COMMON 

Conversations With COMMON

There’s something about his hands.

The way he stretches his fingers long and stiff when he talks. It’s so familiar to me.

It's the way his elbows buckle when he swings his arms by his sides, to the beat of his own music.

It's got me reminiscencing. But I'm not sure why.

Common stood, arms swinging, at the front of the small theatre in Tribeca last night, for his NYC album listening party. From my third row seat, I glanced at the photos from his CD cover, shot by my girl Cassbird, which were superimposed on the large screen behind him.

“Look at the light,” I leaned over and whispered to photographer Delphine Fawundu-Buford. Next to her, Laylah Amatullah Barrayn from Vibe.com, arched her back and nodded at me. No words were needed, she knew what I was talking about.

A strong beam of light had settled upon Common’s face, creating amazing shadows and illuminating his high cheek bones. I studied his eyes, like I did four months ago on 47th st., during our conversation in the snow.

His eyes darted back and forth, landing on faces in the audience; young journalists from the country’s top magazines. His smile faded slightly and still mouthing song lyrics he stared, a little unsure of our reaction. But his head bopping intensified and the grin returned, when he caught a glimpse of someone in the audience, truly feeling the track.

His new album BE, an ode to real hip hop, real people, real music, had completed its 8th or 9th track when Common set us up for the next song, as he did with each one before it.

“Growing up in Chicago’s Southside, I was middle class,” he said. “So I was around all walks of life. I could relate to the gang-banger trying to survive and the preppy kids going to Jack & Jill parties.”

Only those familiar with the exclusive organization and its reputation laughed out loud, while the others just giggled, looking around worried that they had missed out on something funny.

Four or five tracks, later we previewed the premier video of his new single Go.

“This is it,” said Laylah. “This is the video I told you about.”

Last Saturday, after interviewing Common at his Columbia University performance, Laylah mentioned, over Instant Messenger, that Common had a somewhat risqué new video coming out.

“Word?” I asked, a little shocked that the words Common and risqué were even in the same sentence.

“I wonder what that’s all about.”

“We were in the studio and this track was on,” Common said enthusiastically, last night.

“And Kanye started saying, ‘Go, Go, Go.’ All of a sudden John Mayer was like, ‘maybe this could be about going back to your fantasies.’”

“I said wait. Am I gonna let John Mayer start making suggestions?” said Common, laughing and pulling at his beard. “This is hip hop.”

“But sometimes you don’t know when your blessing are coming,” he continued, regaining composure. “Cause if it wasn’t me, Ye and John then we wouldn’t have come up with this song.”

The video, a mixture of ill geometric designs and beautiful, scantly clad models, introduced viewers to Common’s intimate fantasies. Ending, surprisingly with him and the model playing his love interest, walking off into the sunset as his song Faithful faded out.

“People are like, ‘Oh but you’re a conscious rapper,’” said Common an hour later, in the lobby of the theatre. “But I mean, conscious rappers enjoy sex too.”

“Yes, but,” said the very opinionated and humorous writer Marcus Reeves, currently working on his new book about hip- hop after the black power movement.

“How is the ass that you just showed us on your video, any different than what we’re seeing in other videos?”

The friendly debate had been in flow for about five minutes, when a woman, short in stature, with flawless locks, corn rowed tightly and pulled into a braid, joined our small group. She passed around hugs and smiles and took only a few seconds before including her opinion.

“Well,” she said.

“I just felt like, where were the sisters with locks? You know the everyday woman. The variety? “I mean, come on,” she said turning her palm up, towards Delphine and myself as if we were on display.

“Yeah,” I agreed silently. “What about us?”

“But they were all sisters’ right?” asked Common, shoulders shrugged and a smirk on his face.

“Right?” he asked again, looking at me.

A DiAngelo classic, Brown Sugar was playing in the lobby and memories of college began flooding my mind, when Laylah approached us, straining to hear the conversation.

“Can a conscious rapper make a booty shakin video?” I thought to my self?” mentally escaping the ongoing debate unfolding in front of me.

“And is it booty shakin, if booties aren’t actually shakin, but just showing?

“I mean, I have to give Common props,” I thought. “Go wasn’t anything nearly as risqué as videos by The Yang-Yang Twins or Nelly. So does Common actually fall into their category, just for showing some skin?

“All I’m saying,” said Marcus. “Is that I don’t see this as any different. “So what, if it’s classy. I see ass. There’s no such thing as classy ass,” he argued, as members of the group chuckled.

"But," began Common. "No wait," interrupted Marcus.

I laughed out loud at his persistence.

“You say it’s different. But it’s not.”

“But, he’s just expressing that sexual side of himself, which is human,” said the music executive standing beside Common. “People are sexual beings.”

“I used to have cats tell me that they wouldn’t even listen to my stuff cause they couldn’t’ relate to me,” Common added quickly, determine to get his words heard.

“I used to say, ‘I’m not going to do that, because that would mess with my image. So I’m tryin to reach the people who couldn’t feel me before.”

“But, you need to sell records,” replied Marcus, waving his right hand horizontally from side to side, a drink in his left. “I know that. And I think the album is hot. But I know you need to sell records.”

“You can think that,” said Common, smiling with his hand on Marcus’s shoulder. “It’s cool.”

I turned around and peered at Laylah standing behind me, as the debate continued.

“What a long night,” I thought as I sighed.

Our little group eventually split up, as the crowded lobby began to clear.

Quite but intense conversations continued in secluded corners, behind funky leather couches, as Common and I chatted about Cassbird’s photo shoot and how the public is loving his album cover.

I moved over and let a most determined reporter from Damien Dash’s America magazine, conduct a short interview with Common about Kanye West, who produced BE.

“I thought you wanted food?” interrupted Common’s long time friend, who also appeared to be the night’s party’s planner.

I turned to look at Delphine, trying to read her face for the sign to stay or bounce. Her head was rockin back and forth to Go. It was the third time they’d played it in the last half hour and it was slowly growing on me.

“I need some more sushi,” I said.

“And I think there’s some in the corner,” I continued, as I headed towards the half empty tray.

Favela Rising

My Tribeca Film Festival Favorite. Check it!!!

"FAVELA RISING documents a man and a movement, a city divided and a favela (Brazilian squatter settlement) united. Haunted by the murders of his family and many of his friends, Anderson Sá is a former drug-trafficker who turns social revolutionary in Rio de Janeiro’s most feared slum. Through hip-hop music, the rhythms of the street, and Afro-Brazilian dance he rallies his community to counteract the violent oppression enforced by teenage drug armies and sustained by corrupt police. At the dawn of liberation, just as collective mobility is overcoming all odds and Anderson’s grassroots Afro Reggae movement is at the height of its success, a tragic accident threatens to silence the movement forever." MediaRights