Walk the Line

"For a while, even before meeting them, I was sort of struggling with a level of hope for the future of hip-hop," he says. "Not to be so clichéd! But I was concerned—I love the culture. And when I met LD and Ariano, I was like, 'Wow, there is a future!'"

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The best kept secret. Photo by John Gilhooley

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• Jewel (Musician)
• Release Party
• Brooklyn
• Hip-Hop and Rap

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After he finishes his interview, Ariano has to go pick up his son—do the family thing, he says—and after that, he has to do a track with the Wu-Tang Clan's U-God. Before that came tracks with Dead Prez—who are supposed to hate white people, Ariano laughs. One of the worst things that happened to hip-hop was how it was divided, he says: if you're not hard, you're soft. There's no in between.

"A lot of hip-hop out there isolates people—it's like, 'Look what I'm doing! You're not doing this!'" says Ariano. "It's separation. But I wanna do a song with Paula Cole, Fiona Apple and Ice Cube—because it's just supposed to be music, and that's supposed to be everything. I heard a cat say about music that the whole point is to make other people feel human. It's easy to not talk about stuff, especially with hip-hop—with words, you can just dance around stuff. But I feel like we've got something to say."

He grins a little, leaning back on a stool in the Technicali Tabernacle.

"If I didn't, I'd feel like we were just hustling people!"

LD AND ARIANO PERFORM WITH CHALI2NA AND AKIL OF JURASSIC 5, LMNO AND 2MEX OF THE VISIONARIES, LIFE REXALL, GLORY, THE KOZMONAUTS, RBX OF DOGG POUND, TREK LIFE, LIVE RADIO, HOCHII AND LOST ART OF TECHNICALI SOUND, DJ DREZ, AND MIKE THE POET PLUS LIVE PAINTING BY MOTION AT THE RELEASE PARTY FOR A THIN LINE AT THE BLUE CAFÉ, 210 PROMENADE, LONG BEACH, (562) 983-7111; WWW.THEBLUECAFE.COM. FRI., 8:30 P.M. $10 AND FREE COPY OF A THIN LINE WITH ADMISSION. 21+.