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As I mentioned a couple of weeks ago, I'm currently taking a dj class at the Scratch Academy in Manhattan. At the start of each session our teacher, DJ Esquire, asks everybody if they've heard any new music or gone to any clubs during the prior week. I generally play the back of the class and keep quiet, but this week no one else had anything to offer so to break the silence I mentioned a mixtape I had picked up the day before class: Diggy Simmons' First Flight. Normally I don't go out of my way to pick up mixtapes from kid rappers - not since I got over my ABC phase back in '91, anyway - but after hearing the news on Friday that Diggy, son of Run DMC's Rev Run and nephew of Russell Simmons, had just signed a record deal with Atlantic Records I wanted to see if there was any talent behind what seemed like a rather obvious publicity stunt by Atlantic. When Esquire asked my opinion of First Flight, I quickly dismissed it as "wack" (like a baseball bat), not at all concerned that I might actually have to defend the opinion because a) it's a mixtape by one of the kids from Run's House and b) we generally only spend a minute at most on this part of the class, with little time for debate, and quickly get into the week's lesson.
Little did I know that I would be called to task for my opinion by DJ Jazzy Joyce, who happened to be sitting behind Esquire preparing for her appearance as the day's guest lecturer. For those who don't know, Jazzy is a deejay who came up in the Bronx's Forest Hills Projects with Fat Joe and the rest of the D.I.T.C. crew. She spent almost a decade working as one of the deejays on Hot 97's "Ladies Night," though as far as I'm concerned her greatest contribution to hip hop thus far has been her work with Sweet Tee on the classic 80's cut It's My Beat
In any event, as you might guess with a dj who's been around since the 80's and who's spent a large part of her career at Hot 97, Jazzy is a friend of the entire Simmons family and, not surprisingly, was obligated to defend the young Simmons' honor. After a quick back-and-forth, I was forced to concede that Diggy is certainly a better emcee than his older brother Jojo, occasionally even showcasing a surprisingly nuanced flow on the mixtape. If Diggy was an unknown, unsigned, young emcee I would have been a lot more forgiving of his efforts here. With an official record deal, though, expectations for any artist become considerably higher and I just don't think he's quite ready for prime time yet. The biggest problem is that, at such a young age and having grown up in such a privileged environment, Diggy just doesn't have a whole lot to say yet. Certainly he'll have experiences further on in life to share with his listeners, but at this point his lyrics consist of little more than talk about his family's wealth and celebrity, talk that's only interrupted by the repeated, and hard to believe, protests that the success he's had as an emcee has not been aided by either his father or Uncle Russ.
On this one point Jazzy agreed with me, saying that she expected his lyricism to improve with age and even suggesting that Diggy will mature as an emcee once he loses his virginity. A valid point, sure, though the father of the 11 year old student in our class probably didn't appreciate it as he inevitably had to explain to his son what Jazzy was talking about after the class ended.
The one aspect of Diggy's mixtape that I did appreciate was the fact that he went out of his way to feature two producers from his (and my) home state of New Jersey, Neako and Young Jerz. Any emcee that's willing to give some shine to local producers gets a pass from me, though, as I said, Diggy stills needs a few more years of work before he'll have earned that new record deal of his.
Everyone's entitled to their own opinion on the music, though, so have a listen to a couple of the tracks from the mixtape and decide for yourself:
Diggy Simmons - Hustle Simmons (produced by Young Jerz)
Diggy Simmons - Point to Prove (produced by Black the Beast)
You can download the First Flight mixtape for free over here.
As for Joyce, she dropped a whole lot of great stories on us during the class. Most of them won't make much sense without the proper context, so I won't bother recounting them. I did get her to talk about Hot 97 briefly, which she said now uses Serato exclusively, with the last dj at the station giving up on vinyl some five years ago. As she left the class, she offered this one final bit of advice: if you're ever deejaying at a club (or performing as an emcee, for that matter), always remember to bring your own microphone with you, as you never know if the person using the mic before you had a bad case of halitosis. Good advice.
Sweet Tee & Jazzy Joyce - It's My Beat
And as a bonus, here's Diggy rapping over the Made You Look beat:
Diggy - Made You Look
3/28/2010 6:45:51 PM posted by Fresh