Two of my Mixed Tapes will be re-released on my new platform for music called “Slauson and Garfield: Melo Miles Corner”.
The projects are “Freddie Ventura’s Bandana” and “Detroit Streets, Tent Cities Vol. 1”.
The first project was written and completed from January, 2021 to April, 2021. I re-visit Freddie Gibbs and Madlib classic album called “Bandana”. I was working in Ventura County where the legendary City of Oxnard is located which is where Madlib was raised. I was very interested in how Freddie Gibbs and MF Doom create personas to create this parallel creative universe of drug czars and organized crime.
I came up with a style called “Organized Rhyme” and started researching a lot of Meyer Lansky. Being an immigrant from North Africa and being mixed heritage I never felt I belonged in this country and I fell in with latin families because they were very warm and respectful to me: whites called me “Sell em a Slurpee” and other derogatory terms for sand ni…as and blacks thought I was a perpetrator Vanilla Ice type.
At 12, around 1992, I adopted the street name Perp and got into the most dangerous click I could find called “Hispanics at Large” so that haters in the street didn’t chase me down. That’s why I use the name “Napoleon’s Ill Child” – people knew I was the frenchie sand ni..a runt and grown men openly talked about shooting me. However, I worked my alliances like Napoleon and joined about 10 different networks from Pacoima, San Fernando, Indio, Desert Hot Springs, Long Beach, North Hollywood, South Central Los Angeles, Brooklyn and Buena Park to set up my predators like a perp “they come after me, but it was their life I took”. Basically, I ran with the mind set that you can follow me because I’m a runt, but then you will have to deal with my wolves and gorillas so joke is on you. I know how to move like a gangster because they were the only protection I had as a child – it was easy to get my enemies twisted. I remember a professor fronting on me like I’m soft until I ran up on her with my driver from Flatbush and then she started looking at me different. It’s funny how people are.
I’m a very dark person at times because of the violence and humiliation I experienced as a youngster. I wrote horror movie scripts when I was about 10 that almost got me expelled from school writing about a monster that killed my family and neighbors.
I became infatuated with the money that the young hogs like Chief Keef and Blue Face were hauling in and I was like – wow, just from rhyming – something that will get you kicked out of Starbucks. That’s when I went off and took over my social media and blogs with organized rhyme.
I created a persona called Freddie Ventura who is a Southern California drug lord and Boss kind of like Tony Soprano. In that, I was able to re-visit some troubling moments in my childhood raised in the birthplace of Pacas Trece, Pakoima Piru, Project Boys, Brownstone and many other infamous clicks.
However, my style is so over-the-top that all of what I say is true and none of what I say is true. I purposely claim 100 different sets so that the fans don’t try to follow my steps.. These characters I create are just ways for me to deal with some of the childhood grief I endured in the 1980s and 1990s. Every generation I think, damn this gang banging thing is about to dissappear and here it is alive and well. With the internet, I found many interviews to give me first hand accounts from founding members of clicks from sources like Pete Alonso and DJ Vlad.
As for “Detroit Streets, Tent Cities Vol. 1”, I started watching New Jack City and found out that it was based on the Chamber Brothers that operated out of Detroit. I studied urban planning (UCLA MA 09) and became extremely fascinated by cities like Detroit, New York City and Chicago. The interesting thing about the Chamber Brothers were their small-time country roots and their ability to adapt to the harsh streets of Detroit. They used their “country” work ethic and became one of the most profitable street crews in the country making millions on drug profits.
I also talk about the “Black Tony Soprano” that was a decorated cop and military hero that went bad and took over drug trade in Detroit. He used his privilege as a police officer to bust his competition, lock them up and get work for him and his crew.
All of that background to say this: come to Slauson and Garfield for these mixed tapes. You’re going to like how they sound.
