Moment of Truth...

A few day ago, as I was partaking in my usual unproductive routine of checking my Facebook account, I started seeing all these posts that Guru from Gang Starr had passed away from a heart attack. Although it didn't have as big of an impact on me as the day MJ died, I was still in a state of shock. Luckily, his death was just a rumor. Unfortunately, he's still in critical condition.

Before I go on, I have to give a disclaimer that I'm not trying to act like I'm Gang Starr's #1 fan -- I'm actually not too familiar with their early stuff (a few years ago I might've fronted like I was a big fan in order to get some recognition from the "hardcore underground hip hop heads," but I'm old enough now where I don't need approval from an elitist suburbanite. I know I'm Hip Hop). However, I will say that their Moment of Truth album from '98 was one of the few East Coast joints at the time that was able to break through my closed-minded "strictly West Coast" mentality (I'm still kicking myself in the ass for sleeping on the Black Star album when it was first released, which is now one of my all time favorites).

So although Moment of Truth held a lot of significance for me, that's not what took me by surprise upon hearing the news of his heart attack. The answer to that can be traced back to '03 when my brother took me to see Gang Starr, Talib Kweli and Common at House of Blues. In between sets, he went to the bar to get us some drinks and came back excited: "Jr., I was just talking to Guru right now. He's at the bar. You wanna go meet him?"

When we got there, my first thought was "Damn, he's shorter than he looks on stage!" I stand at a whopping 5'6" and he was around the same height as me. Anyway, since I recently turned 21, my star struck/faded ass offers to buy him a drink, but he politely and nonchalantly says, "Ah no thanks man. I don't drink. Thanks though." Since I probably looked as stupid as I felt, he added, "It's cool. You're still young. I've been there too," which definitely made me feel like less of a jackass. And other than seeing Magic Johnson chillin' in the VIP area, it's amazing how my interaction with Guru was one of the few things I remember from that night. The next day, it all made sense to me after listening to the Moment of Truth song:

Suicide? Nah, I'm not a foolish guy
Don't even feel like drinking or even gettin' high
Cuz all that's gonna do, really, is accelerate
The anxieties that I wish I could alleviate

That's why I was so shocked to hear that he had a heart attack. To see something like that happen to someone who's relatively young and conscious of their health put things into perspective for me. First, it helped reinforce the notion that I need to be more mindful of my long term health and start thinking about my future. Second, I need to utilize my time better and be more productive when it comes to music.

Guru and Gang Starr have a pretty extensive catalog that they could leave behind as their legacy. When 2Pac died, he still had a ton of unreleased songs b/c he was just a beast in the studio! If something were to happen to me tomorrow (*knock on wood*), what would I leave behind? Two mixtapes? That's it?!? And one of those is from '05, under a different MC name, so I don't even want to count that since it's pretty crappy quality. lol. I've got a bunch of random verses and songs written, but they haven't been recorded yet. For my next mixtape I'm already done with about 12-15 tracks, but I've been lazy with recording the rest of it. This project should've been done by now, but I've been sitting on it for the longest time. If there's one positive thing I can learn from Guru's situation, it's that I need to create a greater sense of urgency with my art...

But just as you'll receive what is comin to you
Everybody else is gonna get theirs too
I ain't no saint, therefore I cannot dispute
That everyone must meet their moment of truth