"US"

While it’s still fresh in my mind, as the dusk begins to settle; just as I capture life's details through the lens of a camera, my voice and the written word become ever so prevalent in times like these. Where a thought is processed and exported out into the world as quickly as its existence to consciousness; where the lines between what’s real and what’s fake blur more and more every day. 

One thing becomes certain, “The Culture” is here to stay, and it is a force and energetic field, amplified and expressed through Hip Hop music.

May 3-5, 2024, will be a weekend talked about in barbershops and over spades and dominoes tables for generations to come. It’s the weekend when the world became aware of what “this thing of ours” really means and represents at its core, and that’s “culture.” And that cannot be taught or bought.
It’s either in you or it’s not. 

But what is “the culture”? Certainly, hip hop is a part of it, and at the forefront of it for sure. But on a deeper level, when Kendrick said, “when I say we, it’s not just me I’m what the culture feeling,” what is that “culture” he spoke of?

Hip Hop, originating in the Bronx in the 80s, brought forth a voice to a voiceless generation. The crack epidemic changed the dynamic of the Black American family and social system, and to put it quite frankly, brothers in the hood figured out how to grab Pops’ records and loop them. Just like Black folk, we’ll figure some shit out. And fifty years later, here we are. 

This music grew deeper and wider roots than I think even Kool Moe Dee could imagine. Though it spread, what hip hop did to the inner cities around Black America was different than perhaps you’d say Canada. Hip Hop became the soundtrack to our lives, and myself being a ‘91 baby caught it mid-stride. What is the culture?

The culture is when I was 12 years old walking to the bus stop, listening to my CD Walkman, “Tupac's Greatest Hits,” screaming, “Now follow as we ride, Motherfuck the rest two of the best from the Westside.”

“KenFolks”
The Forum
Juneteenth 2024

 It’s remembering when Jay-Z retired, and I walked to Best Buy to grab that wack-ass Kingdom Come CD, but also remembering hearing The Blueprint for the first time on MP3. The culture is Saturday mornings waking up to hit the barbershops and push the latest Lil Wayne mixtape, then hearing the reviews the following Monday in school. Being 15 years old when Gucci Mane’s “Bricks” dropped. I take you down memory lane to say that “the culture” is engraved in us from the moment most of us had ears.

There was a foundation that was laid, and whether we like to admit it or not, there are rules to this thing of ours.

“WIN”
Jay Rock & K Dot

When you love something, you study it. You dig for it, and because Hip Hop continued to expand from its conception, there was always something there for the eclectic listener. Myself, it was always Pac from birth, but that led me to Mos Def, Common, Outkast, E-40; my hunger for music never stopped. I’ve always admired the lyrical aspect of being able to articulate a moment, a memory, a feeling so well that it resonated with millions of people. Saying something so powerful that you feel like the artist made the song just for you. “Aquemini” by Outkast, “Man on the Moon” by Kid Cudi, “Blessed” by Q and K. Dot—these specific tracks have all become engrained in who I am as an artist. That’s culture.

“You Are Not From Bompton”
Bompton, Balifornia
2024

The intriguing part about Hip Hop within our culture is that it is a SPORT. Who can use their words and intellect to bring you out of your own world and into theirs. It has to be potent to pierce that veil of life.  The most potent bars and intricate brush strokes on the canvas of sound is who paints the better picture or worse.  I’ve always felt that in hip hop, in the art of rapping itself the things that are written should mean something. Even if it’s to turn up or turn down, or whatever, they should come from a place of authenticity and sincerity. At least that’s what I look for in my hip hop albums. Lyrical content matters in hip hop. You want to be the best? Prove you can hold the people and the charts.

Prove you can lead the level of artistry into the right direction, and not conform to the chasing of trends. Prove that what you say actually matters.

Prove your the best.

We made the culture cool. 

Writers, right?

Writer’s write, right. Since a young age my mother has always instilled the importance of the pen, up until now I’ve sort of just kept the experiences to myself….because really? Who would care.  Growth and time has brought me new insight; the older I become the more my being reaches out for a space to completely let go.

 At twenty five years old, I’m not the smartest nor the most politically correct individual but I’d be doing my generation a disservice to stay silent and keep these cultural changing experiences to myself. 

So where does one begin?

Honestly I’m not sure, I am no different than any other my readers in the sense that we are all spiritual beings having a human experience. That’s a quote on a mural off Crenshaw and Stocker in LA and its something my mother has told me all my life.

When posed with the question, “Who are you?” or the classic new kid new school “stand up and introduce yourself to the class?” the most common responses begin with “my name is”. My mom always asked me what my response was and quickly corrected me if it was anything short of her standards of the conscious African American male she was raising. It wasn’t until ten years later that I was passing the mural and saw it that it finally resonated with I. I and I feel at some point all of us forget that we are not pawns in this game of life we are the creators of the board.

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Trust the process, something I am still learning that is critical to the growth of an artist.

Maybe if I share my soul with the world, they will listen. I think that the reason a lot of people feel alone in the world is because they are afraid if they actually speak up about how they feel in their place in the world no one would take the time to actually hear them out. Perhaps no one will take the time to read the words I am writing now, but I still must do my duty and try.  My buttercup once told me is the hardest part as an artist, is picking up the pen brush or whatever medium you may use and taking the fist step toward something beautiful. So that is what I am doing here.

KISO

Perhaps, it's been this intense year that inspired me to finally get up off my lazy butt and do what I know I was born to do....capture life moments. I have made many futile attempts to create a website, a merch site, a portfolio, etc...but the only thing that I've managed to stay consistent with primarily because its so simple and doesn't require much more than a click is my hydreams.tumblr. Check it out if you haven't,I feel it visually shows my growth as not only a photographer but as human being as well. Its conception was at a time where nothing else gave me nourishment but my art, so scroll away it has been a interesting and amazing human experience.

Ok so here's to the point, if you know me than you know me, if you don't then this is my way of saying hello.....Hi.. .... if you've gotten this far then thank you immensely this is my life and what I do. I've gotten that question "What do you do?" enough times this year and have yet until now been able to explain all the various mediums that I am connected with...so this is it.

KISO, my art..my life.....organically.