In an age of rappers bending over backward to flaunt their wealth, Mr. Lif would rather preach about the government’s cruel intentions or the stifling nature of the black middle class than spout out some nonsense about his car.
While you won’t find the standard-issue bling on any of Mr. Lif’s records, you will find a young poet who is carrying the torch of earlier socially conscious rappers like Public Enemy and KRS-One. Lif’s recordings for the prestigious Def Jux label have elevated him to the top of the hip-hop underground and he just so happens to be from up the street.
Jeffrey Haynes was born 28 years ago in Brighton, the western enclave of Boston that doubles as home for campus-fleeing Boston University students. He attended prep school in Dedham and then Colgate University in upstate New York a place he isn’t fond of.
‘Colgate was just a segregated place for rich people,’ Lif said in a phone interview. ‘All the black kids lived in their area, and all the Asian kids lived in their area.’
Lif left Colgate after two years as an English major who never took any English classes. ‘My parents were pissed at first, but they just wanted me to go to college so I wouldn’t be a bum. When they saw that I wasn’t going to be a bum, they were alright.’
He avoided bumhood by throwing himself into music. He had started rapping in 1993, emulating idols like Chubb Rock and Run-DMC, and when he came back to Brighton he hooked up with other Boston MCs who were just learning how to get into the business.
Lif started releasing 12 inch singles on various labels, including Boston-based Brick Records, making a name for himself with his insightful lyricism and an identifiable look he wears glasses and sports foot-long dreadlocks.
Lif got a break when he hooked up with New York-rapper El-P, a member of the seminal hip-hop group Company Flow. Company Flow had just broken up, and El-P was starting up his own label, Definitive Jux.
‘El-P came around Boston to do some shows, and I opened,’ Lif said. ‘We talked a little and exchanged numbers, and he offered to do some production for me. Things just took off from there. I’m proud about how big he’s taking his label. I didn’t expect it to become the juggernaut that it is.’
Lif began releasing singles on Def Jux, as well as dropping a live album recorded at Cambridge’s Middle East club. Finally, just last year, he released his most definitive statement to date in the Emergency Rations EP, a collection of songs lambasting U.S. foreign policy.
‘I thought I was going to get a lot more negative feedback because what I was saying was contrary to popular views at the time,’ Lif said. He added, ‘Watching the news inspired me. George Bush was out there trying to shape the way we see other nations, but it’s all just bullst. I wanted to make a record that was propagandabut propaganda by the people.’
Lif then set his sights on releasing his full-length debut, a project he had envisioned since he first started rapping. ‘It was just business,’ Lif said about the long wait for I Phantom. ‘I was waiting for a label to represent to match my efforts. It would be a waste of my time if they couldn’t match my work with marketing and publicity.’
I Phantom is an ambitious concept album about one man’s struggle to find his niche in society as he deals with work and family troubles. The narrative arc is so complex that Lif had to write out the plot and how each song plays into it in the album’s liner notes.
‘I wanted to tell a story, but it ended up being way more cryptic than I thought it would be,’ he said. ‘When I turned it over to my management, they didn’t have a reaction – they just didn’t get it. So that’s why I had to spell it out for everyone. It’s still cryptic, but it’s easier to get.’
Mr. Lif is one of the brightest jewels in the Def Jux crown, and he has responded to his East Coast notoriety by shunning it he moved to Berkeley, California, two years ago. ‘If I stay in one place too long it breeds complacency,’ he said about ditching Brighton. ‘Out here is perfect for me. I’m out handing out promos and freestyling on corners to get people to listen to my album. It keeps me hungry.’
Welcome Mr. Lif home as he plays the Middle East in Cambridge tonight.
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