Blue Scholars

Comprised of Emcee Geologic and producer/DJ Sabzi, the Blue Scholars hail from Seattle and do their part in taking hip-hop back to its populist roots. The band runs their own label, organizes its own regional showcases for lesser known artists in their scene, and write songs that relate the true stories of the working class instead of the glossy high life fantasies that are being sold to every corner of the suburbs. Having released the full length Bayani in 2007 and more recently the digital only follow-up Joe Metro EP, the Blue Scholars have had a busy year, punctuated by playing shows on both coasts and the Midwest.

Recently, SSv had the opportunity to speak with Sabzi concerning the inspirational familial roots that define the Blue Scholars’ music, his early experiences in the punk/ska scene that helped shape his perceptions, and the group’s raison d’etre.

SSv: Talk to me about the songwriting process. Is basically making the beats your end and Geologic’s end is the lyrics?

Blue Scholars: Yeah, pretty much. It started out as mostly me making beats and then him picking from those beats and writing to it. It evolved into as much as him picking out records to make beats out of and me telling him song ideas to write about. I do make the beats and he writes the lyrics, so we’re both pretty involved in the creative process.

SSv: So it’s a very give and take process?

BS: Yeah.

SSv: Where do you guys go for your song ideas? A lot of your stuff seems to be about community, the Pacific Northwest community in particular.

BS: Sure. We really don’t intend for it to be limited to that. The main thing that we do in terms of songs ideas is that we try to write music about subject matter that people can relate to. I like making music like “town music” or folk music in a way, but it takes the form of hip-hop. If you could write a song to capture what it’s really like to have the 9-5 grind or to be working in a restaurant, then a lot of folks out there can relate to it. We try to make soundtrack music for the lives of people we have a connection with and for ourselves.

SSv: From reading up on you, it seems that you were very into punk and ska back in the day. Is that true?

BS: Yeah, I was. Still am. It’s not what it used to be though.

SSv: Yeah, I agree. That music back in the day was very community based too.

BS: Yeah, exactly.

SSv: Would you say this sense of community has gone over to hip hop more so?

BS: Are you saying for the genre or for us?

SSv: Let’s say for you.

BS:For me, I can’t really make any generalizations about a genre because those are flawed to begin with. But for me, my whole experience as a young teenager with punk rock and independent music, skating culture in the early to mid-90s, just not what it is now. It taught me a lot about, as a kid … it was through that that I learned about not becoming a sheep. It just eats up whatever’s fed to me on television and it gives us a sense that we can seek out our own music and create our own culture, which is something that is very community oriented. The rest just follows from that. If you’re familiar with the punk rock ethos of that era, you’ll know what I’m talking about.

SSv: Would it be fair to say that you grew disillusioned with the whole punk thing?

BS: Not really. Based on where I was living and the era I was living in, I went through the unique thing of growing up on hip-hop early and then getting sick of what it was turning into in the late 90s with the whole Puff Daddy era.

SSv: With the whole living large lifestyle.

BS: Right. I stopped being able to relate to it at that point. There were certainly elements that were still cool, certain MCs were still raw, certain beats were nice, but it wasn’t until I was able to reconnect with the community folks who were doing it independently til I got back to it. I never really left punk rock. I’m still a fan of both. I’m a fan of music. I wouldn’t say I left the punk rock department and transferred over.

SSv: The Blue Scholars seem to be more of a populist hip hop group, as opposed to the mainstream stuff that seems to be more of an aristocracy, just like how in the 70s, you know, when they talk about the history of punk, they always mention about how the rock bands then were a big, rich, rock aristocracy. Then punk came and took it to a grassroots kind of thing.

BS: People’s music.

SSv: So you guys are called the Blue Scholars. The name sort of plays off of “blue collar” and the scholar part, which implies two different worlds.

BS: Yeah, exactly. It’s good that you read it that way.

SSv: I could sort of relate to that because I came from a pretty blue collar family myself and then I went to college and found it was two different mindsets.

