PHOTO BY: fstop45, all rights reserved

As a part of my series on legendary hip-hop writers/journalists, I present a conversation with my bro Bonz Malone. It is still hard to believe that we have been friends for over twenty years. Going way back to the early days when hip-hop culture was moving from a New York City novelty to a worldwide industry, me and Bonz met at a Profile Records party for long-forgotten rapper L.A. Star. At that time there were only a few Black writers documenting this musical terrain (including Nelson George, Greg Tate and Harry Allen), but Bonz was by far the boldest in terms of style.

Though I had read his poetic street rants (at the time, Malone wrote everything in his own special brand of ghetto phonetics) of this Brooklyn based wild-boy in the pages of Spin and the Village Voice, I had no idea he was such a passionate soul. Like a combination of Cameron Crowe (his youthfulness) and Lester Bangs (unafraid of the edge), the man-child who had once tagged trains and worked for a crack cocaine crew had kicked in the door of music criticism and refused to leave.

While in real life, writers like myself romanticized the dark side of street life, Bonz not only lived it but he put it into his work. Of course, that gritty bravado sometimes made him a little scary to be around, but we were all a little richer for the experience.

Everybody that was around in those early days has a Bonz Malone story; in the rap-set world that we travel in, more than a few have even morphed into urban legends that rival only alligators in the sewer. There was Bonz throwing M-80s after a Third Bass concert at the Beacon, there was Bonz handing in stories handwritten on loose-leaf, there was Bonz bombing the system one day and partying with Russell Simmons the next.

A ghettocentric renaissance man who’d written wonderful articles, guest-starred in acclaimed films (Slam) and signed Mobb Deep to their first deal, Bonz Malone had put a certified stamp on truthfulness on every endeavor. In Malone’s life and work, the main thing one could count on was the brilliance of his unpredictability to reveal the essence of his subject.

***
MG: First, where did the name Bonz come from?
Bonz: Well, there were two meanings. The first being that ‘bonz’ represented the skeletons in the closet. You know, those things we had done in the past. I would tell people, if you open my coffin a hundred years from now, that’s what you will see, bones. That’s the realest shit. So, when I started writing graffiti, that was the name I chose.

MG: What was the other meaning?
Bonz: (laughs) It also stood for Black Fonz, because I always saw myself as the Fonzie nigga. Henry Winkler was a dope dude. How many Jewish actors you know can play an Italian better than real Italians?

MG: What was your hip-hop experience that made you want to be down?
Bonz: Man, it was the night that Wild Style opened in Times Square in 1983. I was 12 years old, and I had to wait for my grandmother to go to sleep so I could sneak out. I put my life on the line, but it was worth it. The theater was so crowded, I had to sit on the stairs. And, the whole movie was in the audience. I saw Grandmaster Caz, Rock Steady, Grandmaster DST and Lee.

MG: I know you wrote graff for years. What was that like?
Bonz: That’s the first element of hip-hop. Man, bombing trains was what I loved to do, that’s who I am. Even today, I have to fight myself not to write on the train. I never did any of those huge masterpieces outside the train, but I tagged in the train. Once we moved to Brooklyn, I was doing the 2’s and 5’s. Those trains went through the South Bronx, so people knew my name.

MG: You went from writing on walls to typing on paper. Talk about that transition?
Bonz: I started writing for the high school newspaper and Bill Adler, who was then the publicist at Def Jam, saw my clips and hooked me up with Spin magazine. The first professional piece I wrote was a review was a review of De La Soul’s 3 Feet High and Rising.

One of the things that made me want to write for print was reading Jimmy Breslin in The Daily News, because I didn’t like the way he wrote about the Black community in New York City. Breslin stirred a lot of racial shit in his columns, and it was obvious he knew nothing about Black people. Through my writings, I wanted people to know who we were and the beauty that hip-hop represented.

MG: Were you paying attention to other hip-hop writers of that period?
Bonz: I was aware of the others like you and Harry Allen, but I wasn’t really paying attention. I was working with John Leland and Joe Levy, and both of those guys taught me a lot. I considered my work to be graffiti writing in print. They later gave me a column (Radio Graffiti), but it was real sporadic because I kept getting locked-up. Every magazine I’ve written for—Spin, The Source, Vibe-have all bailed me out of jail at one time or another.

MG: What is your favorite album from that golden period?
Bonz: To me, the number one hip-hop album is Public Enemy’s It Takes a Nation of Millions to Hold Us Back (Def Jam, 1988). When that fucking record dropped, I thought the end of the world was coming. I’ve worn gray and black everyday. The first time I heard that record, I almost cried. Nothing made today could go up against that one disc. Nothing.

MG: Didn’t you and Chuck D. get into a little thing back then.
Bonz: Yeah, because he dissed me for no reason. He called me a “house nigger,” because I wrote for a white magazine. Hell, there weren’t any real hip-hop magazines out then, but he was mad because I was writing about rap in a rock magazine. We talked about it later, and now we have nothing but respect for one another.

MG: At one time rappers talked the world, now they just talk about themselves.
Bonz: You’re so right.

MG: After your Spin days, you went over to The Source. People might not realize it now, but that was once a great magazine.
Bonz: Originally The Source was a college fanzine, but when they decided to move to New York and become a glossy, they contacted me over at Spin. I wrote a Queen Latifah cover story, I wrote a Tribe Called Quest cover story and I wrote the first Biggie story. We didn’t make much money, but we sure got a lot of free t-shirts.

MG: Talk a little about your time as rap A&R at Island Records under Chris Blackwell.
Bonz: That was in the early ‘90s. I almost signed Biggie. We lived two blocks away from each other. I had heard his demo around the same time Puff was trying to sign him. Biggie told me if I won a craps game, he would sign with Island instead. We shot dice on the roof of Island Records for three hours, but I lost.

MG: But, you did sign Mobb Deep.
Bonz: My man Matty C. ran the “Unsigned Hype” column at The Source. He played their tape for me, and in the first eight seconds, I wanted them. Nobody was making that kind of music except NWA. Nas hadn’t even come out yet. To me, Mobb Deep was the NWA of the East Coast.

MG: I know you worked for and partied with Russell Simmons years ago. Any insights?
Bonz: I liked Russell better when he was broke. He was cool and hungry, and not so self-absorbed. Russell has done many things for many people, but I’ve seen him become an asshole.

MG: What are some of the stories you’ve written that stand out?
Bonz: I covered the 1987 Grammy Awards for Spin; when Millie Villnilli won for Best New Artist, I almost got thrown out for screaming, ‘Ya’ll can’t even sing!’ as they were walking-up to the podium. Later, when I was writing the story, I said Dick Clark’s teeth were made of wood. As far as the rap side, I guess it was going to the studio to interview De La Soul, because they gave me a copy of 3 Feet… before it came out. At that time, something like that meant a lot.

MG: I know you kick-started your acting career with a part in Slam (1998).
Bonz: Yeah, I had been friends with Marc Levine for a long time. Originally, I was supposed to star in that movie, but, once again, I was in jail. I had introduced Marc to Saul Williams, so he got the lead instead. I wasn’t, mad, because I still got another part in the movie. That film changed our lives.

MG: What do you think about hip-hop culture today?
Bonz: Rap music is a joke these days. It’s not hip-hop culture, its rap life. Rap life is more concerned with what it can get for itself, not what it can contribute. These niggas just want to make money, but they have very little to offer. I come from an era when rappers didn’t even curse, now you got all these cats cussing instead of rhyming.

SS: What about hip-hop writing?
Bonz: I have respect for everybody, but it was always my thing to be the best writer there was. I feel like I blasted the door open for a lot of people. A lot of writers today barely know there history, while other so-called ghetto lit writers like Relentless Aaron are just using writing as a hustle.

To paraphrase (graffiti artist) Iz the Wiz, a writer is somebody you want to write with or fight with; those words are burned into my heart.

This past Monday night I attended a HOT-97 promotional event for Common at a midtown spot called Providence; formerly Le Bar Bat (for you old schoolers), this was one of those jams where it’s mostly excited fans who actually dance, clap and don’t talk through the entire set. While one might think that an artist of Common’s stature would be in some roped-off area staring down at the little people, nothing could have been further from the truth.

In fact, when I got there, the Windy City brother was busy taking pictures with audience members and signing autographs. Afterwards, he grapped a mic and did a short set of songs from his latest disc Universal Mind Control. Of course, that had the crowd waving their arms like hip-hop wasn’t REALLY dead, and they just wanted to have fun like it was the eighties again. Considering that the album is mostly a collection of party songs with an electro feel, perhaps I was in a time machine.

