The Pharcyde’s Bizarre Ride II the Pharcyde Turns 30!
The Los Angeles rap trio Pharcyde released their debut album in 1992, showcasing a heady blend of jazzy bohemianism, self-conscious rap intellect, and SoCal 420 culture.
Richard Pryor, a legend in the world of stand-up comedy, started writing new material for a tour in 1992. Pryor did gigs at the Comedy Store in Los Angeles while seated in an easy chair, giving the impression that he was drawn and fragile from multiple sclerosis and years of riotous living. He sometimes grabbed his assistant's arm to find his spot beneath the bright lights. Eventually, the difficulties brought on by his illness became regular. He laughed openly about his body turning against him, like his first heart attack in 1977 or the frightening freebasing episode in 1980. At 51, his you-know-what had stopped doing what he wanted it to. What used to be taboo, like wetting oneself, was now normal behavior. Strangers at the intimate Sunset Strip venue found humor in the vulnerable and embarrassing stories shared by the performers.
The founding members of the Pharcyde listened to Pryor's raunchy recordings from the 1970s at a graffiti-covered home close to the USC campus in South Central Los Angeles. They gathered in South Central, an area of Los Angeles heralded by John Singleton's Boyz n the Hood and broadcast across the globe by cable news's journalistic sniper scope from a helicopter for months before. They spent the more significant part of 1992 holed up in the house they called the Pharcyde Manor, working on a tape that included the songs Passin' Me By, Officer, and Ya Mama, to create their first album Bizarre Ride II the Pharcyde. They borrowed Pryor's vocabulary from clips like White and Black People and Black Funerals, which appeared in the songs' lyrics and sound. In a sense, he was a relative in the faith.
Even so, they saw South Central from a somewhat different angle. The South Central Unit after-school arts program is where L.A. club dancers Tre Hardson, Imani Wilcox, and Romye Robinson met Derrick Stewart, a rapper/producer, and John Martinez, the gifted son of a jazz musician. The Pharcyde was formed at SCU, founded by Reggie Andrews, an R&B producer-turned-teacher. Hardson became SlimKid Tre, Wilcox became Imani, Robinson became Bootie Brown, Stewart changed his name to Fatlip, and Martinez, the group's svengali producer, became J-Swift when they were not busy rummaging through stacks of old jazz and rock albums in Andrews' garage. Quickly afterward, the five of them started living together in a large home on West 24th and South Budlong, on the fringes of South Central.
In 1991, they mostly recorded a demo at SCU and featured a demo version of their first single, Ya Mama. Each of the four members one-ups the others with outlandish, nonsensical snaps that perfectly capture kids on the cusp of adulthood and which remarkably remain funny, creating a kaleidoscopic take on the dozens, one of the oldest African-American traditions. "Ya mama's got a wooden leg with actual feet," "what a pity, got a glass titty, filled up with Kool-Aid, just for the kiddies," and "she looks like she's been in a dryer with some rocks." She was beatboxin' for Lou Rawls while wearing bright red boxer underwear to top off Fatlip's evocative description. The June 1992 smash song Ya Mama might have been the end all, be all of the group's gimmick rapping.
Fortunately, the same recording also included the songs Officer and Passin' Me By, which depict the band's propensity for virtuoso dicking about and their playful, cynical view of the police and women. Mike Ross, co-owner of the pioneering L.A. rap label Delicious Vinyl, heard Passin' and knew he had to sign the group after hearing their hits Wild Thing by Tone-Loc and Bust a Move by Young MC in 1989. After hearing them, he instantly signed the band and gave them free rein over all aspects of their first album's production.
Bizarre Ride II the Pharcyde is still one of the best examples of adolescent bravado and honesty. Released in November of 1992, the album is a continuation of the sample-drunk fun of albums like 3 Feet High and Rising by De La Soul, Paul's Boutique by the Beastie Boys, and Sex Packets by the Digital Underground. It's futuristic in its outlook but fond of nods to the past. It's a dissing game that leaves no mom unscathed and no friend unshamed, and it's included fully in one song (Ya Mama). It's an album of outrageousness that makes you laugh till you cry because your buddy said something so profoundly foolish that it made you cry. And instead of the memory fading away like a cloud of marijuana smoke, it's captured forever on wax.
Pryor's voice can be heard at the start of Bizarre Ride II the Pharcyde. The project's guiding principle, "Oh shit!" is a sample from a piece about Sugar Ray Robinson from Craps. When the musical entrance by J-Swift ends, Pryor's outburst pierces the silence. After he exclaims in disbelief, Oh Shit, the drums kick in, ushering in the group's first official song. Tre starts the song by transforming the children's song Little Sally Walker into a raunchy rap that belongs at the most boisterous table during lunch.
