{"id":15293,"date":"2018-10-17T05:30:18","date_gmt":"2018-10-17T09:30:18","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/?p=15293"},"modified":"2018-10-18T07:25:55","modified_gmt":"2018-10-18T11:25:55","slug":"fantastic-negrito-we-can-turn-it-around-part-3","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/2018\/10\/17\/fantastic-negrito-we-can-turn-it-around-part-3\/","title":{"rendered":"Fantastic Negrito: We Can Turn It Around (Part 3)"},"content":{"rendered":"

Continued from Part Two<\/a>…<\/i><\/p>\n

The production on The Last Days of Oakland<\/i> is \u201cboxy,\u201d and Xavier says that that quality is a deliberate aesthetic choice. \u201cI wanted it to feel like I’m sitting right in someone’s living room,\u201d he says. And I tried to minimize production; I was really going for a sense of urgency, immediacy, right now.\u201d He sums up his mindset: \u201cI try to do less, do smaller, and do it right there where it’s happening.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"In our 2016 conversation, Xavier was already thinking about his next Fantastic Negrito album. \u201cI’ve been writing quite a bit,\u201d he told me. \u201cAnd I had an idea: I really want to resolve a lot of things with my Dad. I ran away at 12 and I never saw him again; he passed away when I was in foster care.\u201d Xavier’s idea at that time was to create an album around themes of unresolved father-and-son issues.<\/p>\n

But in the year that followed, he spent a great deal of time on the road and in front of concert audiences. By the time late summer 2017 rolled around \u2013 and with studio time booked for December \u2013 Xavier’s thinking had changed a great deal. \u201cI’m a coward,\u201d he explained in October. \u201cI abandoned that. It’s too much; I just wasn’t ready for it. Maybe someday.\u201d<\/p>\n

Still, and paradoxically, adopting the persona of Fantastic Negrito has empowered Xavier Dhprepaulezz to reveal more of himself. While his X Factor<\/i> era music is enjoyable, there is \u2013 at least in relative terms \u2013 a shallowness and superficiality to it. But leaving his given name behind and taking on a stage name (one filled with a boastful, hype-filled hip-hop attitude) frees him to dig deeper emotionally and to deliver in a more heartfelt and meaningful way. Stage name be damned, that lack of artifice is key to his connection with his audiences, both onstage and on record.<\/p>\n

But it’s always wrapped in an invented persona. Asked if he has ever once regretted creating Fantastic Negrito,\u201d he responds with a quick and emphatic no. \u201cI don\u2019t like Xavier,\u201d he says. \u201cI like the incarnations. I like Fantastic Negrito, Chocolate Butterfly, Blood Sugar X; I like all these people.\u201d But the invented incarnations do connect with audiences. \u201cThere’s a reason that Chris Cornell took me out on tour three times, Sturgill Simpson takes me out,\u201d he says. \u201cThey get<\/i> it. Songs are connectivity.\u201d<\/p>\n

So who is this man when he’s not writing, performing or recording? \u201cThen, I\u2019m not Fantastic Negrito,\u201d he says. \u201cPeople see me on the street \u2013 I could be with my kid or something \u2013 and ask, ‘Are you Fantastic Negrito?’ And I go, ‘Not now. That\u2019s that other<\/i> dude. He\u2019s a lot to deal with.’\u201d In those situations, he says he wants to be \u201ca civilian. It\u2019s like Spider Man’s Peter Parker; that\u2019s how I feel.\u201d<\/p>\n

As he entered the studio in December 2017, a theme had coalesced around his new material, some of which he had previewed onstage at LEAF a few months earlier. He says that two of those songs, \u201cPlastic Hamburgers\u201d and \u201cThe Duffler\u201d explore his current thinking. \u201cThey just seem about humanity,\u201d he explains. \u201cThe unnamed people. Lyrically they seem about people that I know, neighborhoods that I grew up in, filled with interesting characters. Flawed people.\u201d He cites a Buddhist concept, \u201cThe philosophy of desire being the road to misery: wanting things we don’t have.\u201d<\/p>\n

By the time of the December sessions, the upcoming album \u2013 released June 15, 2018 \u2013 had a provisional title: Please Don’t Be Dead<\/i>. The title refers not to a particular person but to the American dream. Xavier expresses his hope that the things he values will survive this era: \u201cthis normalcy, this country that we built, this way of life that we built, this happiness that we built, communication.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"\u201cThere\u2019s so much that\u2019s going on in the world,\u201d Xavier says. \u201cI think there\u2019s a responsibility in the job \u2013 for me, especially as an artist \u2013 that you do something compelling and interesting.\u201d And as the ironic ancient Chinese blessing portends, we do indeed live in interesting times. Xavier believes that Americans \u201cvoted into office extremely dangerous right wing people who fan the flames of intolerance, hatred, and bigotry.\u201d<\/p>\n

As the subject of flawed personalities colors our conversation, Xavier mentions one in particular; the current resident of the White House. \u201cThe cast of characters we have leading us now are severely flawed people, in terms of character and their personalities,\u201d he says. \u201cThe presidency of Trump is interesting from an artist’s perspective. I mean, everyday you wake up and you\u2019re like, ‘What\u2019s this guy doing?’ It’s shocking. And now we’re to the point where we realize, ‘Whatever it is, tomorrow\u2019s gonna be some other shit that\u2019s even more<\/i> bizarre!’ He’s the attacker. Attacks everybody. It’s just amazing how many fires this guy’s started.\u201d<\/p>\n

He continues, revealing a curious kind of empathy with Trump. \u201cWe put our fate and all this power in the hands of somebody so flawed, and he flaunts it. He\u2019s definitely a reflection of a lot of us, a lot of people I know. He\u2019s interesting; I\u2019ll give him that. He\u2019s a reality star. And he\u2019s always in my head, because I recognize<\/i> that person. Maybe I\u2019ve been<\/i> that person, that extreme narcissist.\u201d Pausing, he adds, \u201ca lot of people would say, ‘Yes, you have been that guy.’\u201d<\/p>\n

Xavier also mentions the hubris he sees in a figure like disgraced Hollywood mogul Harvey Weinstein. \u201cThere\u2019s a sense of arrogance that must go along with every single person you come across; you\u2019re gonna keep making the same mistake, because there\u2019s this power thing going on. That arrogance is something I see in people in my neighborhood, too.\u201d<\/p>\n

Click here to continue<\/a>…<\/i><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Continued from Part Two… The production on The Last Days of Oakland is \u201cboxy,\u201d and Xavier says that that quality is a deliberate aesthetic choice. \u201cI wanted it to feel […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":15303,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[9,31,41,49,60,69],"tags":[2868],"class_list":["post-15293","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-blues","category-funk","category-interview","category-new-release","category-rb","category-soul","tag-fantastic-negrito","cat-9-id","cat-31-id","cat-41-id","cat-49-id","cat-60-id","cat-69-id","has_thumb"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15293","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=15293"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15293\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":15371,"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15293\/revisions\/15371"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/15303"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=15293"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=15293"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=15293"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}