Yet, as I watched those fresh faced kids (most who weren’t born when Afrika Bambaataa was still looking for the perfect beat) flexing to the songs like the frantic 808 charged title track and others, I couldn’t help but think about a few of the reviews I had read that dissed the record completely. Critics like Jon Caramanica in the New York Times and Greg Kot in the Chicago Tribune acted as though Common had kicked their dog or something.

All right, I’m not saying that Universal Mind Control is the brother’s best disc (my personal favorite is the much hated Electric Circus), but I still get excited when artists try something new instead of sticking to the tried and true. The critics might not be digging Universal Mind Control, but those kids at Providence on Monday night was certainly feeling the electric funk.

Being raised by both my mother and grandmother had its advantages. Thinking back to life uptown during my 1970s wonder years, one of the first thoughts that come to mind is the food that was constantly cooking on our old stove.

Dark as mahogany, grandma came from Harrisonburg, Virginia; born into a family of country chefs who dwelled in the Negro neighborhood known as New Town (her own grandmother’s fresh biscuits and jelly were legendary), she seemed to think it was a sin if something wasn’t frying, broiling, simmering, boiling, baking or in the process of cooling off.

“Grandma cooks and mommy heats up,” I once told one of my mother’s friends. Yet, since grandma worked in a factory in New Jersey and was out of the flat before I awoke, Sunday mornings was the only time she made a full breakfast. Returning home from nine o’clock mass at St. Catherine of Genoa, where I was an altar-boy, the hearty smell of eggs, bacon, sausages and grits met me at the front door.

Though I’m not sure what was on my mind, I always said I didn’t want any grits. Maybe it was the way they looked or the way grits hardened in the pot when they were cold, but I wasn’t feeling them. “Boy don’t know what he missing, Mary,” grandma’s boyfriend Joe said and laughed. Staring at his plate, a yellow river of yolk from his over-easy eggs pooled into the grits.

“Well, if he don’t want’em, I can’t force him,” she replied. Although I could hear in her voice that my rejection of the grits was a slight betrayal to her, I refused to relent. In the same way that I (at the time) detested chicken and dumplings and pig feet, I spent my entire childhood gritless. A few years later, when I was fourteen, me, mom and baby brother moved to Baltimore. I stayed in the City of Poe graduating from high school. Then, in the August of ’81, I returned to Harlem and to my grandma’s soulful kitchen.

Although it was just the two of us living there, grandma still cooked as though an army was coming. Yet, as a freshman at Long Island University in Brooklyn, I became popular because I often brought home hungry friends for Sunday dinner. “Now make sure you get enough,” she said sweetly, her dark hands holding the spoon tightly as she put more food on our plates.

Afterwards, grandma wrapped up the food in heavy aluminum foil and insisted my friend took some grub back to the dorm. I recall once asking if she had her recipes written down, but she just laughed. “I don’t need any recipes,” she said proudly, pointing to her temple. “I got them all up here.”

To this day, I can’t quite explain what got me eating grits; perhaps, as an adult, they became less gross or I just got more curious about what was such the big deal. I had put a little salt, butter and cheese on them, and shoved them in the mouth.

Expecting the worse, I was blown away by the taste. I thought about Joe, who had died years before, teasing me at Sunday breakfast. It was at that moment that my tongue began to do the happy dance. “Not you eating grits,” grandma blurted proudly that summer Sunday morning as we sat at the faux-wood kitchen table.

Fourteen years after grandma’s death on March 8, 1994, I still eat grits on Sunday mornings whenever possible; and with each massive forkful, I think about grandma.

Last week Aretha Franklin told NPR: “Chitlins are off the menu. They were keeping my weight up. Chitlins have been canceled off of my list, and I know my fans and friends are screaming ‘Hallelujah!’ I want to be around for a long time, so let’s drop the chitlins.”

Listening to this confession about one of my former favorite dishes made me smile. Especially, since I once heard a story about the Queen of Soul making a pots of chitlins in her hotel room when on tour back in the day. But, in this day in age, many health focused Black folks have choosen to step away from funky pork parts. Truthfully, though I haven’t had chitlins in years, Ms. Franklin’s comments made me think about my late grandma’s southern cooking.

Perhaps if I had known exactly what chitlins were (or chitterlings, as some people spell it) when I was a boy, I never would have eaten them. Though the funk that wafted through the apartment when grandma stood over the sink cleaning them should have clued me in, how was I to know that my favorite meal was cooked pig intestines?

