Black News

Each week as part of SunLit — The Sun’s literature section — we feature staff recommendations from book stores across Colorado. This week, the staff from Old Firehouse Books in Fort Collins recommends a tale of self-improvement, an Indigenous mystery and a biography of George Washington Carver.

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From the publisher: Comics and cultural superstar Alison Bechdel delivers a deeply layered story of her fascination, from childhood to adulthood, with every fitness craze to come down the pike: from Jack LaLanne in the 60s (“Outlandish jumpsuit! Cantaloupe-sized guns!”) to the existential oddness of present-day spin class. Readers will see their athletic or semi-active pasts flash before their eyes through an ever-evolving panoply of running shoes, bicycles, skis, and sundry other gear.

But the more Bechdel tries to improve herself, the more her self appears to be the thing in her way. She turns for enlightenment to Eastern philosophers and literary figures, including Beat writer Jack Kerouac, whose search for self-transcendence in the great outdoors appears in moving conversation with the author’s own. This gifted artist and not-getting-any-younger exerciser comes to a soulful conclusion. The secret to superhuman strength lies not in six-pack abs, but in something much less clearly defined: facing her own non-transcendent but all-important interdependence with others.

From Dany, bookseller: When the weather turns cold the very last thing a book lover would want to do is go running. I mean, it’s basically a cliché how we all curl up with our books and a cup of tea the moment the temperature drops below 60. In her autobiographical graphic novel Alison Bechdel flips our cozy clique on its head and shows that really the most literary thing you could do is suffer outside in the cold, exercising!

Bechdel takes us through waves of exercise trends that she has witnessed first hand: the first joggers in the ’70s, the emergence of yoga and karate in the ’80s, and the gear revolution of the ’90s! So take inspiration from some of the greats: Wordsworth, Coleridge, Emerson, Kerouac, and many more of the transcendentalist writers that Bechdel references and GO OUTSIDE!

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From the publisher: On the surface, Alice is exactly where she thinks she should be: She’s just given birth to a beautiful baby girl, Dawn; her charming husband, Steve — a white academic whose area of study is conveniently her own Mohawk culture — is nothing but supportive; and they’ve moved into a new home in a posh Toronto neighborhood. But Alice could not feel like more of an impostor. She isn’t connecting with her daughter, a struggle made even more difficult by the recent loss of her own mother, and every waking moment is spent hiding her despair from Steve and their ever-watchful neighbors, among whom she’s the sole Indigenous resident. Even when she does have a minute to herself, her perpetual self-doubt hinders the one vestige of her old life she has left: her goal of writing a modern retelling of the Haudenosaunee creation story.

Then, as if all that wasn’t enough, strange things start to happen. She finds herself losing bits of time and hearing voices she can’t explain, all while her neighbors’ passive-aggressive behavior begins to morph into something far more threatening. Though Steve assures her this is all in her head, Alice cannot fight the feeling that something is very, very wrong, and that in her creation story lies the key to her and Dawn’s survival…. She just has to finish it before it’s too late.

From Teresa, bookseller: This book stunned me…I was not expecting the twists and turns it took to get to the ending but I loved every single word on the pages. A strong, unflinching take on motherhood, mental illness, generational trauma and fake allyship are also some of the heavy topics that Elliott writes about in a beautifully crafted way. I can’t stop thinking about the Disney version of Pocahontas, thanks to this book and I have a feeling that I won’t for a long time.

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From the publisher: Christina Vella offers a thorough biography of George Washington Carver, including in-depth details of his relationships with his friends, colleagues, supporters, and those he loved. Despite the exceptional trajectory of his career, Carver was not immune to the racism of the Jim Crow era or the privations and hardships of the Great Depression and two world wars. Yet throughout this tumultuous period, his scientific achievements aligned him with equally extraordinary friends, including Teddy Roosevelt, Mohandas Gandhi, Henry A. Wallace, and Henry Ford.

A prodigious and generous scholar whose life was shaped by struggle and heartbreak as well as success and fame, George Washington Carver remains a key figure in the history of southern agriculture, botanical advancement, and the struggle for civil rights. Vella’s extensively researched biography offers a complex and compelling portrait of one of the most brilliant men of the last century.

