion of the Weiss, 17 Nov. 2018, www.passionweiss.com/2018/11/15/billy-woods-interview-2018/.
Chesman, Donna-Claire. “Billy Woods Is Writing Through the Apocalypse: Interview.” DJBooth, 1 Oct. 2019, djbooth.net/features/2019–10–01-billy-woods-terror-management-interview.
“A Conversation with Billy Woods.” BOSTON HASSLE, 3 July 2019, bostonhassle.com/a-conversation-with-billy-woods/.
Diamond, Samuel. “Interview: Billy Woods.” Tiny Mix Tapes, 24 Apr. 2015, m.tinymixtapes.com/features/billy-woods.
Faraone, Chris, et al. “BILLY WOODS: ONE OF NY’S MOST CREATIVE HIP-HOP ARTISTS BREAKS DOWN HIS PROCESS AND INSPIRATION.” DigBoston, 2 July 2019, digboston.com/billy-woods-one-of-nys-most-creative-hip-hop-artists-breaks-down-his-process-and-inspiration/.
Fullerton, Jason. “Billy Woods Interview.” Southsiders, 6 Jan. 2020, hiphopblog.co.uk/2019/05/23/billy-woods-interview/.
ItsBigVanilla. “Album of the Year #3: Billy Woods & Kenny Segal — Hiding Places.” Reddit, Jan. 2020, www.reddit.com/r/hiphopheads/comments/ejhbp0/album_of_the_year_3_billy_woods_kenny_segal.
Jagoda, Caleb. “Our Generation’s Great American Writer: Billy Woods.” The New Hampshire, 11 Oct. 2019, tnhdigital.com/2019/10/11/billy-woods-our-generations-great-american-writer/.
Okayplayer. “‘The Music Industry Was Detonating Underneath Us…” Billy Woods Reminisces About the Post-’Funcrusher Plus’ Years of Indie-Rap [Interview].” 13 July 2019, www.okayplayer.com/music/billy-woods-interview-hiding-places-underground-rap.html.
“Song Lyrics & Knowledge.” Genius, genius.com/.
Thompson, Paul. “Billy Woods and the Virtue of Hiding.” The FADER, The FADER, 9 Apr. 2019, www.thefader.com/2019/04/09/billy-woods-hiding-places-review.
Songs:
Armand Hammer, Willie Green. “Where the Wild Things Are”. Race Music, backwoodz studioz, 2013.
billy woods, Blockhead. “Keloid”. Known Unknowns, backwoodz studioz, 2017.
billy woods, Blockhead. “Police Came to My Show”. Known Unknowns, backwoodz studioz, 2017.
billy woods & kenny segal. “a day in a week in a year”. Hiding Places, backwoodz studioz, 2019.
billy woods & kenny segal. “checkpoints”. Hiding Places, backwoodz studioz, 2019.
billy woods & kenny segal. “spider hole”. Hiding Places, backwoodz studioz, 2019.
billy woods, Willie Green. “The Wake”. History Will Absolve Me, backwoodz studioz, 2012.