While some families only prepared chitlins during Christmas and New Year’s Eve, grandma was not a creature of ceremony. Whenever I saw the white ten-pound buckets taking-up space in the refrigerator, I knew there would be a feast by the end of the week. Raised in Virginia, grandma knew how to “put her foot” in a pot of chitlins.

Dumping the slimy swine parts into a large pan in the sink, grandma gripped the black handle of her long bladed knife with the skill of a butcher. Wearing a flowered apron tied around her thin waist, she managed to look lady like while doing one of the nastiest chores on the planet. Holding our noses, me and baby brother rushed to the front door and went outside to play.

Boiling the chitlins in a giant silver pot of salty water seasoned with celery, onions and vinegar, the entire flat smelled like pork heaven when we returned home hours later. “Are they ready yet?” I screamed, hanging-up my coat in the foyer closet.

“Boy, stop making all that noise and go get cleaned-up.”

After washing our face and hands, we sat at the faux-wood kitchen table, and shook crimson droplets of Red Devil hot sauce on the soul food that also included potato salad, black-eyed peas and collard greens. Devouring my grub with the quickness, I sopped-up the flavorful juice with cornbread and was ready for more. “Your eyes bigger than your stomach,” grandma laughed, as she proudly put more chitlins on the plate.

One thing about grandma, though she never ate much, she got joy from watching other folks eat.

Years later, when I was a freshman at Long Island University in Brooklyn, I hung out at the college radio station and became friends with an overweight pothead named Gary. With flowing dreadlocks and a thick accent, Gary was an on-air personality (although the station only broadcast on campus) who introduced me to the music of Lee Scratch Perry, Peter Tosh and other reggae artists.

Enviably, when you get two fat guys in a room together, the conversation soon became about food. “You like what?” Gary screamed, not wanting to believe my culinary ignorance. “Man, do you know what chitins are? It’s the pig intestine; you know, what the shit goes through.”

“Get out of here…for real?” I looked at him as though he had gone rabbit hunting on Easter morning or lit the fireplace on Christmas Eve. “You’re joking, right?”

“No joke,” Gary assured me. “It’s the part of the pig that white masters used to give to the slaves, because they didn’t want it.”

For a moment, I was mute. Pondering the deepness of this history, I reflected on its meaning before finally determining that it was too late for me to turn back; blunted on surreality, I reasoned that rejection of chitlins would be a denial of my southern heritage and family roots.

“Well, they taste good to me,” I said, much to Gary’s chagrin. Indeed, it was my intention, as my favorite southern female performer Gladys Knight once sang, “To keep on keeping on.”

Ten years after that discussion with Gary, grandma moved to Baltimore to live with my mother; a few years after that, she got stomach cancer. Scared by the fact that my grandmother wouldn’t be around for very long, I kept postponing my trip to Baltimore. Everyday I’d tell my ma, “I’ll be there tomorrow. I promise.”

Finally, tired of my triflingness, mom called me on a Thursday morning and tensely said, “When are you coming down here?”

“I don’t know ma, I got something to do today and…”

Cutting me off, she screamed, “My mother is dying, and instead of lying down, she’s standing over the sink cleaning chitlins for you.” In my mind, I clearly saw grandma’s frail frame as she held tightly to the black handled knife and carefully cleaned filth from the swine.

That same afternoon, as the Greyhound bus zoomed down Route 40 towards downtown Baltimore, I thought about my grandma’s hands and the steaming pot of chitlins simmering on the stove.

The moniker “renaissance man” is perhaps overused, but I really can’t think of another way to describe journalist/author/producer/director/man about many towns Nelson George. That’s a lot of slashes for one East New York raised dude, but the fact that he does each with perfection is enough to make a roomful of posers pissed on sight.

As New York as a George Gershwin song played by Bobby Short, as Harlem as a Chester Himes novel directed by Woody Allen, as Brooklyn as a Biggie Smalls track produced by Danger Mouse, as international as a black Bond, the brother is everywhere. Still, no matter how busy the man is, there has never been a time when he couldn’t spare a few moments to give yours dearly a little insight on whatever old R&B legend I might be writing about at the time.

Damn, even in the midst of promoting his 2007 HBO film Life Support (which he wrote and directed), the brother still found time to school me on the DeBarge family drama for my then upcoming Vibe feature “Broken Dreams,” which will be reprinted next year in the Best African-American Essays 2009 edited by Debra J. Dickerson and Gerald Early. From a man who has jiggy folks like Jamie Fox, Chris Rock and Queen Latifah on his speed dial, color this “colored” (lets thank Lindsay Lohan for bringing the word back) brother impressed.