Tre's voice undulates with lyrical possibilities; he'd be a vocalist on the point of breaking through if he'd allow a bit more vibrato in. (The fact that he does contributes to the bittersweet perfection of his solo effort Otha Fish.) The climax of his verse occurs when he gets caught having sex with a "brown-eyed bombshell" when he is supposedly alone, only to be discovered by the whole school. J-Swift adds another witty Pryor touch to the moment by saying, "He came and went at the same time."
Apart from his skillful use of samples, J-Swift's musicality is a significant strength of his production. His rhythms are seldom static but rather intricate compositions that change and grow as the song progresses. Imani comes in like a rubber ball and squeaks his way joyously through a poem about sleeping with Greg's mom, who is eager but also scared, somewhat undermining the supposed bravery of the deed. (Greg, of course, catches them in the act of sitting dog-like on the sofa, exclaiming, "Oh shit!") After Imani's stanza, a more sinister piano passage emerges to set the stage for Fatlip.
Fatlip discusses spending a summer evening on Crenshaw Boulevard with a trans lady, and he includes another "son of a bitch" lyric from Pryor. Fatlip, on the other hand, feels duped but laughs off the circumstance. It's easy to see the verse deteriorating into something violent in the hands of a different artist. The poem is insensitive, turning transphobia into a cheap joke, yet it admits his insecurities in its insensitivity. Each Oh Shit lyric alludes to the fear that lies behind the surface of macho sex talk.
Passin' Me By, the group's biggest hit reveals their vulnerability. It's the rare kind of song that can be credited with launching an entire career. A wonderful simp hymn, Passin’ Me By, offers four stories of unrequited love that retain everyone with dignity intact. J-Swift’s beat is a wonder of quirky artistry, blending numerous distinct samples into a rickety foundation for the boys to unload the lowest moments of their young lives. Also, they impart their knowledge, such as the chilly consolation of "I suppose a sparkle in her eye is simply a twinkle in her eye." Buffeted by high rotation on Yo! MTV Raps and BET's Rap City, the song's arty black and white video (which Ross remembers being beaten out by Onyx's Slam as MTV's one regular-rotation rap clip) made the Pharcyde a success with rap fans and Buzz Bin acolytes alike. "I can only imagine how big that song would have gotten,” Ross recalls.
Nonetheless, there are tense moments throughout the record. The first skit, It's Jigaboo Time, follows Oh Shit immediately. Undoubtedly influenced by the group's experience on the dance-and-rap audition track, this uneasy piece enumerates the actions that might earn an artist the title moniker. “You’re rapping for the white man,” Fatlip spits. A possible alternative to the Pharcyde's current moniker, the Jigaboos was proposed at one time. "We just felt that no matter what, when you're out there on stage, you’re definitely being exploited, and you’re definitely lining someone else’s pockets,” Imani told Brian Coleman in Check the Technique. Before the skit's concluding phrase, "But we're all jigaboos in our way," is spoken softly, like a crazy kindergarten teacher, the music rattles itself to pieces with horrific piano stabs and cymbal crashes. After that, the show will resume.
Each song/skit/etc. is essential to the whole. If De La Soul’s Prince Paul loved the heart-rendering aural trip that culminates Stevie Wonder’s Living for the City for its virtuosity and sincerity, the skits on Bizarre Ride work because they are precisely what they seem to be: the unadulterated hijinks of pals fucking about. Skits see the lads contemplating the U.S. president and improvising a dulled Tin Pan Alley ballad about the imminent arrival of their favorite pot supplier, Quinton; they were recorded during a marathon jam session organized by J-Swift and cut into digestible interludes after the fact. It’s Happy Days Are Here Again for indica fans, tucked deep into the couch cushions.
Considering the album's comedic tone, it may be surprising that Tre spent the first several days in the recording studio at Hollywood Sound sobbing. The weight of making an album hit Tre all at once; "This is gonna exist forever," he thought, and he began to cry. Yes, he was pretty intoxicated, but this has to be considered. Being hilarious is hard labor that may be too readily overlooked, particularly in hip-hop. Maybe it's because rock critics place a premium on "serious" art, or maybe it's the way the genre has always been. There are always outliers, and Bizarre Ride II the Pharcyde is no exception.
Although Bizarre Ride was certified gold by early 1996, the group split up early due to infighting and "creative disagreements," which were too familiar during the 90s. J-Swift would depart the group before the following album, Labcabincalifornia (they hooked up instead with a promising youngster called Jay Dee), and a severe crack addiction would cause a tragic spiral from which he's still recovering. Labcabin was an excellent album, but it also arrived at the beginnings of the dizzying, gloomy mook-rock phase in the late 90s, which would wrap up with the band playing for Korn (with Tre later throwing a guest line on 1999's Follow the Leader). Even in one of pop's most vitriolic and apolitical eras, "Somethin' That Means Somethin'" is tough to beat. The Pharcyde's absence of a follow-up to Bizarre Ride isn't a criticism of the band's heritage. Still, far more a monument to the extraordinary power of five youngsters to refract a politically and culturally volatile moment into a work that, surprisingly, transcends its setting.