“LA was just a natural place to work,” said Evans. “We have a large group of friends from the the Triad living in LA and it just seemed new and fresh for everyone.”
Line them up against the best of the LA hip hop scene, however, and it’s doubtful that the the pair will pass the look test. As As unassuming as the skinny, spectacled spectacled Evans (b. (b. Erin Garcia) Garcia) and and the burly former Mount Tabor football player Jamz Jamz (b. James James Joliff) might might appear, their their beats and rhymes rhymes are are far far from ordinary. ordinary.
Their first full-length album Rap Music hit in 2007 with monumental monumental buzz, garnering outstanding reviews from both LA press and national publications alike. It was a more formal follow-up to their debut EP The Illustrated Guide to: 9 to 5, which was thrown together in under three weeks. But unless you knew these two from their high school days, it’s unlikely most of the area in which they grew up has heard of Brother
Reade until now. Since their days dishing out carbohydrates at the Bagel Station in high school, Brother Reade has evolved from their punk roots into a sort of ultramodern blueprint for rappers yet to come. Completely eschewing the bling- andbitches modus operandi that tarnishes much of the rap game these days, Jamz takes the plebeian approach to rhyme writing. It’s possible that one line from “Life Ain’t Easy For Ya’ll” off of Rap Music encapsulates his entire ethos. “The rap game is just that dog/get another income you won’t get that far” says just what needs to be said to every starry-eyed rapper with designs on getting rich, while Evans’ sparse, hollow beats define an album that is so profoundly forward-thinking that some might accuse it of being a throwback. “I feel like a lot of people got a hold of Rap Music and really misunderstood the idea behind it,” said Jamz. “They thought it was a retrograde record and that we were trying to emulate Eric B and Rakim.
We had the same purpose as they did, but we just had it in 2007.” The goal according to Jamz, however, was to create the new classic rap album. Not necessarily classic in the sense of the music it contained, but even more audaciously in in the approach that it espoused. The duo took all of their influences into account, yet took the kind of discursive freedom that’s normally reserved for the downtown New York City jazz scene.
“I think rap music has a great formula, but the way to to go about making it can never be perfected,” Evans said. “A great rap record has to be everything to everybody.”
With With that under under their their belt, the next question is where exactly exactly Brother Reade goes from from here. here. With both Evans and Jamz being accomplished drummers, the experimental experimental bent from from their previous effort prevailed with a little help from from a rather serendipitous source.
Just as Jamz started to pick up his drumming more intensely, the pair began composing more instrumental material built around dual drum sets. It was around that time that a friend set them up with a project conceived by Yamataka Eye, the enigmatic front man for the highly experimental Japanese noise-rock band the Boredoms. The project, known as 88 Boadrum, was a massive drum collaborative that was to take place at the La Brea Tar Pits. Jamz and Evans showed up along with 86 other drummers, all arranged in spiraled arms with the Boredoms at the center in a kiosk for what would be an unforgettable and influential experience.
“Sound was awesome and really entrancing,” Evans said. “It was the craziest minute of my life and it wasn’t a showy thing at all.” Spring 2009 is the current target date for the album and as the duo is prepared to enter the studio as soon as the details are finalized. Don’t call it a new direction, however. It’s just another swath of color on the canvas of Brother Reade as they seek to characterize Hip Hop music in their own terms. It’s the new punk, if you will. “The easy way to distill it down is that it’s whatever we make it to be,” said Jamz. “We’re always going to keep challenging other and redefining each other and redefining our project.”
