Canadian Musician - November/December 2018 | Page 34

It seemed that, for years, Shad
was on the cusp of his “big
break.”
Canadian hip-hop had its share of
luminaries, to be sure, but never
its star – the type of artist that
could couple critical acclaim and
co-signs from high-profile peers
with mainstream recognition on
an international level.
To many, Shad was the
contender. Emerging in the
mid-aughts as a unique voice in
hip-hop, he had it all: innovative
and engaging lyricism, a univer-
sal flow, unique-but-accessible
production, and a compelling live
show to boot.
Right out of the gate with
2005’s When This Is Over, he was
turning the heads of hip-hop pur-
ists and the CanCon indie crowd
alike. Like k-os before him and a
few others after, he was our poly-
math MC with a sonic collage that
somehow screamed “Canadian”
through its left-of-centre eclecti-
cism. His follow-up, 2007’s The Old
Prince, was basically the antithesis
of a sophomore slump, earning
the MC his first of several Juno
Award nominations and coveted
spots on the Polaris Music Prize’s
10-album shortlist.
Then there was the a co-sign
from a top-of-his-game Kanye
West, who himself had proved
that the aesthetics of under-
ground and commercial hip-hop
needn’t be mutually exclusive.
Shad’s stock was soaring, and
even though Drake had come
along and claimed his crown,
lauded LPs in the following de-
cade – namely 2010’s TSOL and
2013’s Flying Colours – made it
seem like only a matter of time
before he broke into the main-
stream consciousness.
And then, he kind of did.
34 • C A N A D I A N M U S I C I A N
Following Jian Ghomeshi’s
highly-publicized dismissal from
his hosting duties of CBC Radio
One’s flagship arts and culture
program, Q, Shad was reportedly
one of the frontrunners to take
over the post. In March of 2015, he
was announced as the one who
would. Shad became a household
name, at least in Canadian house-
holds, but that came with a paus-
ing of his musical projects.
His stint at q lasted a little over
a year, and how successful it was
would depend on who you ask.
Still, the artist seemed to treat it
as just another stop on his artistic
journey. He found a seemingly
better fit as a host and interview-
er with Hip-Hop Evolution, an
acclaimed music documentary
series that premiered on HBO
Canada and went on to earn both
Emmy and Peabody awards. Its
latest four episodes just dropped
in October 2018 via Netflix.
He also released new music,
2016’s Adult Contempt, under
the pseudonym Your Boy Tony
Braxton, which found the artist
ditching his dense lyricism and
hip-hop beats in favour of an
intentionally kitschy throwback to
early ‘90s R&B.
But at long last, in the summer
of 2018, Shad dropped “The Fool
Pt. 1 (Get it Got it Good),” the first
track from an upcoming LP, with
the opening line, “Damn, it feels
good to be back.”
That sentiment was widely
echoed, and then reaffirmed
when the album, A Short Story
About a War, dropped in its
entirety in late October 2018
– his first formal hip-hop LP in
five years.
A Short Story About a War is, as its title
might imply, a concept album, and that
was the case from the outset, before a sin-
gle lyric had been penned.
“I’m not sure if I should call it a story or
an image, but something from my imag-
ination – a fictional world – came into
my mind some years ago, and just stayed
there,” the artist tells Canadian Musician.
“It was this story that I carried around with
me, and also kind of a lens through which
I’d look at the world and think of the
world, and specifically, think about, ‘What
is violence, defined broadly? And what is
peace, and what does it mean to live well
in the world?’ It was like, this might be
crazy, but let me try and make this story
come alive in musical form.”
Not just a concept, but a grandiose
one at that, it’s essentially the story of a
world consumed by war and divisiveness,
cliques and philosophies and ideologies
at odds with one another. Yet in this
fictional world are very real ideas and
explorations of politics, race, migration,
economics, spirituality, and of course, our
most basic humanity. Think Orwell in a
new medium for a new generation –
call it 2084?