Filed under: Features
In the modern Hip Hop game it is not uncommon for overlooked scores of genuinely talented lyricists and producers to take the proverbial back seat to slicker, more commercially viable acts vying for ringtone sales and heavy rotation throughout the nation’s indistinguishable urban market radio airwaves. Even by such dubious standards, however, it is safe to say that few MCs in the annals of rap music have ever been quite as overlooked or criminally underrated for as long as one Joseph McVey, a Houston, Texas native known to the world as Z-Ro.
I. Beginnings
The initial security and calm of Joseph Wayne McVey’s early childhood was shattered with the premature death of his mother of Cancer when he was six years old. The familial displacement which ensued, precipitated by numerous periods spent shuttling between the homes of various relatives throughout the Houston area, heightened the extreme chaos and desolation which typified the young man’s existence, and ultimately led to an involvement in street life. Mcvey’s subsequent ejection from his grandmother’s home due to an involvement with drug dealing and gang activity culminated in a short-lived, disastrous stay with his estranged father. It was not long before he found it necessary to fend for himself, quite literally alone and destitute on the streets of Missouri City, Texas.
A brutal adolescence defined by street hustling and routine violence commenced, and it was in the gritty street anthems of South Houston rap artists such as K-Rino, Klondike Kat, Scarface, Killa Klan and Street Military that McVey sought solace. Inspired by the regionally vibrant H-town hip-hop community, he began to write his own distinctive blend of street poetry, adopting the moniker Z-Ro as testament to his humble origins.
From a young age, this troubled, gifted lyricist’s struggles with extreme poverty, depression, displacement, lengthy bouts of homelessness and numerous periods of incarceration were channeled into an evocative, immensely creative web of rhythmic, rapid fire rhymes and impressive narrative flow.
His subsequent status in certain (mostly Southwestern) circles as one one of the most versatile, talented rappers ever belied a lesser known quality: McVey’s deep, soulful baritone capable of raw, emotive blues-inflected crooning which complemented his cathartic wordplay.
II. Screwed Up Origins
Z-Ro’s career began in earnest as one of the seminal members of a second wave of Houston-area rappers brought within the Screwed Up Click (or S.U.C.) fold by the now legendary Texas soundsmith DJ Screw. Appearing on scores of the prolific Screw’s so-called “grey tapes” in the mid-to-late 1990s, the fledgling Z-Ro’s expansive, invariably complex rhymes were stretched and warped, woven into the fabric of the syrupy, sluggish, hallucinatory Texas rider dreamscapes concocted by the late Screw. The aesthetic of that distinctive street-level psychedelia was informed by its narcotic of choice: copious amounts of codeine and promethazine found in perscription-strength cough syrup. Perhaps because of, or in spite of, the spaced out, lean-heavy origins found on Screw’s many cassette-oriented projects, Z-Ro’s subsequent solo contributions were typified by an often intense velocity and frenzied urgency that stood in stark contrast to the comparatively laid back, almost lackadaisical presentation of his earliest work and the output of many similarly situated Houston artists of the time.
While the dark imagery and swift mic skills of underground South Park Coalition-affiliated luminaries such as Ganksta NIP, Klondike Kat, K-Rino and East Bay legend Spice 1 might all have been reference points, Z-Ro’s lyrical chops, capable of shifting from numbingly fast, polysyballic spitfire fray to surly, mid-paced jaunt and weathered bluesy croon on a dime, quickly took on an urgency and organic quality all its own. With the exception of his distinctive regional slang and swagger, Z-Ro’s rap style transcended the confines of any particular geographic region or time period.
