“Soulidarity”: Using Hip-Hop to Build Community in the Age of Coronavirus
Needless to say, it’s hard to focus on hip-hop when we’re in the midst of a global pandemic. But hip-hop culture was created to help people maintain their spiritual balance under difficult circumstances, and it continues to provide that service. This month we spoke to Next Level artists about how they are dealing with the pandemic itself, and also the widespread stay-at-home directives that have shaped all of our lives over the last two months.
In most cases, that starts with figuring out how to translate common hip-hop practices to an online environment. Since most forms of hip-hop culture were already designed to be flexible enough to thrive in different circumstances – something we’ve repeatedly learned from our Next Level residencies – it should come as no surprise that hip-hop has been in the forefront of making this transition.
One of the first major attempts to bring hip-hop online for the current circumstances was a series of online sets spun by DJ D-Nice under the title of “Club Quarantine”. Other deejays soon followed, and within a few days, this trend evolved into a variety of online battles, most of which were much friendlier than the term “battle” might suggest.
For many viewers, the real attraction of these events was not so much the content itself, as it was the real-time interaction between artists and viewers in the chat and on social media.
By this time, many Next Level alumni were already figuring out how to translate their offline endeavors into Internet-friendly forms. Next Level Team Senegal’s Elliot Gann, for example, has already been hosting beat ciphers all over the world for many years, and he wasted no time in moving the cypher online. As both a hip-hop producer and licensed clinical psychologist, Gann has always been keenly aware of the therapeutic potential of beatmaking (see our interview with him for more info on his work in this area), and he took pains to emphasize communal healing in the way he constructed the cypher: Every week he posts a 20-minute .wav file containing vintage sound recordings from around the world, and participants then have a week to prepare a beat based on these sounds. Every Saturday, they convene and share their results. You can find more information here, or listen to the samples and results here.
Team Croatia’s b-girl Asia One is working on a similar outlet for dancers. “Our Bboy Bgirl community at large globally are doing some interesting things at this time including online global classes and talk-ins,” she writes. “We are getting the opportunity to hear a lot more about Bboys and Bgirls’ histories and stories at this time from all parts of the globe.”
“We are also working together to promote a global initiative that is a stay at home battle where competitors register online, upload footage to be selected and then battle round for round live from their living rooms, bedroom, etc using whatever space they have access to alone, against another competitor doing likewise. To promote it, we are going live and speaking to Bboys and Bgirls globally and sharing their stories. We are encouraging people to just post a clip of them getting down in their space whatever that is, and to share a part of their Hip-Hop story.”
“It’s pretty exciting because we are learning some important things along the way and instituting them as we go- such as countries like Uganda and some other East African countries can’t afford the $30 fee to join the comp so we started a donation program for people to donate so they can join. We are doing the same thing for other regions as well. We are also realizing that people are over thinking the submission video because they are possibly embarrassed or limited by their current surroundings, or too self-conscious, etc. And we are trying to help people overcome these type of issues just to be a part of things.”
This idea – fighting the emotional toll of solitary isolation – is also part of the agenda for Team Cambodia’s SANO. “Amidst cabin fever, grief and social isolation, I know it’s paramount to general health to consider the mental health affects of isolation and lack of exercise, or just a total disruption of your life's rhythm,” he writes. “I've been rounding out my preparation for lockdown needs such as energy generation, to growing my own food, and how to filter/purify my air and water. Meanwhile, on the creative tip, I just did an online name exchange with a graffiti-writer from Michigan. in the name exchange we drew each others name in a kind of style exchange. We can take video/pic to send to the other artist, or we can actually mail it to them. It took me a few minutes to do a simple outline for the homie, and a day later he sent my name... it definitely uplifted my spirit a bit, as it got me doing something productive, and it made me feel a little closer to another human tho we are still thousands of miles away but communicating online.”
“I know many creative heads are putting out videos inline with hiphop arts/culture... things like sketchbook tours, to paintings (analog and digital), to DJ battles, and MC battles, boy move of the day etc.”
One final example of that movement is Team Colombia’s Kid Glyde, who has been offering free online breaking lessons via Zoom. You can find more information on past and future classes at this Facebook page.
In the end, what all of these activities share is a commitment to community. As Asia one puts it, “The goal isn’t really the actual battle, it’s to bring Bboys and Bgirls together during this time in solidarity or soulidarity, to fight the solitary isolation.”