Part 2: my piece on Prodgy/Mobb Deep music throughout my life.
Those were the kinds of times, the kinds of summers, that I remember with the bittersweet longing of a young life gone by. When I play those tracks, I can taste the chronic smoke, remember my baggy shorts, and Armani cologne, the cocaine I packed in green baggies, and razors I used to arrange it into lines. In Spring 2004, I sat in my friends Tahoe, and heard "Got It Twisted" for the first time, the classic beat, coursing through the new speakers, P's grim death threats and bloody imagery filling us all with the kind of fatalism we leaned on, in those times. "A little blood get on my daughter, it's nothing she'll live". The very essence of the song felt like us, as we ran through parties, fights, knifes, pistols fired in the air, beatings, the kind of reckless youthful behavior, you regret and miss in small moments.
I remember the day "Amerikaz Nighmare" dropped. I remember long nights partying in Tijuana, listening to the intro when I woke up the next morning, I remember loving even the Lil' Jon track, "Real Gangstaz", I remember riding the bus from court, back to my three person cell in South Bay county jail, hearing the remix of "Got It Twisted" with Twista, on the radio. I can remember buying "Return Of The Mac" in 2007, and playing it as I lived in a halfway house for 18 months.
"Legends" is still my favorite, I pushed that track on everyone. "The Rotten Apple" was a close second. The dreary, soulful production played as attended community college, took the bus, took the trolley to work. HNIC 2 was a first day purchase, "Young Veterans", and "When I See U" were classics. "I Want Out" detailed the infamous Saigon incident, in the way only Prodigy could, with ruthless menace, and direct threats.
I still listen to P and Mobb everyday, at least one track, or maybe a dozen, when I feel the need. The music is carved into my life, written in every year, every era, every day. I listen to "Quiet Storm" differently now, with the guilt, regret, pain, felt in lines like "I spent too many nights sniffing coke, wasting my life, now I'm tryna make things right..." I got sober in 2006, and have been since. People like P know my addiction, my alcoholism, and I know their's. I know the misery of "Drink Away The Pain", I had to find out for myself the emptiness we both found in the henny, the E&J, the 151.
I am saddened, though not surprised by his death, I feel for his family, his friends, his loved ones. As a fan, he did enough for me. As a fan of his music, he, like Pac, BIG, knew his time would be limited. We just didn't always want to believe it. And in our mourning, we see the kind of bonds that come from this music, these artists, who put their souls, their very essence into their music, and we get to find ourselves in the music.
This is my life, filled with memories colored, shaded, influenced, by Prodigy's, Mobb Deep's music.
