Open Letter To My "Peers"

Dear Local Hip-Hop Artists and Purists And Those Who Had Big Chat On What I Do:

Pretty much.
(via Black World Films)

Yes, my paws are on a different path from yours.
That hardly makes me any less valid.
I'm of a different breed.

I come from a school half of you younger artists know nothing about. A different code that many of you spat upon because those before you who knew better spat upon it to stay relevant and not look "stupid" in front of their/yer boys.

And I was never understood so I don't expect you to get it now.

I knew what I was doing, I knew my mission, and if you think that what I did was worthless--think again.

I knew that I was on a hard mission to have folx remember what the purrpose of the MC was and still could be. I haven't forgotten. The *rest* of you have.

Oh, BTDubs:

Did *you* get scouted for a popular show?
Did they use *your* music in two seasons?
Did LA Mag's Blog include *you* in a list of artists you should hear?
Are *you* collecting royalties from it?

Lemme know, nuh...

via Giphy

Are you versatile and flexible? Prolly not. "Flexible" does not equal being able to rhyme about bxtches in one track, hoes in another, and weed in the next, and knowing whether to use the hard ER in that N-word yawl like to throw around so much. "Flexible" does not mean "do I wear the snapback to the front or back? Do I swagger or do I just stand there onstage and hold my balls?" "Do I come for all the competition with venom and diss trax because I need to prove I'm the baddest bxtch out there cuz there can only be one?"

Yup. That's that REAL hip-hop (sarcastic font *heavily* on).

Yeah-huh. Sure.
(via Giphy)

See, my flex is what you *haven't* seen. Yawl too fxcking judgmental. Yawl was so busy looking at the ears, the hair and the gear that you just dismissed my ability altogether.

(I'm not talking to yawl con folx and event planners...that's a whole other post. I might have words for yawl, too, so be patient.)

I may not have been worthy to be doing yawl's shows, interview segs, and whatever the fxck else yawl came up with to clique up strong, but I know who I am and what I bloody stand for.

👏🏾I. 👏🏾LIVE. 👏🏾 IN.👏🏾MY. 👏🏾TRUTH.

Can you really say the same?
The kawaii is real, not some shxt I made up to seem interesting.
The geekiness is real, not geek chic like some prominent female rappers I could name.

The ears are worn because channeling totems, not because they cute. If that were the case you'd only see me with them onstage and in pix (catch me at Shoprite and see if I'm fxcking kidding).

And what I write is real, not manufactured for the fxcking masses. I didn't visually or musically genre-jump to seem fresh and new. Influences abound because I actually listened to and liked that music/those clothes.

I didn't bite off another's whole lyrical style like some mainstream artists and then win awards for it, and get praise for being "real". I *stayed* real from the jump.

Nobody cosigned me.

I'd give you my kicks to walk in but they might fit funny and not be your style. They're custom...and floss free.

Living in your truth *IS* hip-hop.
And that's all I've ever done from the get-go.
Maybe you should re-evaluate yourselves and live in yours...not what you *think* is yours.

Black Girls are Easy...

... evidently--to mistake for one another.
Especially if we're "weird"or "alternative".
Someone said I "looked exactly like [Tamara of] I Puke Glamour" and then snarkily added "Hmmmmm", regarding my assertion to accept no imitations (which really was a disclaimer for people to distinguish me from a particular... person).

C'mon, dude. I mean, I'm how much darker than she--?
 It got me thinking, though, about how when black girls have coloured hair, awesome, unusual clothes, and express themselves in a different way than what is expected, suddenly we're all Lil Kim or Nicki Minaj, or George Clinton-- anyone but who we actually are. Or we're intentionally twinning ourselves if we have similar hair. In my case, I do actually have a fax, but I've only ever been influenced by what I see.

It's unfortunate, but no other race accuses each other of "trying to be like (fill in the blank)" or "the fake (fill in the blank)"more than black people. I mean, c'mon: non-black girls wear synthetic dreads and straight fringe in all the colours of the fxcking rainbow all the time, and they don't get accused of trying to be, say, Kerli, or Machine Sex or Lady Gaga or whatever. I do it, and I'm suddenly Bitchface/Tamara/I Puke Glamour, I'm Yo-Yo Suicide, and the people I mentioned above--Minaj, Kim, and Uncle George (who, by the way, doesn't have the coloured hair anymore, so I say this to you: :oP). I have big "normie" hair, then I'm Tina Turner, Chaka Khan, Patti Labelle.

Seriously?
Is that really the best we can manage, in lieu of just taking me as I look--does everything have to be identified with someone famous? Last I checked, my name was GATA, not any of the above. Nor am I "George Clinton's wife/granddaughter/whatever".
Yes, that actually happened. More than once, and once from a band on stage performing at the time.
There is a huge difference between imitating and being influenced.
I've been influenced by people from the eighties like Cyndi Lauper, Jody Watley, Eighties Prince and Eighties Madonna (important to say "eighties" because they reinvent themselves so often), hip-hop culture, geek culture, movies, books, subcultures, video games, Japanese street style, mangas, comics, and God knows what else. I'm one of those people who throw stuff together, make it coordinate somehow, and hope it sticks. For as long as I've been able to choose my own clothes, I've been that type. I always expressed myself through my gear, long before Minaj, Gaga, Kim. I used to colour streaks in my hair with eyeshadow and rip up my stockings, cut my tees, slaughter my pants, shop at thrift stores. I was making jewelry out of baby shower favours, doll furniture, and discarded pieces of other jewelry (waste not, want not). I would find a place between eclectic and "me", and that's where I was comfortable.
This always got reactions like this

Or this

Or this

And a lot of this.

Once in awhile it was strange, but nice, to get this...

I still get these reactions. I pretty much expect it. It's one of the perks of being meows truly.

Anyways...
Unless someone is doing this

to their fellow so-called "weird", "alternative" black chyck, or doing everything like this

constantly (::ahem::) , then I don't see how we're all running around trying to be like each other (or celebrities). It must be some odd offshoot of "(fill in the blank) people all look alike". Generalizations; blanket statements. Ignorance. Indifference. Not thinking.
It would be nice to wake up one day and live in a world where this doesn't happen. Where I don't get, "Who you s'posed to be?" Me, duh. I can't be anyone but me, a living mash-up of stuff I really like. And I do it organically. It's something that can't be helped, I'm afraid.
Try and see each person for who they are, rather than think they're just cloning someone else.
Unless, of course, they actually are--and it's blatantly obvious.
Knock yourself out, then, LOL.