As readers of Shaquille O'Neal's twitter could tell you, the right medium really allows a person's personality to shine through; for whatever reason, 140-character-capped courtside iPhone interjections seemed to convincingly balance Shaq's life philosophy and knowing humor better than his rap records ever could. Play to your strengths, focus on what really matters, and you can make your message connect-- whatever the medium. DaVinci's debut record, The Day the Turf Stood Still, has been building an unusual amount of buzz for a Bay Area street rapper, particularly for a record that sounds like a conservative New York rap release. It's full of classicist NYC breakbeat loops and dense raps from an artist with a dry, static demeanor. It contains almost no aesthetic daring. But rap heads are buzzing about it for a reason, and that has a lot to do with not only DaVinci's skills as a rapper but his overarching sense of purposefulness-- he knows how to make you care.
DaVinci grew up in San Francisco's Fillmore district, in the shadow of his Bay Area heroes like San Quinn and Messy Marv. He also arrived at a time when Bay Area rap has been flourishing, thanks to dynamic personalities (The Jacka, Husalah) and a shift in production styles from the classic West Coast Mob Music to the more omnivorous, populist approach of producers like DJ Fresh and the Mecanix. The Bay had begun to reinvent itself by reinventing New York, just as the latter city's national hip-hop profile had dimmed. DaVinci's record does feel like a part of this mutated New York movement, but in a distinct way. Turf is a firmly underground record, with none of the expansive choruses or crisply engineered synthesizer samples that characterize new Bay hip-hop. Additionally, DaVinci's lyrics push towards traditional concrete narratives, a retreat from contemporary Bay rap's more persona-driven styles.
On first listen, to a rap fan unfamiliar with the Bay Area sound, DaVinci's record might sound like yet another rehash, another NY rapper who still can't get over the day Swizz discovered his Casio. But The Day the Turf Stood Still feels like an attempt to do something unique within the Bay's insular world, all while retaining the new Bay's characteristic cannibalizing of different moments in rap history. While his aesthetic isn't ambitious, his wider goals as an artist, his views on the world outside the music, seem like the kind of thing that fans of rap from all corners might find appealing. The Day the Turf Stood Still is strongly rooted in a sense of place-- specifically, his family's Fillmore origins. "What You Finna Do"s ambling noir is the most explicitly political, a gangster's ennui in the face of gentrification's corruption of San Francisco's Harlem. But the most fascinating track is "Idle Mind", which succeeds despite its embrace of one of underground hip-hop's most regrettable clichés-- the twist-ending story. Despite that, it remains emotionally rending, a testament to DaVinci's ability to get a lot of mileage out of a limited template.
Hang out with some older jazz musicians and you'll hear them describe younger players-- often highly fluent, well-rehearsed ones-- with one dismissive phrase: "he ain't sayin nothin." There are some acclaimed rappers today who fall easily into a similar category, relying heavily on street pedigree, class, or cultural signifying, or an overemphasis on tongue-twisting technical expertise. Charisma and creativity, musicality and personality, and particularly the idea of having something worth saying-- all more abstract criteria, admittedly-- can easily be shortchanged by those looking for the next hyphy to change the world. DaVinci's biggest strength is that while he embraces the aesthetic conservatism of 90s New York, a measured, uninterrupted monotone with a clearly-articulated cadence, he doesn't let that be the end itself; it's just a medium to convey a higher cause, to establish a rapper whose personality builds gradually from the content of his lyrics. This approach to music works so well, not in spite of his musical choices, but also not because of them; it works because his personality, as little outward swag as it demonstrates, feels true.
