Visionaries acting seasonal

Visionaries are becoming some kind of independent elders in local hip-hop: kids in ’89, learning listeners in ’93, and promising vanguard in ’98 when they released their first album on Key Kool’s own Up Above Records. And last year’s We Are the Ones We’ve Been Waiting For was an unabashedly personal album—Kool, Dannu, Zen, Rhettmatic, LMNO and 2Mex in fierce thoughtful form—heralding further depth ahead, but that’s a project for next year. Right now is 2Mex’s Anti-Xmas show, something of an anti-tradition, and the Visionaries/Shapeshifters double-headline with Xololanxinxo, Ellay Khule (a.k.a. Rifleman) and Low End Theory’s resident MC Nocando as support makes the philosophy behind the bill clear: This is for fans and family. Kool—who now runs Up Above from above the Hooters downtown—speaks now about fan days and families in his own life.

Was the Roadium Swap Meet as legendary as they say? 
We lived literally on the back wall of the Roadium, and there was a cut in the fence, so we’d just hop the fence every time and get in free. And there was a record stand—a guy named Steve Yano, a Japanese-American dude—and we’d roll up there and Dr. Dre was selling mix tapes, and Yano would play every new hip-hop record—we’d be like, ‘We’ll take that EPMD, we’ll take that Cold Crush Bros.’ We’d put together whatever money we could scrounge up, buy a few records, go to my homie’s house on the other side of the block and DJ all day—rhyming over beats, trying to do anything—and all weekend that’s all we’d do! Our first record Galleries was mixed at Steve’s studio, and I’d be like, ‘Do you remember me?’ And he was like, ‘Of course! You’re the tall Japanese-American kid who plays basketball!’

What neighborhoods do you go back to when you visit your families?
My parents are still there—the same place right behind the Roadium! 2MEX is still off Washington in Mid City and Dannu is from San Diego but lived in Long Beach off Cherry and Seventh—we used to go to that 7-11 all the time! We wrote Galleries in his house! LMNO is still in Long Beach and his grandma is over in Bixby Knolls. We’d always look at that as a haven—all nice and green! We’d hang out at the park and smoke weed—the bad kids!

Whose family has had the biggest presence on the albums?
A lot of my parents and my family are really involved in a couple of the records. The second one, Sophomore Jinx, was when I put my tail between my legs and moved home to finish school. I was working Up Above out of my house, and the whole group would come over for midnight recording sessions. Now my mom is like, ‘I miss being able to walk into your room and be like, “I like this beat!”’ The first set of records I sampled were their jazz records. I had my dad lay backing vocals on things—‘Hey, dad, I need some extra voices,’ and he’d say ‘Okay!’ and jump on it.

Is the rest of the Visionaries gonna bum on you for revealing all this family info?
No! Not at all. That’s what we’re all about. Even at our lowest low points—and I could say those have happened a lot, with six members grinding the indie scene, and money is short and sometimes situations are very bad—the only thing that kept us together is because our families taught us what unconditional love was. A lot of people are afraid to speak on those things. But without family and heritage and ancestry and our grandparents and parents, we wouldn’t be who we are or what we are. We just had the conversation last week—is the whole thing worth doing? We’ve been going for 12 years coming on 13—what are our plans? Take it easy? Or what’s the point? And upon reflecting, we were like, ‘Man, this is the best thing we ever had.’ We’ve always been the dudes everyone looked at: ‘Who the hell are these dudes? What’s a white boy and a Mexican rapping for? These guys aren’t supposed to be here! You’re idiots! Finish college, take a suit-and-tie job! You talk about love—that’s corny!’ One thing I realized about Visionaries—I look back on the biggest moments we had, and before every one of those moments, it’s been an adverse time. People are saying music is dying—but we’re like, ‘Wow, this is our time to step up as human beings . . . ’ That’s why we got together—why feel any remorse or bitterness? We’re just super-happy and positive.

TEAM 2MEX’S ANTI-XMAS SHOW WITH THE VISIONARIES, THE SHAPESHIFTERS AND XOLOLANXINXO PLUS ELLAY KHULE/THE RIFLEMAN, NOCANDO, RIDDLORE, MESTIZO, K TO THE I?????, EPIC AND MORE SPECIAL GUESTS THE AIRLINER | 2419 N BROADWAY | LOS ANGELES 90031 | SUN 7PM | $15 | 18+ | 2MEXLA.COM AND UPABOVERECORDS.COM

Tags: 2mex, airliner, hip hop, Long Beach, Music, visionaries