Dumbfoundead was never that timid asian kid who did all your homework in math class. In fact, if you were to cheat off him, you would be fucking yourself over. He was the class clown and the kid who asked for your lunch tickets so he can get a second lunch. Being exposed to hip-hop at an early age, he randomly walked into a community center in Macarthur Park when he was 14 years old, running into Los Angeles OG's such as Mark Luv (Zulu Nation), Poppin' Chuck, Cre8 (RTN), and EZ Rock (Rocksteady). this is where he started freestyling and learning the history of hip-hop. the year after, a friend from high school took him to a place called Project Blowed in South Central where he found out what DOPE really was. that night he heard some of the most amazing freestylers, rappers like Otherwize, Riddlore, Nocando, P.E.A.C.E., and many more. After ripping countless cyphers and battles he earned the respect of the OG's and became one of the "Blowdians" himself.
At the Project Blowed he ran into two other rappers who were just as animated and skilled as he was, Psychosiz and Open-Mike Eagle. This is when we decided to join forces and form the group the Avengers, i mean Thirsty Fish. He later met even more friends at the Blowed to form a bigger collective known as the Swim Team which includes, Dumbfoundead, Sahtyre, Psychosiz, Open-Mike Eagle, Alpha, Verbs, Lyraflip, Rogue-Venom, Kuest, Doz Tres, Howboutno, and DJ Zo.
You can find Dumbfoundead quantum leaping to one cypher to the next, destroying the self-esteems of emcees, and biking all around Koreatown, Los Angeles.
Intuition sees the world differently. He extracts humor from the mundane, locates heartache in humor, finds comfort in that heartache, and develops stress out of that same comfort. Where most would see a straight line, he tends to see a circle.
Intuition has garnered quite a buzz in the Los Angeles underground hip hop scene, and has been praised by fans and peers for crafting extraordinary lyrics and honing an energetic and precise stage show in conjunction with his trusty DJ, murjONE. His recently released album, Stories About Nothing, is a highly anticipated and widely lauded venture that is entirely produced by the phenomenal Equalibrum and is noteworthy both for the beauty of its sound and the intricacy and suggestiveness of its lyrics.
Intuition was raised in North Pole, Alaska but currently resides in Southern California; throughout his travels his love for rap music has flourished and intensified. His list of influences ranges from A Tribe Called Quest all the way to Wu Tang Clan, and in Equalibrum he found a creative partner with a similar breadth of musical vision. The heavily layered, sample-based beats found on Stories About Nothing serve as a mellifluous accompaniment to Intuition's engaging and involved narratives. The interplay is so dynamic and successful that Intuition's vocals often resemble another sample attentively placed over the harmonies by Equalibrum, while the music's groove pushes the intriguing storytelling forward.
Intuition and the backbone of his stage show, murjONE, have shared the stage with acts like Method Man, Lupe Fiasco, Murs, Brother Ali, Living Legends, Sean Price, Sage Francis, Dilated Peoples, Rhymefest, Blackalicious, Little Brother, Busdriver, Josh Martinez, Pigeon John, Zion-I and countless others. Intuition and murjONE’s energetic and well planned sets contrast sharply with the unintelligible, rowdy, hypemen-centered performances that have come to characterize the genre's live expression; this devotion to fine-tuning their craft and projecting a sense of professionalism ensures that fans past, present, and future will continue to follow and support the efforts of these young musicians with zeal.
Intuition is a rapper. You should be his listener.
BIZZART is an amalgam of contradictory and cohesive elements, a mishmash of sounds that treat the ears to both the good and the bad. The project is the brainchild of Arthur Arellanes who, since 1997, has released three albums of the kind of music that draws inspiration from everywhere. I would be hard-pressed to attach some kind of nomenclature to Bizzart, but there is method to the madness. To begin to understand exactly what kind of aural landscape is being manufactured here, you first need to realize that there is a smattering of ersatz and concrete systems; intertwining old and new. It would be a shame to define it simply as “of the future.†Music today is often subjugated—inter-genre influences and easily calculable carbon copies of pre-dated music are prevalent—and although Bizzart has a few particularly loud influences (Can and Saul Williams), the music is also filled with some soft and unlikely moments that speak politically and socially. Bizzart seems to have the zeitgeist by the neck; his showmanship is incontestably aligned with his music. He previewed some work from the new album as well as some old favorites and an improvisational freak-out session that has me thinking the direction will always be the same: forward.
