Most of the best music out there has a real story to tell behind it. It becomes even better when 2 seemingly completely different individuals can combine to share their take on a common issue. This happened perfectly recently with a rapper and folk artist coming together for a common goal.
J.Smo of BUNKS teamed up with Australian singer/songwriter Bob Crain to create this Folk/Rap fusion that explores and discusses 40+ years of Drug War History in less than 5 minutes. This is a remix of Bob’s song “Forsaken Veteran of the Drug Wars” which appears on his album The Hippies Were Right. J.Smo produced the remix fusion as well as handling mixing and mastering duties.
Take in a listen here:
Drugs, illicit, illegal, mind and mood altering drugs like it or not have been a part of modern American and worldwide culture for decades. The Drug War maybe the longest running singular war in history. There is no front, no rear, no flanks and no sides in the Drug War it is every man for themselves. The battles were fought in homes, in the streets, in the dark back alleys, the halls of justice, country and city alike. Some had uniforms and some wore colors it was hand to mind combat where camaraderie was a casualty and treachery a weapon.
One thing that has always been the banner bearer the drum and bugle core of the Drug War is the music. The Drug War has spawned innumerable songs some for, some against, and some because. Yes the fife and drum players also fought and died, their tombstones sometimes bear the names of the famous and the revered battlers and sometimes they are unmarked … tombs of the unknown, all Forsaken Veterans of the Drug Wars.
The Drug War continues, no end in sight J. in his War Correspondent guise advanced the reporting from the mid ‘80s. Through the “just say no” front to the crack house massacres, to glorified chemists on TV and here we stand…no end in sight.
So there you have it. Five decades of the Drug War rolled into four minutes and forty five seconds of Folk Rap Fusion … a new composition a blending of old and new … but the Drug War continues unabated, the casualties mount and the anthems continue to be sung.
What brought these two veterans and their respective genres together was passion and a desire to deliver the message that the Drug War, a war of individual attrition, continues…and there is no victory in sight.
Bob Crain: www.bobcrain.com.au
J.Smo: www.bunksperience.com
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