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Guru and Baldhead Slick

BY MICHAEL ENDELMAN

In 1984, two days after Christmas, Dorchester resident Keith Elam packed all of his belongings into a $500 Volvo and drove down to New York. His mother gave him explicit instructions: "Don’t come back asking for shit!" Seventeen years later, Elam is better known as Guru, half of the legendary hip-hop group Gang Starr, and one of the most successful and distinctive voices in hip-hop. He’ll be back home this Wednesday with a solo show at the Middle East. And he won’t be asking for shit.

Leaving home on that cold December day, as Guru explains over the phone from a studio in New York, was a career-oriented move: "I wanted to get a record deal, I wanted to make it, I wanted to be more than a local yokel." Although Guru’s exodus from the Hub helped his career, it hurt his partnership with Damo D-Ski and DJ 12B Down (say it fast) in the long-forgotten Gang Starr Posse, his first hip-hop group. He explains, "I was living in Brooklyn because I wanted to make it in the hip-hop game. But they didn’t want to rough it, they’d come up for the weekend — eat my food, smoke my weed — and then go back home. They wore out their welcome after a while. Then when I got a record deal, I was real pissed off, and I decided to go on my own. We ended up having a real falling out back then, but we’re men now. We’ve washed away all the past. Damo D-Ski just got out of prison and he gave me a call and we had a good talk."

Even though he moved away, Guru has never forgotten his home town. He’s embraced local MCs like Krumbsnatcha and Big Shug as part of his core crew. And he thinks that growing up here actually helped him succeed in New York. "I always knew that Boston was special. Growing up there helped me survive in the New York rap game. It’s small but intense, and people are very proud. Most of the Boston rappers are streetwise and intelligent; that had a big effect on me."

Just now Guru is using his status as an elder statesmen to help out a cadre of less-experienced MCs. Recorded under the name Baldhead Slick, his new solo album Baldhead Slick & da Click (Ill Kid/Landspeed) has the raspy-voiced MC teaming up with a slew of unknowns (Kaeson, Lae D-Trigga) plus a handful of established peers (Ice-T, Ed O.G.). Raw, gritty, and urgent, the disc finds Guru adopting a slightly different tone than the one he established with Gang Starr. "Baldhead Slick is that cat who’s still connected to the grimy kids on the street. Who pulls up in the car and gets out to talk and hang with the kids. Who chills with pimps, gangstas, and hustlers."

Guru’s visit to the Middle East will be his first show in town since 1998, and he’s excited about the trip back, even though his family aren’t living in Dorchester anymore. "My parents live on the Cape now, and all my siblings moved out, so it’s really just Big Shug and some of the old-school homeboys that I got left. It’s still cool to come back, though, there’s still the vibe. I like to go back and drive through some of the old spots where I used to hang, Four Corners, Blue Hills, Franklin Hill . . . "

And with these thoughts of years gone by, Guru gets nostalgic, talking at length about his juvenile-delinquent tendencies, brawling with Irish kids during the busing crisis, and reading the Phoenix — "a dope newspaper," in his words. In fact, once Guru gets started on Boston, it’s hard to get him to stop. Five minutes after our conversation ends, he calls back to reminisce for another 10 minutes about his adolescence. The most important question, however, is answered succinctly: "Red Sox, baby! I like the Yankees, but the Red Sox are my team, the Sox are in my heart."

Guru performs this Wednesday, December 19, at the Middle East, 480 Mass Ave in Central Square. Call (617) 864-EAST.

Issue Date: December 13 - 20, 2001

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