Last year, Huntsville, Ala., hip-hop duo G-Side took message board buzz and rap blog kudos for 2008's Starshipz and Rocketz and turned it into a mini-movement with the ambitious, worldly, blog-obsessed Huntsville International. The biggest musical export from Huntsville last year, however, was Antoine Dodson and the Gregory Brothers' "The Bed Intruder Song", an embarrassing local news clip turned Internet meme that inexplicably hit the Billboard Hot 100.
On The ONE... COHESIVE, G-Side rapper ST 2 Lettaz, the braying, bold contrast to partner Yung Clova's raspy skepticism, makes two purposefully crude references to Antoine Dodson. "Never" features a dismissive aside ("tampons for you Antoines") and on "Came Up", he warns rappers, "like the Lincoln Park rapist, I'm comin' through your window." ST's ire stems from Dodson's complicity in presenting Huntsville as another backwoods hood (G-Side calls it "a mini Memphis" for good reason). But Dodson's use of the web to make a better life for himself and his family is probably something G-Side can get behind.
These guys rap excitedly about blog love with the same joy they do when they talk about, say, not working at the gas station anymore, or the "couple thou" they get for shows these days. This isn't because they're self-satisfied knuckleheads who don't see the bigger picture, but because, as far as they're concerned, right now their doggedly D.I.Y. come-up is all that matters. Tellingly, a highlight from COHESIVE is titled "Inner Circle".
And then there are the beats. On Starshipz & Rocketz and Huntsville International, the production from in-house beatmakers the Block Beattaz mixed Southern thump and rave-rap experimentalism. Those records sounded like a logical but bold extension of the Dungeon Family aesthetic of the late 1990s. For COHESIVE, the Block Beattaz and likeminded producers A-Team, Str8 Drop, Clams Casino, the Basmo Family, and DJ Burn One create expansive, next-level compositions as audacious as G-Side's raps are modest. It's a strange combination-- big, lush beats and stories about small victories-- but it turns songs that are celebratory of simple things (a girl sending sexy cell-phone pictures, visiting Paris for the first time) or full of thoughtful sentiments (supporting family, helping community) into something epic.
Each grandiose beat is stuffed full of pained, joyful catharsis like the music scoring one of those big "Aha!" moments in a heady sci-fi flick. Seriously, some creative kids with extra time on their hands should set homemade montages to this album and stick them up on YouTube: the Coldplay pianos and spacey drum'n'bass of "Y U Mad" to Darren Aronofsky's The Fountain, maybe, or "Inner Circle"'s stormy bursts of synths and strings to Inception. And there's a steady build-up to these beautiful beats, with every song playing a crucial part in soundtracking ST and Clova's scrappy triumphs: "Nat Geo" propels the album forward, ever so slightly, and "Never" shoots the album into hyperspace, redirecting its energies for a thoughtful finale.
Despite precious references to the Internet and more than enough mini-myth-making, G-Side remain painfully aware of the blog hype echo chamber. On "Y U Mad", ST asks, "if everyone's a star, then who gonna be the audience?" and Clova grounds the track with an affecting end-run around competition: "Niggas jealous? I'm just trying to feed my fam." "MoneyInTheSkyII", a sequel to a song G-Side released for free last spring (and put together while on tour in Norway), finds the group questioning whether they should continue the independent route, get a regular job, or just return to hustling. Even on their most accomplished, comfortable album, G-Side don't forget this rap shit is complicated.
