RIP Eyedea

(Eyedea & Abilities, on the street, SXSW 2009, photo by Matt Sonzala)

Man, we lost another great.

I first saw Eyedea at SXSW, in 1999 I am pretty sure. Maybe 1998. The Rhymesayers camp were performing on one of the hip-hop showcases at the Back Room. And at the time I didn't know anything about them. I just kind of peeped the show and was like, man honestly I didn't really pay much attention.

Then the next year my long time friend DJ Stef came to Chicago to visit, 10 years ago this month as a matter of fact, and we attended the DJ Summit and a big ass show at the Metro with Atmosphere, MF Doom, Rubberroom, Micronauts, man a whole gang of groups (Stef help me out here). I was up in there watching Slug, Eyedea and Abilities on stage from the balcony and I could see that almost every kid on the floor was rapping along to every lyric. I was like, damn man this shit is a phenomenon. A phenomenal, phenomenon.

Slug, Atmosphere, Eyedea, the whole Rhymesayers camp, they built a freakin' scene man, from the ground up, they came in and built a whole scene. I watched it and straight up, the one I was mostly into, especially live, was Eyedea. Not necessarily that night in Chicago, but as those dudes are touring machines, I probably have seen them (Atmosphere + Eyedea & Abilities) 15 times.

I remember seeing him on the Blaze Battle. I was pulling for my man Vizion of course, but I was pretty floored by Eyedea's energy. And he really did smash fools.

Dude was a real writer, crazy off the dome, ill with the delivery, a real MC.

And Abilities is one of the dopest live DJ's in the game.

This is my favorite Eyedea & Abilities song.


Eyedea, Rest In Peace