From Sterling, bookseller: Explore the life of one of the most incredible, fascinating and criminally overlooked historical figures to have been alive at the turn of the 20th century. George Washington Carver was a leading Black artist, professor, and scientist of the time, who used his incredible drive almost entirely in the service of improving his communities’ lives. This biography offers an affordable price point for a thorough examination of his life, including his romantic pursuits and what little is known of the enigma of his youth. 

Carver was so much more than just “the peanut man”; he was skilled in every type of handicraft he ever pursued and at the forefront of agricultural sciences that are only now being rediscovered as the dire need to move away from petrol-chemical farming methods becomes ever more apparent.

RankTribe™ Black Business Directory News – Arts & Entertainment

• Young Thug is one of contemporary hip-hop’s most famous and idiosyncratic figures.
• The artist’s arrest in May 2022 on racketeering charges rattled the hip-hop community.
• With opening statements in the trial due to begin Monday in Atlanta, state prosecutors allege the chart-topping artist is the founder and head of YSL, an affiliate of the Bloods street gang.

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A rap vanguard essential to the Atlanta scene at the genre’s nerve centre, Young Thug is one of contemporary hip-hop’s most famous and idiosyncratic figures.

The artist’s arrest in May 2022 on racketeering charges rattled the community the 32-year-old came up in, as he and 27 other alleged street gang members were swept up in a sprawling indictment that charged some of them with violent crimes.

Opening statements in the trial began Monday in Atlanta. Beforehand, state prosecutors alleged the chart-topping artist, born Jeffery Williams, is the founder and head of YSL, or Young Slime Life, an affiliate of the Bloods street gang.

But defence attorneys assert that YSL is nothing but a record label and a family of artists known as Young Stoner Life – the name of the label Young Thug founded in 2016 as an imprint of 300 Entertainment, a subsidiary of Warner Music Group.

The rapper maintains his innocence.

The case has sparked widespread attention, not least because prosecutors plan to cite rap lyrics as evidence of criminal activity, a practice that for years has prompted accusations of racism and an unconstitutional curbing of artistic expression.

READ MORE | Rapper Young Thug arrested on gang-related charges

The month after his arrest, Young Thug urged fans in a video to sign a petition calling for legislation to restrict courts from using rap lyrics against defendants.

“You know, this isn’t just about me or YSL. I always use my music as a form of artistic expression, and now I see that Black artists and rappers don’t have that, you know, freedom. Everybody, please sign the ‘Protect Black Art’ petition and keep praying for us. I love you all,” he said in the message, which was shown at a concert.

The petition has since garnered tens of thousands of signatures.

Monday trial

On Monday, prosecutors in Atlanta said that rapper Young Thug was the “proclaimed leader” of a gang that “moved like a pack” to commit crimes as opening statements in a long-delayed racketeering case got under way.

“The evidence will show that YSL checks all of the boxes for being a criminal street gang,” said Fulton County prosecutor Adriane Love as she delivered the government’s statement, which she began by quoting Rudyard Kipling’s Law of the Jungle.

Love addressed the issue of songwriting head-on: “We didn’t chase the lyrics to solve the murder; we chased the murder and found the lyrics.”

She read verses from Young Thug’s track Take It To Trial, saying the lyrics the prosecution had identified had “an uncanny similarity to very true, and very real, and quite specific events”.

Using the rapper’s legal name, she said, “Jeffrey Williams’s words, that he promotes through songs with beats behind them – they aren’t random.

“Her presentation was stalled several times. In one instance because Love failed to disclose key parts of it to defence lawyers, as is required.

The mistake caused wrangling among attorneys and more delays, provoking the ire of Judge Ural Glanville.

Artists or a gang?

Max Schardt began the first defence statement on behalf of Shannon Stillwell late Monday. The defence has a six-hour time limit, one hour per defendant, and statements were set to continue Tuesday.

The defence insists YSL stands for Young Stoner Life Records, a hip-hop label that Young Thug founded in 2016 and which, they say, amounts to a vague association of artists, not a gang.

Wearing a white button-up shirt with a black tie and oval spectacles, Young Thug sat quietly in the courtroom as the judge detailed the charges against him and others for the jury.

The opening statements also did not start without a hitch: one juror had car trouble, meaning proceedings began nearly two hours late.

