Gee Watts on his new record, ‘199x,’ out today

Local rapper Gee Watts has an acute sense of the depths of Kansas City’s broken neighborhoods and the possibilities for lives born within the turmoil. His first official album 199x (Nineteen Ninety Never), filled with literate observations and prescient ruminations about life on KC’s streets, drops this week and follows closely in the wake of his 11 unofficial mixtapes.

If there’s any justice in the world, Watts will soon be recognized for more than just the cosign and guest verse from Kendrick Lamar that recently lit up hip-hop blogs. The release of 199x aims to position him as a more introspective alternative to KC’s Strange Music label, and as an heir apparent to the lineage of self-aware lyricists turning the experiences of their youth into social commentary.

We caught up with Watts recently via e-mail, while he was busy promoting the release of the album.

The Pitch: You’ve released quite a few mixtapes, but 199x feels like more of an official album. How did the writing and recording process for this release differ from some of the mixtapes?

Watts: Well before, music was just something I had a passion for, and the homies would help me fund it. Seeing as how none of us are in a position to pay one another for services Jesse [Brown, Watts’s manager and owner/operator of the Distant Dreams label], Kendu [Kendall G. Blakeney, designer and visual artist] and myself decided we’d share business interest with these companies and what we have to offer. We’re more professional with our approach. Seeing as how now we have eyes on what it is we’re doing, we need to approach our craft like that. So I wanted to make an actual body of work that was fluid versus compiling 10 dope songs and making a “mixtape.”

There seems to be more of an emphasis on adding hooks to some of the tracks for this recording. Did you and the producers decide that was necessary, or is that just something you’ve tried to incorporate more as you’ve developed as an artist?

It was just me trying to grow and develop as an all-around artist. Anybody can write rhymes and lace a beat, but it’s artistry to make song. So going in this time I wanted to try my hand at better song writing. Kendu handles visual art, Jesse handles Managing, PR, the technical side, and I represent the bull dog, shark type. Usually in my music that reflects, no hooks, all gas no brakes, just go. I had to tone that down in all aspects and approach the music differently so that it can receive the reception I want. It may sound backwards, but people already listen to my music, now I want them to play it.

You’ve mentioned before that the idea of a “nineteen ninety never” is related to nostalgia for the 1990s and your childhood. Are the beats and production of the album tied to ’90s hip-hop as well?

Kinda, in the sense that a lot of records implemented in the sampling process are songs of the 90s. We have the Dead Presidents Jay [Z] sample, we sample Biggie a few times, I sample Pac with “[Death]Around the Corner.” Even in the “skits” or whatever you wanna call them, we used 90s movies Jungle Fever and Belly. I figured if I gave it that theme it would make sense on the surface, but beyond that 199never means a certain echelon that things of the 90s were created on. MJ was in the 90s Kobe and AI was 90s. Pac and Jay, Wu-tang, Big, 90s. We had Boyz in the Hood and Menace 2 Society in the 90s. Black entrepreneurship was full steam ahead in the 90s. In order to compete in any of those fields, movies, fashion, sports, or music, you had to up your game or get rolled on. With this project I’m saying “this may not be better than them niggas, but it will hold its own.” That’s what 199x is.

As a whole, the album feels particularly down tempo. Was that a conscious choice to include slower beats and more of a deliberate and contemplative flow?

Nah, I can and will go on anything dope. If it’s hot I want it, but without me having a means to just lock in any producer I want I can only use what I get, and what I get I choose the best of that. Just so happens they slow.

[page]The track “199x [Sixteen-Nineteen]” serves as the quasi-title track for this release and also seems like the first single. With lines like Which falls first, character or your worth/ My worth is in my words/That’s all I own on this earth/Church, it ends up coming off as a more meditative and thoughtful rap than some might anticipate. Does that verse play off the chorus of the track in an attempt to dispel the notion or stereotype of rappers being “all about the business… [and] all about the bitches”?

… Yeah, man, glad you caught on to that. That song literally speaks for itself. If I was to give you the lyrics on paper and you read them, you’d get exactly what it is I’m trying to say. In every aspect of the song until the last line. The things that run through my mind, good, bad, or the ills of society is what I place on record. I’ve been trying to get better at giving more light hearted music but shit, life ain’t light hearted. Nobody wants to be preached at either so I try to just leave a gem here and some game there, if one chooses to soak, they will grow from that. I’m soakin’ game 24/7, the man who knows the most knows he knows nothing.

There are a lot of references to zombies and gruesome imagery on tracks like “Zombie Juice” and “Belly.” Is that a larger metaphor for the state of some of Kansas City’s neighborhoods?

Yeah, because Kansas City is the place that raised me for 20 something years, but anyone can relate. You’ve been to one hood, you’ve been to ’em all. I just paint a picture of what I’ve experienced and since these are real life events, unless I’m some super nigga, it’s other people who have been through and go through and see these things that live to tell about it. I know this because I have homies who been through 10 times what I have talked on record, so that lets me know it’s people out there that will relate. It’s refreshing to listen to a song and emotion is evoked behind what the artist is saying. It’s like a reassurance that it’s someone out there going through the same drama. Sort of like that shoulder to lean on.

Do you feel any pressure to represent or be the voice of areas of the city that aren’t always well served?

I’m simply telling my story through lyrics, same time I’d be lying to say that I don’t know I have a lot of people rooting for me to do something for this city the right way. With folks like yourself, and the people continuing to support, it’s only a matter of time before KC is no longer a fly-over zone.

199x is out today on Distant Dreams. For more info on the 1990never project/partnership, go here.