Keep It Goin

BeatKing—the Houston rapper who soundtracked some of the most deranged moments of my twenties—passed away of a pulmonary embolism in August. There was a moment when he was, song-for-song, my favorite rapper. Atlanta’s Rich Homie Quan—one half of Rich Gang, co-conspirator on a number of the best rap songs of the ‘10s—passed in September. There was an extended moment when he was, pound-for-pound, bar-for-bar, emotion-for-emotion my favorite rapper. Ka, the loquacious Brooklyn rapper, passed last week. For only a few weeks after 2013’s The Night’s Gambit was he my favorite rapper, then I lost step with his other releases. (Though I’ve since spent time with this year’s invigorating The Thief Next to Jesus.) But in ethics and practice, he was an animating inspiration for my belief the most essential and iconic people do it for and by themselves.

I don’t have a lot to say about these deaths, because a lot has been said already, and in some respects, I don’t have much to say beyond these were some of my favorite artists ten years ago. Fandom is a one-sided story you tell yourself about yourself, and in light of death, particularly in these stark instances (Quan was 33; BeatKing was 39; Ka was 52), a story about the peak of my party years seems inappropriate, even if BeatKing’s daughters essentially eulogized their father via roast. In 2014 I was the age when everything is for you—the songs on the radio, the trends, the players in their physical primes across the major sports leagues—so of course Tha Tour hit like Jesus parceling out the Beatitudes. (My #1 or #2 favorite long-player of the decade fwiw—ten of its songs are 10/10, ten are 7/10, but it transcends because those perfect ten offer a glimpse of something unmatched.) That it eludes drab and joyless streaming services is a cherry on top, a reminder of what we once had and how we enjoyed it. But that's inconsequential to the story of great artists dying young.

The obvious subtext here is in light of how much these artists meant to me their deaths have me checking in on my own mortality, removed from the time when the culture was for me. “Culture” is defined by those who consume it, not produce it, but being a few years younger than Drake when Drake was at his peak made you feel like you were on the journey with him. Rap music at this time was a near and dear community that spoke to me at a time I needed and wanted it most, and I don’t have the same feeling now when I go out to hear music that I don’t know where it comes from or what community it’s supposed to represent, to say nothing about the rightward turn politically (of artists and audiences) of things like rap music made by men or Brazilian funk/Three Six biters, whatever. I scramble to find something that speaks to me in the way they did. This is beside the point when speaking about their passings.

I refuse to be a “I don’t know what the kids are on about” person because that is the sign of an incurious and intellectually and emotionally stunted mind. But there’s obvious finality to these guys being gone—in ten years, I won’t be able to say “Quan was my favorite rapper for two years” without the addendum of “it’s awful he died when he was 33.” Their deaths remove their ability to continue their stories, their artistic arcs, and be present for their loved ones. What if the artists you love the most right now all died within sixty days of each other in ten years—how would that affect your view of the culture you love and yourself?

The loss of life is devastating, but what has me looking over my shoulder is a feeling of culture in continual decline. Tech has infiltrated every facet of our lives—it is insurmountable corporate debt passed onto the everyday person for the convenience of making things you already did for yourself fractions of a percent easier—and it’s telling these guys in their own ways existed outside of tech and streaming, who prioritized the live experience, the clubgoing experience, the ability to buy a vinyl record directly from them or talk with them after concerts, and, famously, their club walk-through. Tech has swallowed up everything and everyone who refuses to capitulate to vulture capitalists. If there’s a part of your life that’s gotten substantially worse in ten years, the universal root cause is tech.

That includes culture. People have been sounding the alarm on the decline of culture, but it reads to me like heavy-handed theorizing, not something as gut-level palpable as “bad music succeeds because it’s familiar and games streaming services.” I don’t think culture is over, has flattened (or flatlined), or that it’s incapable of evolving in the age of tech and the algorithm and the dissolution of shared IRL spaces due to the rental and housing collapses and the mental health crash of the pandemic era. But I do feel a tinge of “maybe it’s over for me” when things I consume ring hollow, as a copy of a copy of a copy, or I receive them as a person who, admittedly, is often wrong, but nonetheless feels like it’s been done before, and it was done better then, and things presented as the cutting edge are consumed in that way by those who are or are close to being 25. I was stupid to believe I was “old” at that age. I rebel against Abe Simpson’s expiration date: “They changed what it was, now what’s it is weird and scary. It’ll happen to you.” I am not crusading against youth. But there is a feeling things have changed for the worse, I miss the way people used to talk and dress, and the more tragedies we face the more removed we are from an imagined (but also…maybe not?) reality where things were different.

There’s nothing novel about aging, and to be in my own head as a response to these deaths speaks to a level of solipsism I am typically uncomfortable sharing, but on a pure fan, parasocial, these-artists-meant-a-lot-to-me level, how else do we process death. Nothing is more real or final. Nothing leaves as emphatic a period without closure. These were not my favorite artists because they made some songs I liked; it was how they approached their craft, their presence in my social life, their literal and figurative voices emerging from a crowd of lesser talents to, however briefly (or not), capture the imagination and the window of the culture where they mattered and therefore I mattered and what I liked mattered and what I thought mattered and even though I am not a musician they let me believe I can do what I set my mind to, too. Their being gone removes living proof of the path from where I am to the dreams I still have of the ideal life for myself. It’s tragic that they’re gone and my heart goes out to their families. The culture presses on, much of it is just as worthy, intoxicating, and essential, but often squeezed through conduits I have no interest in (mostly based around wholly virtual communities). Life is a gift, death is random, all we have is the time we’re given. You can embrace this at 25, 35, 45; you can embrace time up until the time you’re gone. What else are you supposed to do.

What I’m reading: Elegy Owed
Listening to: Rich As In Spirit
Watching: Sisters