In attendance was Kevin Liles – the CEO of 300 Entertainment, under which Young Thug founded his label – who told journalists rap was being persecuted.”If this were country music, rock music,” he said, “we wouldn’t be here.”

‘Punishing Black expression’

Liles was among advocates who lambasted the state for citing lyrics as admission of criminal activity.

In a motions hearing earlier this month, Glanville gave prosecutors the green light to present 17 sets of lyrics as evidence, provided they could link their content to real-world crimes.

Defence attorneys had sought to exclude lyrics from evidence, saying that “rap is the only fictional art form treated this way”.

Erik Nielson, a University of Richmond professor and specialist on the subject, told AFP earlier this year that prosecuting rap lyrics “resides in a much longer tradition of punishing Black expression”.

Nielson could not comment directly on the YSL case as he will testify as an expert witness.

The lengthy jury selection and Monday morning’s delays are part of a much longer road to come. It’s expected the trial could last well into 2024.

The prosecution has filed a list of hundreds of potential witnesses. The defence’s list includes family members and fellow rappers TI and Killer Mike.

Monday’s opening statements took place in the same Fulton County courthouse where former president Donald Trump is himself embroiled in a racketeering case over alleged attempts to overturn the 2020 election.

Stories, not crimes

Young Thug’s lyrics describe the violence-plagued and poverty-stricken environment the rapper grew up in but aren’t evidence of criminal activity, his lawyer Brian Steel said in court Tuesday.

Attorney Brian Steel detailed the artist’s rags-to-riches trajectory as part of the defence’s opening statements.

In a lengthy opening, Steel described Young Thug’s upbringing in since-closed housing projects in Atlanta, where his family could barely afford food or utilities and lived in a community riven by violence fuelled by severe poverty.

His raps detail murders, shootings and drug use because “this is the environment that he grew up, these are the people he knew, these are stories he knew,” Steel said.

The attorney said the artist aspired to fame to “break the generational hopelessness” experienced by his family.

The lawyer also said the rapper developed “deep embedded beliefs about our criminal justice system” – namely that it “was not just – at least not for the people that he saw”.

Steel described one scene where the rapper’s then-20-year-old brother was shot near their building, and when police arrived, they handcuffed his overwrought mother and put a sheet over his brother, even though he was still breathing.

Once he gained celebrity for his art, Steel said Young Thug became a mythical figure in his community, and engaged in rivalries online not as part of a gang but to “generate interest” in his work, as is common in the industry.

Comparing it to sports, Steel said:

‘Rap weirdo’

Born 16 August 1991, Williams grew up in the Jonesboro South projects of Atlanta, where other renowned rappers, including Waka Flocka Flame, 2 Chainz and Ludacris also came from.

As a teen, he declared himself to be the “next Lil Wayne,” another Southern rapper he idolised in his youth – before becoming friends with him, getting bigger than him, and eventually beefing with him.

Starting in 2011, the young rapper released mixtape after mixtape, drawing the attention of Atlanta legend Gucci Mane, who signed him.

His debut commercial single Stoner gained acclaim, while fan favourite Danny Glover earned him remixes from prominent rappers, including Nicki Minaj.

Beloved for his experimentation in the booth, Young Thug pulled off avant-garde flows rife with voice cracks and squeals, made trippier by mind-bending rhymes and scrambled words.

One critic at the hip-hop magazine XXL dubbed the prolific artist a “rap weirdo,” while Billboard applauded his vocal contortions: “He finds a new way to distress and warp his tone, to burrow resourcefully into rhythmic cracks and crevices.”

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Over more than a decade, Young Thug has won legions of fans, though, for years, his psychedelic, flamboyant style and famously outlandish personality overwhelmed the infectious peculiarities and mastery of his music.

But today, he is one of rap’s most emulated artists, spawning a new generation of Thug clones, including Gunna, Lil Duke and the late Lil Keed.

Gunna, one of Young Thug’s most famous proteges, was also swept up in the Georgia indictment but took a plea deal.

Critics have declared Young Thug among the most influential voices of his generation, crediting the rapper with concocting rap’s current flavour by infusing it with his singular uncanny expression.

“I love when people ask me what I’m saying,” he told The Fader magazine in 2014. “Even though I ain’t gonna tell them. I’ll let them listen 10 more years before I tell them.”

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