& The Entertainer
HIS DUAL PERSONALITIES
By Andrew King
While Exit formally introduced k-os ’ inventive artistry to welcoming audiences , it was with his majorly successful sophomore effort , Joyful Rebellion , that he crossed over into the mainstream .
“ It was really with that record that my fear of the pop world …” he begins , pausing to contemplate his word choice . “ It ’ s not really fear , but I think most musicians I respect have a fear of consciously making pop songs , or pandering to that too much .” But on songs like “ Man I Used To Be ” and his hallmark hit “ Crabbuckit ,” he clearly shed that stigma , lacing the very essence of pop into his sonic concoction with impressive results .
Joyful Rebellion achieved platinum status , earned him hardware from the JUNOs and MMVAs , and had people across the country that wouldn ’ t have labeled themselves hiphop fans following one of its most innovative artists .
But k-os was – and continues to be – very aware of the fact that great albums are built on dynamics and balance , and for every sunny chorus or hook a la “ Crabbuckit ,” there ’ s a venomous verse of hard-hitting rhymes a la “ Emcee Murdah .”
The albums that followed found k-os getting more creative and experimental with his foiling of styles and influences , culminating in 2013 with BLack on BLonde , an ambitious double disc that introduced a clear division between the rap ( BLack ) and alt-rock ( BLonde ) musings of this multi-faceted artist .
The peak of his collaborative and experimental progress to that point , BLack on BLonde was responsible for the vintage fuzzed-out blues rock of lead single “ The Dog Is Mine ” on one half and the club-ready pop-hop banger “ Nyce 2 Know Ya ” and intoxicating flow of “ Spraying My Pen ” on the other , the latter featuring k-os and two of his most accomplished peers , Saukrates and Shad , dropping densely lyrical verses in something of an homage to the conscious hip-hop of the early ‘ 90s .
When it came time to start compiling his next work , though – one that would inherently be more solitary – k-os sought to revisit his winning formula ; to rediscover the synched duality , we ’ ll call it , that gave records like Joyful Rebellion , Atlantis , and Yes ! their offkilter cohesion .
“ I kind of go back and forth between those two elements , light and dark ” he begins about his approach for Can ’ t Fly Without Gravity . “ Being a Buddhist at my core , it ’ s a yin and yang kind of thing . It ’ s the natural way of the universe – night and day . Darkness infringes on us all because it ’ s the nature of the universe . I think following that in your work and art , you can ’ t really lose , because you ’ re just following a universal premise that you didn ’ t create . We met this here – dark and light going together and needing each other .”
The process involved the artist dissecting the relationship he ’ d fostered with pop music , and even the genre itself . “ Let ’ s be real ,” he opens . “ Black people in music history , our job has been to entertain people . It ’ s , ‘ Hey , boy , play a song for us ,’ and everyone goes for it because it ’ s happy and it ’ s fun , and there ’ s nothing wrong with that .”
To clarify his point , he mentions Sammy Davis Jr . – “ one of the best entertainers ever , but not someone that ’ s known for his lyrics or what he had to say . Pop is often about entertaining . But take Kurt Cobain . Kurt never wanted to entertain . That idea of entertaining people , if you ’ re a true artist , you want to have your say and be lauded after for more than just being an entertainer .”
And that ’ s the balance he wanted to strike on Can ’ t Fly Without Gravity – songs that are entertaining and accessible but still carry substance ; that go into darker or more complex places than those commonly associated with mainstream pop . He lists artists like The Beatles , Bowie , and Radiohead as ambassadors of the idea that songs can be magnetic and meaningful at the same time . “ And once you get to that level of artistry , you ’ re not really worried about entertaining people anymore , unless you ’ re so entertaining , like David Bowie , where even your far out stuff becomes pop .”
The album does an admirable job of straddling that line and maintaining its balance . The lead single , “ WiLD4TheNight ( Egoland ),” is a microcosm of that dynamic , boasting an EDM beat that ’ s in tune with what ’ s currently dominating the charts but featuring the rhyme prowess and vocal hooks that people have associated with k-os for over a decade .
Of course , he keeps the straight rap strong and sharp on cuts like the aptly-titled ( though criminally short ) “ Rap Zealot ” and “ Boyz II Men ,” featuring Canadian hip-hop pioneers Saukrates , Kardinal Offishall , and Choclair – members of early ‘ 90s crew The Circle – rhyming alongside Shad , King Reign , and a killer closing verse from k-os himself .
“ That started out as a Wu-Tang experiment one afternoon in my apartment ,” k-os recalls . It began with a call-out to Saukrates to add a verse to the track , though once he had it , he sent it to Choclair in hopes of eliciting a verse from him . That turned into a formula – sending a new MC the previous one ’ s verse to inspire another that would drop in sequence within the track . “ Everyone ’ s just trying to outdo the guy before him ,” k-os shares . “ I was mesmerized by it . It was like , ‘ Is this really going down ?’”
To really delve into the styles he was exploring on BLack on BLonde , k-os recorded the majority of its cuts with guest producers , from hip-hop royalty in T-Minus on the first half to Canrock icons like Ryan Dahle of Limblifter and Mounties and Sebastien Grainger of Death From Above 1979 on the other .
This time out , though , k-os has sole or shared production credits on all but three tracks . “ Sometimes , you need the contrast of another mind to show you the way ,” he says in direct reference to BLack on BLonde . But after welcoming a relatively lengthy cast of collaborators into that project , he set out to go back to his own yin-yang formula and some of the artistic idiosyncrasies that come with it . “ To know what you do , you have to not do it ,” he says , comparing his latest two works . “ This is the triumphant return to the k-os sound , because this is just how I do it .”
Ultimately , Can ’ t Fly Without Gravity seems to have left k-os with the idea that his dual creative selves can coexist without compromise ; that a great artist and a great entertainer can be one in the same . It ’ s as musically ambitious as anything he ’ s put out , defying the conventions of its time while borrowing bits and pieces of influence from different people , places , and eras in a welcome return to form . n
Andrew King is the Editor of Canadian Musician .
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