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icepack By A.D. Amorosi
³ IT’S SAD SEEING Philly boys fighting Philly boys, even ex-patriots. In one corner, we’ve got DJ/Mad Decent label owner Diplo over in L.A. In the other, we’ve got artist Jayson Musson up in Brooklyn. Anyone keeping track knows that the “Harlem Shake” sensation — an annoying No. 1 Billboard hit credited to DJ Baauer on the Mad Decent label — owes its title sample to Musson’s old Philly rap act Plastic Little and their 2001 song “Miller Time.”And Musson wants money. Does this have to go to court? Can’t you gents just sit down at the Melrose and talk it out? ³ South Broad Street’s Dolphin Tavern put up a valiant fight last year, with weekends full of rock shows, stripteases and big beer promotions. Nothing could save it, though, and it closed up shop in August. Then along came Avram Hornik to scoop it up as a complement to his then-recent purchase of the still-unopened Boot & Saddle.Surprisingly last week I spied the Dolphin’s neon sign shining down Broad like a beacon, and heard word that Hornik (and his Four Corners Management) will reopen the Dolphin March 20 with Kraftwork bartender Matt Summers watching over the homestead. And yes, the dancing girls will return. ³You can’t walk down East Passyunk Avenue without hearing the cursed question: “Who will replace George Sabatino at Stateside?” Now it’s time for an answer: Elijah Milligan from Vernick Food & Drink and Bar Ferdinand,come on down. You’re the winner. Now start chef-ing. ³ Maybe you’ve never seen just how handsome disc jockey Randy Kotz is, what with him being locked up in a booth at WMMR and WYSP all those years. Now, the new Fishtown resident Kotz can be seen as a cranky CEO in high-profile national print and billboard ads for the Southern Nevada Water Authority. The ad was shot at Power Plant Productions on North Second Street by renowned photographer Vincent Dixon for R&R Partners.Las Vegas, baby. ³You may have missed the Pink Skull DJs’ usual Second Friday party at Johnny Brenda’s,but that doesn’t mean that you can’t give Justin Geller and Julian Grefe some money. They just released Blind Babies of the International Sunshine Society on which they sample Led Zeppelin and Quando Quango. Usually that kind of thing is either illegal or a copyright debacle, but thanks to something called Legitmix, you can buy the new music as long as you already own or also buy the stuff being sampled. More at legitmix.com. ³ Congrats to Mitch and Anne Marie Cohen of Cohen & Co. Hardware at 615 Passyunk Ave. near South Street. They’re celebrating 100 years and four generations of family ownership, and will host a swell celebration before summer hits. ³ More swellness at citypaper.net/criticalmass. (a_amorosi@citypaper.net)
COLONELS OF TRUTH: (L-R) Marjani Clark, Hezekiah Davis and Lloyd Alexander of Johnny Popcorn. MARK STEHLE
[ hip-hop/soul/funk ]
THE NEXT EPISODE Hezekiah Davis gets hot and salty with Johnny Popcorn. By A.D. Amorosi
H
ezekiah Davis has two very different sides to his musical personality. There’s the West Philly-based, Delaware-and-West Chester-raised guy who made strange, conscious hip-hop under his own name. Hezekiah’s albums Hurry Up and Wait and I Predict a Riot were the toast of indie hip-hop, a sound Davis knew intimately from his time toying with Bahamadia, Grand Agent and The Roots before their major-label days. And then there is Johnny Popcorn, the abrasively soulful newwave-avant-funk ensemble in which Davis shows off his loud and lyrically caustic side. In sound and vision, the project reveals Davis’ deep roots, going back to his family’s origins in Kentucky and North Carolina. “My dad and uncles were real sarcastic assholes,” says Davis, laughing. “I’m probably a bigger asshole than they.” He calls his mom and pop the family’s true weirdos, “punk-funk heads” that raised him with a flair for the dramatic — “I was doing black theater in the ’80s before doing black theater was cool” — and a feel for the funk. “I can recite Grace Jones and Gil Scott-Heron songs back to front, but couldn’t sing a Marvin Gaye song to save my life.” Add Tone Whitfield, best known as Bilal’s musical director, to the mix, and Johnny Popcorn’s debut album, The Crow, is a tasty, cack-
ling mess along the lines of Janelle Monae or N.E.R.D. Davis has been a part of the scene since before Meek Mill was born. We laugh about lounges and events gone by — Wilhelmina’s, Footwork parties with DJ Rich Medina — and how Davis promoted rap-and-dance jams under his Beat Society moniker. “Remember that, remember that,” he says as we run down a murderers’ row of names, places and introductions.“Chuck Treece led me to Tone, who introduced me to Bilal with Musiq Soulchild in the room,” says Davis. The nu-soul community was tight back then. “Talk with one person, then somebody else co-signs for your credibility.” Davis never needed anybody to prove his mettle. Recalling the indie labels he was on — like Rawkus, then home to Mos Def and Talib Kweli — and the conscious rappers he’s known, Davis questions how truly independent they have been since then. He always wanted a manager but couldn’t find one who had as many connections in the biz as he did, so Davis managed himself. He learned to book his own gigs, figure out his flight and hotel plans and make deals with promoters. “I might’ve sold more units [by working with a manager], but I wouldn’t have had that say-so, that self-control,” he says. True independence also meant he didn’t want to rely on someone else to make his name or guide his way. “I didn’t want to glom onto anyone,” he says, taking his diplomatic time and measuring his words. “Then and now, I can either be Hezekiah or I can be amongst a list of people under
“My dad and uncles were real sarcastic assholes.”
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