Food & Liquor 20 06

Atwenty four year old Lupe made his “official” commercial debut (he’d put one single out with a short-lived group “the pak” at nineteen) under the watchful eye of executive producer Jay-Z, after he was impressed by Lupe’s guest appearance on Kanye West’s “Touch the Sky.” From the outset, Lupe set his existential agenda, with the album’s name being a metaphor for good (“Food”) and evil (“Liquor”). Food & Liquor spans a myriad of topics from capitalism and mass consumption, to single parent households, personal and community vices. As he says in his intro,

“Complain about the liquor store but what you drinking liquor for? Complain about the gloom but when’d you pick a broom up? Just listening to Pac ain’t gone make it stop A rebel in your thoughts, ain’t gon’ make it halt”

As the album builds, Lupe’s wordplay, storytelling and penchant for extended metaphors gives us an insight into the mind of a young philosopher and shows how the environment he came from affects him. Lupe sets the stage for his universal pondering in this intro, laying out his dichotomy and alluding to the temptations, desires, obstacles and challenges he and his community face on a daily basis.

Earlier in the intro, his sister, Ayesha Jacko lays out the duality and dichotomy of life through the contrast of corner stores (also, nicknamed “Food & Liquors”) describing the actual life that plays out in their neighborhood in and around them.

Food and liquor stores rest on every corner

From 45th and State to the last standing Henry Horner

J&J’s, Harold’s Chicken, good finger lickin’

While they sin, gin, sin sin at Rothschild’s and Kenwood Liquors

The winos crooked stagger meets the high stride of the youth

She details the seediness of the establishment, describing characters lost to their lowest vices, unable to deal with the pain that turns to anger,

They rebel and raise hell across alleyways and in classroom settings

They get, high off that trunk bass and 20/20 rims

They rock braids, Air Force Ones, and Timbs

They drink Hennessy, Hypnotiq, and 40’s

They call they women hoes, bust downs, and shorties

They keep funeral homes in business and gunshot wards of hospitals full

And then, ultimately alludes to a hero, or at least a truth teller who will offer us hope (Lupe) as they expose the reality we face.

The well is running dry

The days of Malcolm and Martin have ended

Our hope has descended and off to the side

Waiting for the reinstallment of the

Revolution

Because we are dying at the cost of our own pollution

But God has another solution, that has evolved from the hood I present one who turns, the Fiasco to good

As a lyricist, and writer, Lupe’s style is dense, chocked full with layered and veiled meanings, allusions and allegory. In this debut, Lupe immediately lays claims to being a gifted storyteller, with all these tools at his disposal. One of his gifts is that despite his desire to tackle complex subjects, and crafting his music in a way that requires a close read, his prowess in delivery and structure allow for a pleasurable listen. As Hip-Hop emceeing has evolved, one of its main traits has been the level of speed and dexterity an emcee is required to have to show a level of skill. Multisyllabic rhyme patterns and triple entendres, to the uninitiated, can feel uninviting at best, and garbled incoherence at its worst. Lupe doesn’t stray into these dead ends, while still giving a master class in poetry over beats.

One of his songs, “He Say/ She say” is a great example of his storytelling. The song structure is a traditional hook/ verse/hook/verse, with the two verses being identical, except for the point of view. Lupe relays a first person conversation between a mother and her ex-husband. As the mother laments the lack of presence in his son’s life and the effects of this in the first verse, which then becomes the son’s identical conversation with his father in the second. Considering the parallel of Lupe’s own experience with a household wherein the father wasn’t a daily physical presence, yet was clearly a regular one within his son’s life, the song conveys how critical it is to the development of a child. In particular in this case of a young man to have his father’s presence more than anything:

Now I ain’t asking you for money or to come back to me

Some days it ain’t sunny, but it ain’t so hard

Just breaks my heart

When I try to provide and he say ‘Mommy, that ain’t your job’

To be a man, I try to make him understand

That I’m his number one fan

But it’s like you booing from the stands

You know the world is out to get him

So why don’t you give him a chance?” and he’s starting to harbor

Earlier in the verse, the speaker (Mom/Son) lays out the consequences of the actions (or inaction) by the father that affect his son.