Of course, being a fan of his ’80s writings in Billboard and the Village Voice (where George penned more than a few superb essays for his Native Son column) I’ve known Nelson George longer than he’s known me. Being the geeky nerd boy that I am, a brother still remembers our first meeting one warm summer day in 1988.

Standing in the train station at 145th Street and Broadway, there was funny drunk who was talking much junk out loud. Looking like the Ned the Wino from Good Times, dude was ranting about who knows what. Yet, while everybody else was moving away from him, I noticed Nelson George watching this “performance” as though it were a one-man show Off-Broadway. “There’s nothing as entertaining as an old school drunk,” Nelson said, when he noticed me.

Like the great Richard Pryor, whose ghetto observations was a major influence for many urban writers, Nelson clearly understood that raw material for future writings could be found wherever one might be.

Since then Nelson has written many non-fiction books (on topics ranging from Motown to basketball, hiphop to black films), novels short stories and magazine articles; in addition he also helped fund Spike’s first joint She’s Got to Have It (released two years before I met him), wrote and produced Strictly BusinessCB4 and and, currently, is the man behind VH1 Hip-Hop Honors and BET’s popular American Gangster. As if that wasn’t enough, he has also started shooting a series of short films, the first being A Barber’s Tale.

Next year, I’m looking forward to reading his upcoming autobiography City Kid: A Writer’s Memoir of Ghetto Life and Post-Soul Success. How he does so much I’ll never know, but in my next life, I want to be Nelson George.

TO VIEW A BARBER’S TALE, GO TO: http://starworksny.com/blog/2008/11/07/barbers-tale

http://nelsondgeorge.net

Simone by Michael A. Gonzales

Simone can remember the exact moment when she first shared the stage with her jazz superstar mother Nina. “Most people in the audience probably didn’t even know that Nina Simone had a daughter,” she laughs over the telephone from her home in Pennsylvania. “I had been watching mom from the wings since I was a kid, but when she agreed to accompany me on piano as I sang ‘Music for Lovers,’ it was a magical moment.”

Recorded that same night in Ireland, Simone has used the track as the opening song on her debut disc Simone on Simone, a loving tribute to her late mother. “We performed together twice afterwards, in Chicago and Los Angeles, but none of those times eclipsed that first time.” Though Simone’s given name is Lisa Celeste Stroud, she choose the stage name as a salute to her mom.

Known for her rough exterior, gruff voice and musical genius, Nina Simone’s material like “Feeling Good” and “Sinnerman” are still vibrant today. Used in various films and television shows including Point of No Return and Six Feet Under, her haunting music has proved itself eternal.

Exiled from America and living in France, she died in 2003 from breast cancer at the age of 70.

“My mother’s spirit is always with me, and that was especially true when I was working on this project,” Simone says. A stage actress and performer who in 2001 played the lead role in the touring company of Aida, the last thing Simone planned on doing was recording covers of her mother’s music.

“I had my own material that I wanted to get to, but when I started going through mom’s sheet music, I reconsidered. I realized these were some of my favorite songs.” Yet, anyone expecting Simone to be an aural Xerox of her mother will be greatly disappointed. Recording with a nineteen-piece big band, Simone’s voice has a honeyed, theatrical tone.

“I’ve never wanted to be a replica of my mom,” Simone explains. “I knew if I wanted to be accepted as a true artist, I would have to sing my own way.” Somewhere in jazz heaven, Nina Simone is smiling.

(Simone will perform on November 13^th Blue Note Jazz Club 131 W. 3rd St 212-475-8592)

India and Eric Benet

A few days ago I had a wonderful telephone chat with one of my favorite soul singers Eric Benet. Though some folks still can’t let go of the Halle Berry incident from a few years ago (I think brothers were madder than the sisters this time), there is no denying that Benet is one of the underrated voices of modern R&B.

Yet, while Eric is still doing promotion for the recently released Love and Life (Warner Brothers Records) disc, which was released in September, the brother had more than music on his mind. “People have to understand how important it is for us to go out and vote,” said Benet. “How scary would it be for the soccer mom and Mr. McCain to win this election. As I see it, its time for us to put this country back on track.”

