With our problems and limitations as a region, there still isn’t any other place I’d rather live than the South. We’ve got the best BBQ, football is a second religion around these parts, and sweet tea flows as mighty as the Mississippi River. In addition, we’ve kinda been running things in the music industry as well, specifically as it relates to hip-hop. We’ve been crushing this for almost twenty years now, so much so that the hottest dude coming out of New York City has made huge strides in his career by overtly adopting the “Tao of Texas”. And self-proclaimed Kings of hip-hop (not that I’m arguing that point) have made it a point to get some of that Southern magic working on their behalf by signing Southern artist like Cy Hi the Prince (Atlanta) and J. Cole (Fayetteville, North Carolina), and teaming up with the likes of Southern beatsmith Lex Luger (Virginia), and New Orleans crooner Frank Ocean.
Ah Frank Ocean. I remember the first time I heard his music, like it was yesterday in fact. I downloaded his mixtape, loaded it on my Droid, and went for a walk (one of my preferred methods of listening to new music). It was so amazing I went home, sat on the couch, closed my eyes and went through nostalgia, Ultra in its entirty again. His voice is superbly unique and as such, it has reverberated across the music industry in 2011. This past weekend Frank kicked off his solo tour at the House of Blues in his hometown of New Orleans and my buddies from the Baton Rogue based brand The dope. Game were on hand to witness. They took the liberty of creating a very short video montage of Frank’s set (under 1 minute) to give those of us that couldn’t attend or decided to watch LSU play Alabama a glimpse into the night’s event.
I shouldn’t have to say it but if you haven’t listened to Frank Ocean’s mixtape, you need to shoot yourself in the face hurry up and rectify it. Pronto.
