Kool Keith, DJ
Spooky
Crystal
Ballroom, 1332 W Burnside St., 778-5625
9 pm Friday,
Sept. 17
$13
Kool Keith will
also appear at Music Millennium-Northwest,
801 NW 23rd Ave., 248-0163, 7 pm Friday, Sept. 17. Free.
You can e-mail
Kool Keith at blakkelvis@aol.com.
"Earth people, I was born on Jupiter"
--Kool Keith, "Earth People"
Kool Keith, a.k.a. Keith Thornton, is hip-hop's intergalactic
heir apparent to George Clinton and Sun Ra.
In the 12 loony years since he broke into the scene as
frontman for the New York outfit Ultramagnetic MCs, Keith
has mutated into several wacked-out personas. In 1997, he
rode in from space as Dr. Octagon, a futuristic, orifice-obsessed
gynecologist spewing stream-of-consciousness nonsense. Earlier
this year, Keith emerged as Dr. Dooom, a cannibalistic serial
killer from the projects. Dooom offed Octagon on First
Come, First Served. Most recently, Keith peacefully
donned a plastic black wig and proclaimed himself Black
Elvis, a space-age adventurer and mack daddy. His first
voyage, Black Elvis/Lost in Space, is a big-booming,
catchy-as-syphilis journey through one man's twisted mind
and boundless creativity.
WW recently chatted on the phone with Kool Keith,
who was in Cincinnati to do a show.
WW: Your albums are very conceptual. Is that
something that's difficult to translate into a live atmosphere?
Kool Keith: Conceptual, huh? Huh. Well, the stuff I'm
doing is so unique and new. It's not the average trendy
stuff. It's a new millennium, and it's time for a change--my
own production! It's not hard to translate, to me anyway.
You've been doing this for 12 years. How have you seen
the hip-hop form changing over the course of your involvement?
Rap's been stagnant for a long time--the last six or
seven years. It was just the same hip-hop/jazz/New York
stuff, same wistful stuff's been going for a while now.
It's taken a while to break new ground. All the producers--there's
been no experimentation, even through they were trying.
Nothing. But the thing about my new album--I think I made
a little pavement on something new for a change.
Since rap is the bestselling form in music right now,
does that give you a freer sense of experimentation, a larger
platform to work on?
Since Columbia released this, it's given me bigger exposure,
yeah. The most ever, definitely. A lot of my stuff has been
stolen because of a lack of major press. Groups would come
out on larger labels, and they would use stuff from me and
take it national. But many fans don't know that, they don't
know me, and then a band comes out on Def Jam, and they
have my image. They portray it across the country. Any band
tomorrow could come out and put on some Black Elvis. I couldn't
be independent any longer.
How did the shifting personas and costumes evolve?
I got tired of seeing artists with just regular stuff
on--baseball caps on backwards and baggy jeans. I wasn't
impressed with the imagery. It's a small thing helping me
to come up with ideas and images. I don't buy clothes because
of the name on it; I buy it for the design, the futuristic
look of it. I don't care if the costume was made by Arm
& Hammer Baking Soda, cause when I wear it, it's how
it looks.
Where did you find the Black Elvis wig?
[Keith yells at someone, telling the person not to touch
his wardrobe.] Huh? Oh, I was walking down Hollywood spontaneously
one day, saw it and said, "This shit look kinda hype." I
put it on, and I've been wearing it ever since. No plan,
man.
You wear it in your everyday life?
Yeah. It makes a difference.
How do you see Black Elvis as different from some of
your other personas?
He's a futuristic person...aerodynamic, space, different
things. Elvis is a movie star, a rock star. He's got a very
high lifestyle. Black Elvis is in the building! I see rappers
talking about their lives and how hard they are. They're
insecure about being hard. Of course, when they come to
L.A., they're surrounded by bodyguards and can't go to the
mall by themselves. I don't feel like I need to make records
that talk about the apartment I grew up in. I have energy
and talent to go other places, find new territories. I don't
have to prove that I'm tough. I'll get tough when I have
to get tough.
Your music has, if anything, been accepted more by white
fans. I was wondering whether that's where "Black Elvis"
originated?
In a way. From regular urban standards, a lot of the
kids haven't heard it. I was advanced another notch, like
a black scientist. They may not know about me from the media.
I'm ahead of time. I'm moving at warp speed, and maybe a
lot of kids on the Internet are catching on, and those who
can't see me haven't been able to see the material. It's
all because of the political defenses of the music industry
and the radio. I can't be run through regular channels.
But those who have the means to search out and aggressively
find smaller stations, they know me.
How do you write lyrics? Are you a write-in-the-shower
guy, do you carry a notebook or do you just get into a studio
and freestyle?
I write all my songs very naturally. I'll see something,
and it triggers me, and I'll go home and start writing.
I write a lot internationally, when I travel. I'm in a universal
mindset when I write. I could see a dog crossing the street
and then write something about a lonely dog. It just may
come out a bit more abstract than that. "I'm in a universal
mindset when I write. I could see a dog crossing the street
and then write something about a lonely dog."
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Willamette Week | originally
published September 15,
1999
|