Cool on food for thought, but for you he’s a starver

Starting to use red markers on his work

His teacher say they know he’s much smarter

But he’s hurt

Used to hand his homework in first like he was the classroom starter.”

Burst to tears, let him know she’s serious

“Now he’s fighting in class

Got a note last week that says he might not pass

Ask me if his daddy was sick of us

Cause you ain’t never pick him up

You see what his problem is?

He don’t know where his poppa is No positive male role model

To play football and build railroad models

It’s making a hole; you’ve been digging it

Cause you ain’t been kicking it

Since he was old enough to hold bottles

He wasn’t supposed to get introduced to that

He don’t deserve to get used to that

The song highlights a cause and effect to the father’s absence, ironically only present even in the verse through the voice of the mother and son, as Lupe does not have the father responding to the protests of his family. This, in a way, strengthens the position of the family, as the mother who speaks first, is the voice, and the conscious relaying to her (ex) partner what the cost of his absence is. A young man lost to violence, to apathy and possibly to end up as one of the nameless “winos” or “rebels” calling women “hoes” that Ayesha refers to in the intro. Lupe’s reference to the son’s harboring “a cool” on food for thought, a great play on words to show the son’s decreasing interest in school learning, is an idea he’ll return to in not only successive songs, but albums as well.

We see that cool personified in a song of the same name on the album, wherein we meet a nameless character (for now) who returns from an untimely demise. Again, Lupe’s imagery serves as much to bring numerous meanings and ideas, as it does to give listeners a powerful picture and something to connect with in the song

He came back, in the same suit that he was buried in

Similar to the one his grandfather was married in Yes, he was still fresh to death

Bling, two earrings, a chain layin’ on his chest

He still had it cause they couldn’t find it

And the bullets from his enemies sat like two inches behind it

Smelled the Hennessy from when his niggas got reminded

And poured out liquor in his memory, he didn’t

Mind It

But, he couldn’t sip it fast enough

So the liquor was just fillin’ the casket up

Floatin’ down by his feet was the letter from his sister

Second grade handwriting simply read, “I miss ya” Suit jacket pocket held his baby daughter’s picture

Right next to it, one of his mans stuck a Swisher

He had a notion as he laid there soakin’

He saw that the latch was broken, he kicked his casket open And he…

Lupe’s resurrected corpse carries all the stereotypes of a nameless, faceless hood character, complete with blunt, fly threads and chains, plus a bottle of henny for his transition. The hook itself provides the lesson of the parable:

This life goes passing you by It might go fast if you lie You born, you live then you die

Oh oh oh oh

If life goes passing you by Don’t cry

If you’re breaking the rules, making your moves

Paying your dues, chasing the cool

Over the next two verses, we watch as our hustler rises from the dead, and returns home, back to the very corner he was shot at, back into the path of the actual dealers who shot him the first time. gettin’ back in his lane

Doin’ his thang, first he had to find something to slang

Next stop was his block, it had the same cops

Walked right past the same spot where he was shot

Shocked that some lil’ niggas tried to sell him rocks

It just felt weird, being on the opposite

They figured that he wasn’t from there so they pulled out

And robbed him with the same gun they shot him with

Put it to his head and said, “You’re scared, ain’t ya?”

He said, “Hustler for death, no heaven for a gangsta”

Lupe’s tale also symbolizes the cycle of violence that exists within the confines of the community. Upon his return, “the cool” doesn’t reflect or pause to consider how he died, what that means, and why. The character almost acts as if nothing happens, his death a matter of circumstance and only a delay before he returns to his pursuits of the fast life. He’s so consumed by the hustle, not realizing he’s a corpse until in front of a mirror (as if tunneling out of a casket, and imbibing liquor that simply pours through him aren’t already dead giveaways) even after that realization he continues on his mission like a zombie possessed. These images draw us again back to Ayesha’s descriptions of the figures in front of the Food & Liquor wrapped up in their vices, spiraling towards an unseen end. Both of these songs, “the cool” and “he say/she say”, are cautionary tales, with the latter foreshadowing what’s to come in the former. Lupe’s subtle reference of “the cool” serving as a breadcrumb to follow.