BS: Right. That experience sort of relates to the immigrant experience, of being the first generation in your family to ever make that class jump. So Geo’s the son of Pilipino immigrants and the first of his family to go to college. I was raised by Iranian immigrants, but I wasn’t the first of my family to go to college. However, both of our families are working folks and the kind of work we’re doing is different. So the name “Blue Scholars” is a play on blue collar, but it’s also because we met in college and the idea is to make education for the working class or education from a working class perspective. It’s not like we’re the champions of anything.

What really sucks is that when you’re talking about something that seems somewhat intelligent, everyone thinks that you’re being condescending. That’s not our intent at all. It would be completely contradictory to what we’re about. I think of it as like, especially given the amount of success we’ve had, we’re the first of a community to be put into other circles and class of people and we’re trying to funnel some of those resources back to the folks, from the perspective of theory and more practical things, like offering opportunities and work to people.

SSv: Speaking of the things you’re working towards, I read about The Program, the Seattle hip-hop showcase you organized. That lasted about four or five days, didn’t it? Were you overall satisfied with that?

BS: Yeah, man. We headlined each night. It was originally just going to be our New Year’s Show and there’s place here in town called the Show Box and it holds maybe 1,400 people. We were going to do two days for New Years and we realized that with all the people we were going to try to get on, because that’s something we try to do, with the attention we’re getting to direct some of that attention to the other local musicians. There were way too many people to put on two bills, so instead we made the show smaller and spread it out over five days. It wasn’t just a Blue Scholars show anymore. It became this showcase, so we called it The Program. Every day sold out.

SSv: Is there any chance of you guys doing something similar for the end of this year or maybe some other time in the future?

BS: Sure. We’re definitely toying with the idea of even making it an annual thing, based on how well it went on.

SSv: Are there any particular acts you want to plug at the moment?

BS: Sure. The Physics is a group out of Seattle that I like a lot. They remind me a lot of Slim Village, but very Seattle-y. But the way they’re Seattle-y isn’t a way that ostracizes anymore that’s not from here, you know what I’m saying?

SSv: Right. They’re not overly regional.

BS: Well, people talk about “oh, regional music is going to only have a short reach,” but the truth is that Dr. Dre rapped about LA all the time or Nas was talking about New York. I liked that growing up, to hear about other people’s lives in other people’s cities. So there’s The Physics. There’s a guy called Khingz from Tacoma. He’s pretty dope. There’s Gabriel Teodros, one of our label mates. Common Market is another group that I’ve produced for. Dime Death is a group that’s been getting some notice as of late. Cancer Rising; they’re a couple of characters. I could go on and on.

SSv: It’s good that you could go on and on because that means it’s thriving over there.

BS: I think things are really popping off.

SSv: So let’s talk a little bit about the Joe Metro EP that you’re offering only in digital format. Now it’s 35 minutes long, which arguably isn’t an EP. It’s mainly remixes from your last album [2007's Bayani]?

BS: Well, it’s only a few cuts, but we also offer all the instrumentals from those cuts as well. So it’s not a bunch of different songs, but I think some people who aren’t familiar with hip hop and how those singles work don’t understand that. I mean the era of vinyl is unfortunately did, so a lot of times folks who are looking for instrumentals can’t get them, so our EPs include our instrumentals.

SSv: So people don’t have to go to the trouble of seeking out all the B-sides.

BS: Exactly. Joe Metro has the “Joe Metro” album version, the “Joe Metro” remix, the Jose Razul. The song called “Southbound.” There’s a song called “Town Hawk” that’s actually a Physics song we collaborated on. If it was up to me, if I didn’t know the industry, I’d put out a new song every week and a half or two weeks. Just like one. Just keep putting them out like a publication. With technology as it is today, I think the way we understand album releases is going to slowly phase out.

SSv: What’s keeping you from doing that?

BS: Right now, it’s really just time. I’m just insanely busy. Since 2008 started, I’ve been home for no more than nine days. Total.