Audio By Carbonatix
As far as American cities go, Kansas City isn’t at the top of the list when it comes to violence, tunes, and scandal. But that wasn’t always the case, with the city’s music and organized crime worlds inextricably intertwined. Kansas City was a hotbed of jazz in the ’40s, acting as a petri dish for the music’s evolution from big band swing to bebop. A civic effort in the ’70s to revive the jazz scene, however, ended up with a mafia war, nightclub explosions, and corruption involving Las Vegas casino development. So it’s not too weird to have a local rapper name himself after a sub-machine gun. That’d be Tech N9ne, a K.C. icon whose lyrical flow is just as rat-a-tat as his namesake. (Maybe you heard his hair-raising guest spot alongside Andre 3000 on Lil Wayne’s Tha Carter IV?) All 6’s and 7’s, Tech N9ne’s newest album, is creepy, hypnotic, hooky, and packed with high-profile guests. Tech N9ne, who turns 40 this year but has lost none of his vitality, brings his Lost Cities Tour through the Valley with Jay Rock, Krizz Kaliko, and Kutt Calhoun, along with Atlanta’s Flawless.
