Artist: Jeru the Damaja
Song: D. Original
Album: The Sun Rises In The East
Mood: Dark
Growing up, I was a self-proclaimed “Hip-Hop Head”- I knew everything there was to know about hip-hop, and I prided myself on having a near-encyclopedic knowledge of the history of the art and its contributors. The first hip-hop album I ever remember owning (not counting MC Hammer’s “Please Hammer Don’t Hurt ‘Em,” because everybody owned that one) was DMX’s “It’s Dark and Hell Is Hot.” I was 12 when it came out, so I had to convince my grandmother to buy it for me; being awesome, she acquiesced to my request. For a while, I was huge on commercial hip-hop presence was more important to me than lyricism, but all that changed when I listened to Jeru the Damaja’s “The Sun Rises In The East.” That album was 10 tracks of perfection, a hip-hop classic in every way. All 10 songs were produced by DJ Premier, who provided the sonic backdrop that embodied 1990′s New York hip-hop: moody, somber strings, boom-bap drums, and choruses crafted purely from vocal samples of other artists.
Since most people haven’t heard of Jeru the Damaja, I figured the best song to introduce him is the second track from his debut album, “D. Original.” It’s hip-hop for a rainy day –ominous piano stabs and the famous DJ Premier scratching and drum patterns, married together and topped with Jeru’s top-flight lyricism. Every time I listen to this song, I imagine a grey, dreary day in New York City where rain is pouring down, washing the accumulated filth and detritus of the city into the gutter. Give it a shot –for a song that’s seemingly mired in grime, it’s remarkably refreshing.
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