April, 2021
Archive

By In rap

Pick of the Litter: “Damien”

My formative years of listening to hip-hop came in high school, when I’d have to catch the city bus at 5:30 in the morning to go to school in Honolulu. It took about an hour to sweep through my town and pick up other riders then go over the mountains to get to my school. The perfect amount of time to listen to an album.

It was on one of those bus rides that I first listened to It’s Dark And Hell Is Hot — a Hemingway-esque title that spoke to a bookish, angsty pastor’s kid invigorated by the chill of the early morning air and the rebellious potential of adolescent independence.

The only song I’d heard before then was “Ruff Ryders’ Anthem,” because how could you not. It was everywhere when it came out. Even if you didn’t listen to the radio or watch MTV or whatever, it would still find you in traffic, thumping out of someone else’s car speakers directly into your bloodstream.

As one track after the next passed through my ears in the pre-sunrise delirium, the song that stuck with me most — both that morning and ever since — was “Damien,” where D(MX) the struggling artist is promised unimaginable success by D(amien) the devil in exchange for “blood out, blood in” allegiance…

Read more at Passion of the Weiss

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By In Hawaii

The Social Failures Behind the Death of Iremamber Sykap

Here’s what we know about the shooting of 16-year-old Iremamber Sykap.

On April 5, Sykap was driving a stolen car along with five others between the ages of 14 and 22. Following a police chase, officers shot at the car, and it crashed into a drainage ditch near McCully. Sykap was taken in critical condition to the hospital, where he died.

According to Honolulu Police Chief Susan Ballard, the car was connected to several crimes leading up to the fatal shooting, including an armed robbery in Moiliili just 20 minutes prior, though no guns were found at the scene of the crash.

We don’t know much about Sykap the person just yet, but we know he was born in Guam and was the youngest of eight children. We know from his sister that “he would make you laugh at your lowest.” We know from his teacher that he was friendly and playful, and that he loved his family deeply. And we know from the gatherings at the place of his death that he was loved, too.

We also know he had a history of criminal behavior that resulted in multiple arrests.

It can be hard to square these two accounts of Sykap, especially since we tend to think of criminal behavior as a function of personality: people who do bad things are bad people, like cartoon villains. In reality, criminality is often directly tied to whether or not one’s basic needs are met…

Read more at Civil Beat

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