A single father raising his 17-year-old daughter India, the usually laid back singer got a little excited. “I try to teach her that we cannot allow ourselves to be powerless. It’s all right to get angry and frustrated at how the world is sometimes, but we must not become complacent. If you want to be heard, go out and vote.” Indeed, if you haven’t done it yet, get with the program.

Having lived in Baltimore for a few years when I was a teenager, I’ve always had a real love/hate relationship when it came to HBO’s series The Wire. Of course, I was drawn in by the amazing young black actors and excellent writing, but truthfully, I was tired of seeing Baltimore portrayed as a holding pen.

Indeed, it got to the point that whenever I mentioned going to B-more to see the fam, folks would ask me, “Is it the same way it is on The Wire?” All I could say was, don’t believe the hype. While the city does have its fair share of gangstas and junkies, there are a lot of Black artists (shout out to late painter Larry Scott), writers, poets and teachers doing positive work in the community.

With that said and done, allow me to riff about the latest issue of Stop Smiling magazine (theme: Washington, DC), which features dual covers of actor/musician Anwan Glover and writer George Pelecanos. Both of these men contributed their talents to The Wire, and helped make it into a television show that re-introduced the word “Dickensian” into our popular lexicon–though I dare you to use it in a sentence when not talking about the show.

Though I had been a fan of Pelecanos years before he made the transition to television (his great DC/ seventies novel King Suckerman was once optioned by Puff Daddy), it was Anwan Glover’s (who played raspy voiced dealer Slim Charles on the show) revealing interview that damn near brought a tear to my eye.

Still mourning the murder of his brother last year, caring for a cancer ridden mother and trying to be a good role model to his 14-year-old son, Anwan goes into great detail describing his desire to escape the hood when he was a boy. “I used to get away and go to the zoo, just to imagine different places. Ride my bike to the airport. I always wanted to get away,” he confesses.

Even without a script, dude be droppin’ dialogue that is straight poetry. In addition, Glover talks about his role as a singer for seminal go-go group the Backyard Band.

For more information about the magazine, go to: http://www.stopsmilingonline.com/Grab a copy.

(Center: Anwan “Big G” Glover of the Backyard Band as Slim Charles on the third season of The Wire; watch video of the Backyard Band here)

Ever since I started reading the Village Voice in the early-1980s, the holy trinity of soul brother journalists that made a generation of scribes feel that it was possible to write about male blackness without apology was Greg Tate, Nelson George and Barry Michael Cooper. In the days before Vibe or XXL hit the newsstands, when funk and rap music was still considered a novelty until the next rock explosion, these men paved the way for the forthcoming revolution in journalism.

And, like the dudes of the Harlem Renaissance, each one of these cats wrote in their own unique voices that are still relevant today.

While I’m cool with each of these literary mavericks, it is Barry Michael Cooper that I’ve become the closest. Like myself, Barry is a Harlem homeboy who relocated to Baltimore and has a reputation for being a wild child behind the keyboard. Bringing his own form of uptown grit to the table along with a love of film and Fitzgerald, this wordsmith master blaster wrote one of the greatest music stories of 1988.

Published in the Village Voice and entitled “Teddy Riley Groove Master: Harlem Gangsters Raise a Genius,” this brilliant feature not only named new jack swing, but made a Black boy like me ready to stop messing around with those around the way clowns, shut the bedroom door and write. Anyone who wants to check out the eternal beauty of this piece can read the reprint in And It Don’t Stop: The Best American Hip-Hop Journalism of the Last 25 Years edited by Raquel Cepeda. Though Barry’s story was twenty years old this month, the freshness of the piece (like Tom Wolfe hangin’ on the corner) reads like it was written last week.

Since that time, Barry Michael Cooper has racked-up screen credits, having written the wonderful Harlem trilogy New Jack City, Above the Rim and Sugar Hill. In addition, he has won serveral journalism awards and recently produced the Larry Davis episode of BET’s American Gangster series. Yet, it’s his latest role as a political columnist for The Huffington Post that I wanted to inform you about; with titles like “The Final Days of an American Gangster” and “Sarah Palin and The GOP’s Charli Baltimore Plan,” these hip-hop centric essays are filled with passion, honesty, humor, intellect and realness. Believe me, this is political writing for people who never read (or understand) political writing.

Twenty years after naming the genre, Barry Michael Cooper’s writing is still keeping the textual spirit of new jack swing alive.

Huffington Post:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/barry-michael-cooper

Interview with Barry Michael Cooper:
http://www.stopsmilingonline.com/story_detail.php?id=791