ABSYTE (ABSOLUTE NSYTE)

Chi-town hip-hop act Absyte piques our interests with her brand of conscious raps and on her new song “Truth Seeker” she delivers solid performance while dropping gems for us to grow on.

Bolstered by a cinematic backdrop courtesy of Da Grynch, Absyte wastes no time in diving into the issues that affect us all. Real-time issues in the current state of affairs ranging from systemic racism, discrimination, and more, Absyte looks at the situation and profers solutions as the song progresses. Lines like “Too late, open up heavens gate/Some be running to goals like trains that can’t wait” sees her imploring listeners to sometimes take it easy and smell the roses before time’s up.
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TAGS:ABSYTE - THE WORD IS BOND BLOG

It's reigning women
Moira McCormick, Special to the Tribune
CHICAGO TRIBUNE
Nothing gets Chicago rapper Psalm One fired up faster than the "femcee" label.

"I like to think I'm being respected more and more as an MC -- not a `femcee,'" says the young hip-hop artist, who happens to be female. "That `good . . . for a girl' [stuff] is crap."

Psalm One is one of Chicago's most buzzed-about rappers. Her upcoming album "The Death of Frequent Flyer" is in the final stage of negotiations for release on high-profile independent hip-hop label Rhyme Sayers Entertainment, home of indie-rap superstars Atmosphere. The album features beats by Atmosphere producer Ant and a guest rap from Rhyme Sayers heavyweight Brother Ali. She and Ali open for legendary underground rapper MF Doom (newly signed to Rhyme Sayers) Nov. 15 at the Abbey Pub.

Psalm's not alone in her disdain for the "femcee" tag; indeed, for anything that causes her and her increasingly visible sisters-in-arms to be considered separate from hip-hop in general.

"A lot of people still think girls can't rap," says veteran rapper/producer Ang 13, one of the city's most respected MCs for the past decade. She performs at Metro on Nov. 24 with one of her own favorite local luminaries, Absyte. "We have to work 150 percent harder to get a third of the credit -- we are the super-underdogs. It'd be nice if we were just considered rappers, not `female rappers.' But hip-hop is male-dominated."

An outspoken child

Ang 13 (Angela Zone) was born in Zaire and moved to Chicago at age 5. Outspoken from the get-go, yet all but muzzled at school and at home -- "I wasn't even allowed to go to family reunions, because they knew I was gonna tell all the business" -- she started rapping because "I hated being stifled all the time. I had to speak.

"Hip-hop saved my life," Ang (pronounced "Anj") says candidly. Without it, "I think I would've been a young mother. I think I would've been an abusive person -- drug abuse, alcohol.

"With hip-hop, we draw off of each other's art, each other's energy. And once it flows, there's no stopping it."

There was certainly no stopping the budding MC herself, once she got her first taste of rhyming for an audience in 7th grade. Uncompromising, fearless, articulate and a formidable physical presence, Ang 13 built her renown both solo and, for a time, as part of all-girl crew Lyrisis.

She regularly took down men in battle raps, and graced a host of compilations and mix CDs, even guesting on Los Angeles-based major-label act Jurassic 5's 2002 album "Power in Numbers."

Ang 13 is planning to release three indie CDs over the next nine months, and continues to perform around the city -- recently commanding the mic at Wicker Park club the Note's inaugural all-female hip-hop night "Lady's First."

Appearing at the event were a plethora of Chicago's double-X (as in chromosome) rappers, including Psalm One, Steph Staa, Lyrisis, Jabba Jones, Keesh Future, Lady Flipside and Underground Railroad.

Unlike mainstream counterparts such as the exhibitionistic Lil' Kim, "they don't play their femininity as a gimmick," observes "Lady's First" promoter Sunil Honeycutt, who says the event will be staged quarterly.

Honeycutt also manages and deejays for cherubic powerhouse Staa, a burgeoning singing/rapping talent.

As South Chicago native Staa sees it, too many women rappers are "more like strippers." Some time ago, she recalls with a grimace, a potential manager informed her that she "had to be more marketable, wear more revealing clothes," if she wanted to make it.

"But even before I'm a singer or a rapper, I'm a songwriter," Staa says. "I have a responsibility."

Sobering conversation

Conscious hip-hop with an edge is the specialty of Absyte (Camille Jones), an intense, laser-eyed beauty with a biology-psychology degree and a 2003 New York battle-rap victory, against 16 men, under her belt. She recalls a sobering conversation with local hip-hop producer Xtreme:

"He very eloquently told me it's a risk [for a record label] to try breaking a female hip-hop artist without having her trail behind a group of guys -- like Lil' Kim behind Biggie [Smalls] and Eve behind DMX," Absyte says. "My feminist reaction was, `This is b.s.,' but realistically, it's probably true."

Still, Absyte's pushing her debut mix CD, "Absolute Swagga," on her own, performing around town and aiming to encounter a record exec with a more enlightened outlook.

"There is some truth to the idea that a successful female rapper has to be either part of a male crew, or be eye candy," says Bryan Leach, vice president of urban A&R at TVT Records, home of chart-toppers Lil Jon & the Eastside Boyz. "Although the `eye candy' factor can apply to males too -- Ja Rule, for example, took off his shirt and promoted sexuality.

"Still, there is a double standard," he acknowledges. "A perception that guys won't buy records from a female MC who can rhyme but isn't all that attractive."

That perception's not stopping the new crop of women rappers. Psalm One recalls that as a teen she initially resisted hip-hop as a creative outlet.

"For about two weeks in 9th grade, I did the alternative thing -- I was only gonna wear black and write poetry and be all withdrawn," she says drolly. "But that didn't work."

What was, ultimately, most appealing about hip-hop to the young then-Cristalle Bowen, who spent most of her formative years in the South Side's Englewood neighborhood (playing drums at church and in basement bands), was "the fact that you could say anything, write anything. I wrote raps for an entire year before I let anyone know I did."

Bowen adopted the name Psalm One from Psalm 65:11: "It's that Bible verse, `Thou crownest the air with thy goodness, and thy paths drop fatness.' I was like, `Ooh, the Bible says `fatness'!"

Gaining inspiration

Female hip-hop role models (Lauryn Hill and Digable Planets' Ladybug, and respected old-schoolers such as MC Lyte, Queen Latifah and Salt-N-Pepa) were inspiring for Psalm -- especially the "prolific and mind-boggling" former Fugee's landmark 1998 solo debut "The Miseducation of Lauryn Hill."

She also cites groundbreaking Chicagoans Rita J, of local collective Family Tree, and the duo Infamous Syndicate -- made up of Shawnna (daughter of blues great Buddy Guy and a member of Ludacris' crew) and Teefa (a WGCI air personality.)

While pursuing a chemistry degree at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Psalm One joined hip-hop crew PDX. She subsequently released a solo independent EP, the fresh and disarming "Whippersnapper." Her first full-length, "Bio:Chemistry" -- replete with Psalm's tangy, whip-smart observations on life -- debuted shortly before her 2002 graduation and will be re-released Nov. 30 with five new songs and a retooled title, "Bio:Chemistry 2:esters & essays," on Chicago label Birthwrite Records.

"In this male-dominated industry, you have to take yourself seriously and know why you're doing it," says Psalm One. "You need to be very thoughtful about it. Maybe when I get a little older and I'm still doing this, a girl might be looking up to me, you know?" - The Chicago Tribune