Chrissy and I have been close for a decade now. Along with 2 other close friends from University in Guelph, we all came together to Toronto nearly 8 years ago. We been through some shit. While most of you spent the summer debating the merit of the Ice Bucket Challenge on your facebook accounts, Chris moved home to spend a final year with her mother who was dying of ALS.
I first came across Brother Ali around the same time our crew was getting ready to make the move out of Guelph. His early records were an awakening for me. The voice of an angel, in the body of an obese albino. Lyrically he poured out his heart singing to his battles with his ex-wife, her crackhead mother, his self image, his mother, his grandfather and his very place on this earth. Yet throughout each verse was this honest and uplifting message that he would not be victim to his circumstances. It was as beautiful sonically as it was emotionally.
My first Ali show was during the mayhem of Canadian Music Week (or North By Northeast...I can never tell em apart) in March of 2007. Amidst the hundreds of shows going down that weekend, less than a hundred people turned out in the massive hall of The Phoenix Concert Theatre. The fans were as undeterred by the empty room as was the man himself. We crowded around the stage like bugs to a light, and he brought a party like no other. The magic of Brother Ali goes beyond the message. Yes there is this beautiful and tragic undertone to the lyrics, yet they are forever buoyed by the infectious beats of Atmosphere DJ Ant, and his boundless commitment to making a party. In a room meant for thousands, less than a hundred of us came together that night and made an energy so much larger than our individual parts.
In August 2010, I brought Chrissy along with 3 other friends, many who had never met each other before this journey, to New York City to experience Rock The Bells. We had no idea how that weekend would forge new bonds that would last forever from that fateful trip. With a show that featured reunions of The Wu Tang Clan, A Tribe Called Quest, and the return to the stage of Lauryn Hill, and the unspeakable magic of Manhattan, we should have guessed. When it came time for Brother Ali's set at the festival, it was a tough sell, given his slot on the side stage during the main stage set of icon KRS-ONE. My insistence that Ali was the man to see convinced my friends, and I was amazed that by the start of his set, against that of KRS-One, there were several thousand strong waiting for Ali. In just a few short years, his star was rising. That message, that foundational vibration, was resonating in a lot more people than I would have guessed. It was reflected in the very songs he was now crafting. It was no longer "I will overcome" but "I have overcome" and "look at us now". The entire set was a living embodiment of the joyous experience of beating the odds through sheer force of will and impeccable style. By the end of his raucous set, nearly a third of the main stage crowd had drifted from the iconic KRS, to share in the magic happening on the side stage.
Later, on the highway home, we were sideswiped in our tiny coup by a double tractor-trailer that knocked us into a cement highway divider. Incredibly, we emerged completely unscathed (minus a side view mirror). We pulled immediately into a nearby rest stop, literally kissed the ground and began holding each other. Inspired, I moved to the jambox and the first sounds we heard from that point was Brother Ali's opening to "Fresh Air"
"I'm the luckiest son of bitch that ever lived!"
A couple years ago, Chrissy found Jesus. No not that wine-making surfer dude Mel Gibson tortured the fuck out of in "The Passion". She did however meet the love of her life in an American marine named Jesus, who was stationed in Korea while she was teaching abroad. With the passing of her mother, Chrissie is leaving Monday to begin the rest of this life in Alabama. We could think of no better way of spending a final night together, than by spending it dancing alongside Brother Ali here in Toronto.
His set at Tattoo Rock Parlour was as engaging as always. In an era where social media creates this illusion of connectivity to the artists we love, Ali has long achieved this the old fashioned way. Through his songs, he has created a tangible access to his highs and his lows and instilled in us all that through the power of love, nothing can stand in the way of our happiness. From the pain of "Walking Away" and "Baby Girl" to the stubborn style of "Forrest Whitaker" and "Self Taught" the crowd was fully engaged in the truth that love has more power than anything that stands in our way. I could see it in Chrissy. I could hear it in Ali. I could feel it in myself.
We thank artists far too often for a good time. In Brother Ali, there are no words for his impact on our good life.
