El Guante says: I'm eager to try those Twin Cities travel agents...

... or just hop into a van with Minnesota plates. Let's continue the onslaught, by asking El Guante about geographical matters and CD sales, because hip-hop fandom is all about state lines and stats.

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H: How much does Madison hip-hop have some sort of beachead in, or pipeline to, the Twin Cities?

El Guante: I think a lot of it just comes straight through The Crest, because they're the biggest act from Madison, BY FAR—and they have a lot of connections up there. I think The Crest bring a lot of Twin Cities artists down, who then network with some artists here, and then the Crest go up to the Twin Cities a lot. Not to talk bad about everyone else—but The Crest have the biggest fan base and are doing the most stuff.

H: Do you feel some sort of obligation to open things up for other artists, people you're working with right now, just by virtue of being there?

EG: Not especially. I mean I'm making this move for selfish reasons: I want to further my own career. But if other doors are opened and bridges are built because of that—that's just kinda the icing on the cake.

H: What are you most looking forward to that you wouldn't be able to get here?

EG: Even though I'll be living in the Twin Cities, we're planning on traveling a lot and touring.... If I were in Madison I could still probably do some of it—I think it's just going to be easier now. So I'm most excited about working with this independent label on setting up tours. I just want to travel and play shows right now: I don't have a day job, this is a good time of my life to do that.

H: Do you think there's gonna be a yearly exodus of artists who want to take their careers seriously/further?

EG: To an extent, simply because it's a college town, and with First Wave we're going to have more college students in the hip-hop scene than there has been traditionally. Then yeah, 'cause naturally college students leave after college, most of the time—but you're talking about the other acts.

I don't know—because The Crest [have] been based here for a long time and they're still successful. Most of the acts that are having any kind of success right now don't necessarily need to uproot or go anywhere else. There are certain perks, but I don't think it's an absolute necessity.

H: I've been to a bunch of empty hip-hop shows here—what factors do you think lead to that?

I mean, on one hand, there's a national downturn in attendance at live shows of every genre. That's anecdotal—just what I hear from people. Specifically, in terms of hip-hop in Madison: people need to be more creative. When I move I just want to play shows—aside from when I'm touring—I wanna play shows that are always like an event, with some kinda theme, like a Valentine's show, something special. The era of three bands at the King Club on a Friday night is kind of over. And that's not just hip-hop.

H: Have you kept track of how many CDs you've sold?

EG: not really, I have a vague idea. Around 200 of the first one that wasn't very good, before I really knew what I was doing. Then around 4-500 of Vanishing Point. We must've made about 500-700 of the mixtape, that we were just selling or giving away for free—the Grey Summer mixtape. So it's all been very localized, half of it to people that I know personally, and half of it to people at shows and stuff. That's definitely a goal of mine (it's gonna help by moving away) not to just sell CDs to my friends.

H: You now have a presence in two markets, aside from Minneapolis being a lot bigger--

I think it could be really nice, cause after leaving here I can come back, and like I was saying before, a show here would be more of an event. It wouldn't be just me playing another show, it would be me coming back after I've been gone for three months, and hopefully all my friends would come out, people who remember me from shows would come out. After touring, I'm hoping my show will get better and more engaging....

And then the two markets thing would be cool. [Maybe I'll] live in a different city for two years, and then move. Like I'll move to Des Moines for two years, and move to Chicago for two years.

H: Des Moines?

EG: [laughs] That's the first thing that popped into my head

H: do you have some special connection to Des Moines?

EG: not at all...

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El Guante's final show as a Madisonian is at the King Club. It's an event, though, 'cause it's uptown Saturday night, and there will be 20,000 artists on stage. And before I forget, Guante gave me permission to leak a hitherto unheard track.

THIS IS IT [mp3, zshared]

El Guante says... Eat at Taste of Asia

Kyle Myhre, aka El Guante, recently posted a few points of clarification re: my Q&A in the current issue of The Onion with him. WHICH YOU SHOULD STILL GO PICK UP. I think the more open-ended of those points will be addressed as I post more content from our original conversation on Dane101 and Emcees Without Voices but figured I'd get this thing up quickly, since it's actually about a restaurant that I'd hoped would get some additional exposure from the piece, as he'd strongly endorsed it, and mentioned that its business was being hurt by the construction along East Washington.

As per his blog, in the very last item of the Q&A...

One one blog post, you directed everyone in Madison to eat at Taste of Asia. You said, don't ask questions, but why?

[Laughs] I love Chinese buffets, like good old American, greasy Chinese food. I'm thinking about filming a music video there, or like a YouTube bio. Next time I go, I'll have to talk to them.

...Myhre wanted to convey that the East Washington buffet "Taste of Asia is NOT greasy-- i was saying that most places are-- and i like that-- but what makes ToA special is that the food is a bit more classy."

There wasn't any intent to quote him out of context by clipping his full endorsement, but I understand the concern, so here's the rest of his take on the Taste of Asia, from the original transcript:

Taste of Asia's the best in town because it's not as greasy, it's not just Chinese: they serve Hmong, Laotian, Thai food. We bought a bunch of egg rolls from them for a party we were having, 'cause they were doing a fundraiser: selling these egg rolls to help Hmong immigrants. They're good people, and again, the food is just great. The one thing they don't have is an ice cream machine. If they had that, I'd never leave.

What's an ideal meal there?
I like a lot of white rice, which is boring—but also a lot of broccoli from the chicken and broccoli. They also serve really good sesame chicken and General Tso's chicken, because it's crispier: it's not just soggy breaded stuff. But the best thing they have there are the Hmong egg rolls--not as fried as a traditional Chinese buffet egg roll.

Taste of Asia can be found @ 2817 East Washington. They've got a website, but it doesn't seem to have been updated for a while.

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Myhre also says he's not sure if he booked the Coup's plane ticket. I wrote that in the intro on the basis of a conversation I had with him during Hip-hop as a Movement Week. I was trying to determine if Pam the Funkstress would be DJing, and he was able to rule her appearance out because he'd "booked" the tickets for the band and Boots Riley, but hadn't seen a Pam listed. In scare-quotes, 'cause, as he now posts...

I think I helped book the Coup tickets-- Katrina Flores and the Multicultural Student Coalition may have done that though--i don't really remember. I remember being at the Student Travel place for what seemed like hours, but I was probably just following Katrina's orders. haha.

Free on Friday

When we mentioned we'd say something about El Guante's penultimate Madison rap show, this is actually what we had in mind (Manchromatic will be performing with him @ the Inferno on Thursday). This one's free, within staggering distance for us--and wallflowering's more appealing when new art's going up.

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Event details not exactly offline info anymore, though.

Action Figures Not Included

happy hangover, america

"If there ain't no light at the end of the tunnel, then build a fire and roast marshmallows on sticks of dynamite..."--El Guante's July 4th Anthem,

"Unmastered"[this was originally a MySpace rip, go there to stream].

Boom?

We're going to talk some shit about press releases (and mention a few things re: El Guante's penultimate rap show) whenever we wake up in the afternoon. But first, we'd like to share our favorite line from an email he sent out June 21st:

His blog, "Why Is El Guante So Angry," has become a widely-trafficked local website due to its unique blend of hip hop, politics and vitriol.