III. Fisher Boy and Beyond
Z-Ro’s proper debut on the small Houston-based Fisher Boy imprint, entitled “Look What You Did To Me” (1998), proved a stunning one man exorcism- a vivid, relentlessly grim series of autbiographical snapshots reeking of paranoia, rage, loneliness and desperation. At once a gangster biopic and a fierce religious devotional, the record stripped away any semblance of gangster rap caricature or stylized veneer, revealing instead a life of supreme isolation, uncertainty, betrayal, depression, fear, and routine violence. It was a very real, personal, unusually honest and human take on the genre. From the seething opener, “Guerilla Til I Die”, to the scathing title track, the roots reggae-inflected “Ghetto Crisis” and the menacing “Dedicated 2 U” (and well over a dozen other equally memorable numbers) Z-Ro’s highly personal lyricism evoked the trials and tribulations of gang life on the streets of Ridgemont, Texas with soul-baring candidness, his portraits of solitary street hustling and profound suffering melding seamlessly with apocalyptic invocations of biblical scripture and verse.
Lyrically, of course, the record was superb: a procession of impossibly dense undulating verbiage and tightly wound, rhythmically fierce rapping commencing over sparse synth lines and smooth Southwest rider beats. It remains one of the darker, more uncompromising grassroots hip hop debuts ever.
With meager production values and distribution, however, the record went all but unnoticed in every locale, save Texas and select areas of the Southern and Western hip-hop markets where a fervently devout, if comparatively tight knit, following developed.
Follow-up records including “Z-ro vs the World” (Den Den/Straight Profit, 2000) boasting the staggering, charged regional anthem “Dirty Third” among a slew of other underground rider classics and “King of Da Ghetto” (Straight Profit, 2001) (“I Found Me”, “Block Bleeder”, “Haters Song”, “Wake Up”, “Pain”, ditto) proved near flawless elaborations upon what came before. Angst-ridden ruminations informed equally by a paradoxical whirlwind of street grinding, retributional violence, and deep-seated religious conviction complemented peerless rhythmic flow, lyrical complexity, and memorably layered vocal harmonies. No less impressive was McVey’s work on Guerilla Maab’s “Rise” (Resurrection, 1999), an early Southside Houston-centric group collaberation on which he took center stage, alongside cousin Trae (who has subsequently proven a formidable, if slightly less consistent, Houston-area presence in his own right) and then up-and-coming lyrical monster Dougie D.
These additions to McVey’s repertoire built upon the foundations laid, but proved less morose and relentlessly bleak than what came before, as he retreated somewhat from the pathos-saturated introversion of his debut while adding a layer of sonic sheen and more upbeat, stylized Southwestern flair to the equation.
IV.Rap-A-Lot
With a rapidly expanding core fan base, Z-Ro eventually joined the ranks of local rap mogul J. Prince’s Houston-based Rap-A-Lot Records roster (home to the Geto Boys, Scarface, Devin The Dude, and many others), much to the chagrin of some die-hards. Subsequent releases on that label were generally quite good, however, though more subdued in tone and delivery than preceding output. Slicker, noticeably hi-res production values (which nonetheless retained the sample-free synth-heavy character of earlier work) courtesy of veteran producer Mike Dean, typified the best of this updated material. From “The Life of Joseph McVey” (Rap-A-Lot, 2004) to “Let The Truth Be Told” (2005) and “I’m Still Living” (2006), the self-anointed Mo City Don continued to deliver, each subsequent release boasting a maze of words, thoughts and sound more memorable, insightful, and consistent than what many modern contemporaries brought to the fore (North, South, East or West).
Even Z-Ro’s lukewarm “Power” (2007), hurriedly recorded and produced entirely by the rapper himself in a scaled down home studio under difficult time constraints (completed in its entirety just days prior to the commencement of a several month long prison stint), was not without its share of redeeming qualities.
Though not without its occasional creative misstep, the release of a subsequent Z-Ro recording had generally proven a cause for considerable excitement…
(to be continued) -Mike Ramek
Sources: Introductory biographical information culled in part from an excellent three part interview with Rakesh which can be viewed here, the artists own lyrics and bios, a wonderful DJ Screw documentary entitled “The Untold Story“, as well as a print interview conducted by SOHH Rizoh and an interview with Downsouth.com.
Discographical information compiled from my own collection and the good people at discogs.com.
