Week's ago the coroner's report finally revealed that it was a pulmonary embolism that killed Hip Hop luminary Heavy D. Heavy D died at 44 an age that is eerily close to my own age of 37 which made me reflect on my journey with this swagtastic, well rounded(no pun intended) entertainer.
Dwight Myers came bouncing into my life via Video Soul one afternoon in 1986. His panache coupled with his energetic vocal presentation made him an immediate role model. Before going any further I was an overweight 11 year old at the time and the only extra large emcees went by the nom de plum Fat Boys. I enjoyed there music and was a huge fan but didn't want to emulate them outside of the occasional beat/eat box display for extra pizza in the lunch room. With Heavy I saw an emcee that resonated with who I envisioned myself to be right then not someone I had to evolve into. LL at the time was the only rapper that I aspired to be, so much so that I adopted the name LL Kool Rai for about half a day. To become LL I had to shed pounds, bulk up, and grow but not with Heavy I could be fly and flabby. The lyrics told me so.....
Dwight Myers came bouncing into my life via Video Soul one afternoon in 1986. His panache coupled with his energetic vocal presentation made him an immediate role model. Before going any further I was an overweight 11 year old at the time and the only extra large emcees went by the nom de plum Fat Boys. I enjoyed there music and was a huge fan but didn't want to emulate them outside of the occasional beat/eat box display for extra pizza in the lunch room. With Heavy I saw an emcee that resonated with who I envisioned myself to be right then not someone I had to evolve into. LL at the time was the only rapper that I aspired to be, so much so that I adopted the name LL Kool Rai for about half a day. To become LL I had to shed pounds, bulk up, and grow but not with Heavy I could be fly and flabby. The lyrics told me so.....
I'm healthy and stacked not a beast all fat
I get applauds and awards every time I rap
I love the way I am, I would never switch
I'm the greatest entertainer since porno flicks
From that point on his style became my style but I couldn't follow too close or else it would appear like jockery. So I added little flourishes of my own to maintain some semblance of individuality. Heavy wore Coca-Cola clothing and so I would rock Pepsi. Heavy was draped in head to toe stone washed denim in Money Earnin', Mt. Vernon video and so I donned a similar ensemble for my first official performance as an mc. In the song Don't You Know he mentioned on the day of his betrothal he would be wearing a, "fly white tuxedo looking smooth." So for my eighth-grade graduation it was mandatory that I wear a white suit.
His nicknames were reconfigured to express my own desire to be a romantic type. By ninth grade I would change my hip hop moniker almost weekly. For a day I was the Extra Large Lothario which brought a look of disgust from my boy DJ. He then told me that was a bootleg version(not really the term used but the 1989 equivalent) of the Overweight Lover. From that point on I had to distance myself from the obvious paeans to this MC. Yet there was still something that Heavy D brought that few have before and even fewer since. The love aspect.
Having never been a rough and tumble brogue I always gravitated towards emcee's who expressed love in their music. LL Cool J and Spoonie G preceded Heavy as rap Romeo's but D was just as adept as these men at making the hip hop love songs. Though they were referred to initially by critics as warmed over LL verses there was an obvious affinity for affection from the onset of his career. By the time he dropped Big Tyme he had figured how to make these types of songs his own way. Combining R&B, reggae, swing and hip hop into the mix, he made a musically intoxicating concoction. This tape was so good that my cousin's cousin stole it from our best friend. This Cd spawned so many Heavy D imitators who made some good songs but never outshined Big Daddy. Father MC, Phalon(Jazze Pha), and Queen Latifah were all cut from the Heavy D cloth but never had the musical productivity that Heavy exhibited(Latifah being the exception). His sound it could be argued was the blueprint for Bad Boy records.
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Blue Funk was his most aggressive outing not in the way Run Dmc overcompensated on Down with the King but a more brash work. This album was anchored by Truthful a song about a deceptive lover and an underground gem A Bunch of Niggaz. The tune which boasted an all star line up that included Guru, Busta Rhymes at his LONS apex, and a hungry up and coming Notorious BIG. The next two outings Nuttin' But Love(1994) and Waterbed Hev(1997) were steeped in R&B and carried an Adult Contemporary/Hip Hop tinge which many of his contemporaries employed because that sound allowed Puff to print his own money. Nuttin' But Love and later Mr. Smith by LL Cool J showed rappers that they could find their lane in this crop of MCs without selling out. I envision Big Lez's big legs prancing around every time my Ipod finds it's way to Black Coffee. This ode to the finest of around the way girls would even force my father to walk around and sing the hook.
Waterbed Hev was the most jiggy effort in his discography but was still not a cardinal sin because Heavy was always jiggy and the single Big Daddy just felt good. The production at times was saccharin sweet and used obvious samples but crate digging was never part of the Heavy D sound. The haters bashed songs like Keep It Comin' with it's warmed over Gap Band rip as trivial but to me the nimble tongued emcee rode the track like a jockey on a derby thoroughbred. This album was the first glimpse of " what more can I say" syndrome all rappers experience. It seemed like he was still playing well but now playing to the level of those around him with style and subject matter. This was still a solid effort and the last album that I enjoyed. The follow up was far too uneven for me to give any serious consideration on this page.
In the end Heavy was not so heavy having shed over 100 pounds he looked healthy and that inspired me to drop some lbs. All the words used in this pale in comparison to the true impact of this heavy set fly light skinned cat and what he embodied to other fly light skin cats. For all of those who followed after him we admired all he stood for and Dice Raw said it best I'm kindda W.E.B. Dubois meets Heavy D and the boys smooth as a Rolls Royce. That one bar says everything that I always wanted to say about myself filtered through the example of someone. A thinking revolutionary who loved his people and a fly quiet revolutionary who loved everybody. Curse you Dice, I couldn't have said it better.
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