Torii MacAdams gets green like Swamp Thing
In Ego Trip’s Big Book of Rap Lists, rapper and legal department liability R.A. The Rugged Man lists the top ten ways to get dropped from a record label. Number one is “Glorify violence, keep your label in fear at all times and make them believe that making a mistake on your project will contribute to the end of their lives.” EarthGang have taken this lesson to heart. In their new video (for two-year old song) “The F Bomb,” members Johnny Venus and Doctur Dot storm the house of a label executive, taking him hostage with hands bound and a bag over his head. The unsurprising gist of “The F Bomb” is that EarthGang simply don’t give a fuck about a litany of issues deemed extraneous to their artistic expression, even (shock!) “a blogger, or a critic, who be talkin’ all that bullshit, with the typin’ and the clickin’.”
EarthGang, despite their distaste for my nocturnal clickins and typins are talented rappers. “The F Bomb”’s cooing, soulful sample provides the necessary platform for Doctur Dot’s modulating near-patois and Johnny Venus’ young Andre 3000-esque delivery. EarthGang’s Atlanta roots have lent them to Outkast comparisons from more than one publication*, which are inevitable for intelligent, youthful eccentrics from The A. EarthGang aren’t the preternaturally gifted supernova Outkast are, but their left-approach and avowed distaste for the pernicious effects of the rap game will surely continue to bear fruit.
Visually, “ The F Bomb” is a collision of The Purge and Snow on Tha Bluff; Johnny Venus dons a Jason-style hockey mask, and the rappers wield baseball bats and machetes. On leafy Atlanta streets, EarthGang are backed by similarly masked cohorts, carrying stenciled banners bearing the group’s feather (quill?) logo. Whether or not EarthGang care about critical acceptance is probably immaterial; their bandana’d bannermen are ushering Johnny Venus and Doctur Dot into greater Internet acclaim with each Youtube view.
*Passion of the Weiss included
