![]() ![]() It was a few months after Lost in Translation came out that eXquire was approached by Republic, a division of Universal, about making an album. The track proved, or should have, that eXquire was capable of more than just over-the-top profanity. “Twist the doorknob slow so she don’t hear the clickin’/And peek into her room to make sure she ain’t listenin.'” At the end of the story it turns out his mom is still up, doing dishes, but instead of getting mad at little Anthony she gives him milk and cookies. “Tippy-toe-ing to the kitchen, PJs on with the feets on/so when I walk it’s like chikka-chikka-chikka,” he raps. The best song on the mixtape, aside from “Huzzah,” was a quiet piece of detailed storytelling, “I Should Be Sleeping,” about eXquire as a little kid trying to sneak out of his room at night to grab a bag of chips without his mom hearing him. ![]() Movie', Mario Merch Is Hotter Than EverĪnd yet there was more than lasciviousness on Lost in Translation. With the Massive Success of 'The Super Mario Bros. The song opens with eXquire proclaiming, “Drunk driving on a Wednesday/with three bitches in an M.P.V./Half a gallon of Georgi Peorgi/with cranberry, that’s the P.O.P.” For most of the video, he’s sitting around with a snarly look on his face while a pair of women dance on either side of him with their butts level with his head and turned toward the camera. Watching the video, you got the sense that eXquire, who appears shirtless holding a spear and wearing heavy gold chains, was truly a wild and menacing guy. (It has racked up 1.3 million views to date, and is still remembered by many as the best posse cut of 2011.) That fall, a remix version of “Huzzah” that included guest verses by underground rap favorites El-P, Danny Brown, Das Racist and Despot, was made into a memorable black-and-white video that became an online sensation. After briefly quitting music in frustration, eXquire caught a second wind, and in the spring of 2011, “Huzzah” came out and got him noticed. After dropping out of high school in 10th grade, he set out to try and make it as a rapper, but was told by A&R people that he was too cerebral to become a hit at a time when mainstream hip-hop was dominated by the grittier likes of 50 Cent. Raised in a public housing apartment in the Crown Heights neighborhood of Brooklyn, eXquire was a nerdy kid who spent his time watching movies and reading comic books instead of getting into drug dealing and robbery the way a bunch of his friends did. ![]() ![]() Like, I’m up here trying to say some shit! But people just wrote me off as a novelty.”ĭave Chappelle’s Rise From Rick James to Radio City: A Timeline “I think I went through my Dave Chappelle moment, where I was like, ‘I don’t know if they’re laughing with me or they’re laughing at me. “I’d be onstage and I’d feel like a parody,” eXquire said recently, recalling one show in particular, at PS1-MoMA, that left him on the brink of tears. For better and for worse, he has come to the conclusion that his personality does not easily translate to any kind of marketable brand - at least not one with which he’s comfortable. And while eXquire has always had undeniable charisma and tends to be utterly convincing in his good-natured confidence, he has spent the past several years bumping up against the fact that magnetism alone is not enough to make someone a star in hip-hop. But eXquire is something else, too: an artist of color who, in becoming successful, found himself performing for predominantly white audiences who seemed to like him only for his raunch and recklessness, while appearing largely indifferent to everything else he felt he had to offer. ![]()
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |