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Mecca: Spearheading Hip Hop Creole

Mecca

Contributed by by Alex Viard on 6/15/07

“If I was in Miami right now I’d be runnin’ around with sandals in 80 degrees.” As his weekend draws to a close, Haitian-American rapper, poet, actor, and activist Mecca aka Grimo (pronounced ‘gree-moe’) is still warming up to the Windy City’s frigid January reception. Despite being born in Brooklyn and bred in Shadyville (Queens) until the age of seventeen, tropical Miami has been home to this young entertainer for over a decade. It’s the only major U.S. city to boast an official Little Haiti and include Haitian Creole as one of its official languages.

A look at his MySpace page finds him rubbing elbows with the likes of Lil Wayne, Gloria Valez, Lil Jon, Dwayne Wade, Wayne Wonder, and a host of others celebrities in numerous Miami hotspots. The release party for his Kreyol Konneksyon album at Manhattan’s S.O.B.’s enjoyed support from Haitian heavyweights in the music industry such as Harve Pierre (VP, Bad Boy Records), DJ Whoo Kid (G-Unit), and Wyclef Jean - who was briefly joined by Pras for a partial Fugees reunion. In fact, Mecca is the leading artist on Jean’s Sak Pase Records, a relationship that developed largely off the strength of the buzz Mecca created for himself.

“I think once you start creating a buzz and got a team working with you to create a buzz, other opportunities come into play. I’ve been presented with the opportunity to feature in films, host red carpets at events just like you see on Entertainment Tonight or the red carpet stuff that goes on in Hollywood. There was an opportunity for me to do Dwayne Wade’s MVP party at Privee when the Heat won the championship. I was on the red carpet, I was the host.”

Mecca has managed to turn himself into a Haitian celebrity through local radio and television spots, acting, spoken word, and his popular brand of Hip Hop Kreyole. He has revived and transformed the Haitian Hip Hop Kreyole movement with his blend of the Haitian Creole language and popular hip hop club mixes.

“My man Booga from On Point Entertainment is the one that’s really connected with Wyclef. He’s done work with him in the past. My relationship with Booga is tight, we know each other from back the days, ever since I moved to Miami. I’ve been on the scene he’s been on the scene, so of course we gonna collab. So now the opportunity permits that we working together now. Pushin the whole Hip Hop Kreyole movement, being Haitian, Wyclef being Haitian, it all make sense. Sak Pase Records, Refugee Camp, Hex Battalion, Mecca aka Grimo. Me and Wyclef are doing the same work and I think now its recognized so it makes sense to just blend and do the work.”

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“You gottta connect back with your heritage. We’re making this great effort through the music, using entertainment as a platform to educate. To kill the stereotypes of Haitian people cause if you really tap into the information and the history of Haitian people that we were very, very impressionable on how the world is today. We basically made the difference. The first independent black nation in the world and we’re in the situation we are now?”

Haiti is the site of the only successful slave rebellion in the history of the world. Once known as the Pearl of the Antilles, it is now the poorest country in the Western Hemisphere. In 1804 the black population of the French sugar producing slave colony Saint-Domingue completed a thirteen-year struggle when it defeated French forces in the Battle of Vertiers, becoming the first black republic in the world and the first independent nation in Latin America. Located in the Caribbean where it occupies the western third of the island Hispaniola, the Maryland sized nation of 8 million has struggled with constant political instability, rooted in its grinding poverty and deep-seated class and color divisions. There has historically been a mostly black poor majority accompanied by small middle and elite classes comprised of both black and light skinned mulatto factions, in which the latter have traditionally been perceived as dominant.

“That light skin Haitian male with coarse hair with nappy hair they call a ‘grimo.’ If your hair is suave then you a ‘mulatto’, if you’re that complexion and you got softer textured hair. I’ve been called Grimo because of the complexion. And once you start to understand what’s going on in Haiti today with the class, they determine what class you are by complexion, and the financial status also. Grimo’s just a term that represents what people perceive me as to be in the Haitian culture.”

Haiti’s situation has produced a massive outward migration with an estimated 3-4 million Haitians living outside its borders, including some 80% of its professionals. The 1957 installment of dictator Franois “Papa Doc” Duvalier sparked an ongoing exodus from Haiti that has led many ŽmigrŽs to city’s like New York, Boston, Montreal, and of course, Miami. Mecca’s company HEX Battalion derives its name from both the literal Haitian exodus as well as a metaphorical exodus into progress for Haitians, to which it contributes.

“So we gotta fix that. Me as an entertainer, I’ma do that through music. That’s what I know how to do. Other people have different levels of what they know how to do and we’re just trying to build a network with the movement.”

Mecca’s MySpace page and website document extensively his celebrity outings right alongside his strong commitment to education, unity, and justice. He has allied himself with organizations such as Haitian Women of Miami, joining them in Washington as they fought for fair treatment of the hundreds of indefinitely detained Haitian refugees in U.S. facilities. Mecca motivates youth of all backgrounds to excel both academically and in their personal lives as he travels to schools and community centers throughout the nation, sharing the cultural and historical contributions of Haitians to the world.

Take a casual scroll through his MySpace page and one can’t help but notice that right alongside Mecca’s extensive community services is something that might seem out of sync to some: the clichŽ images of loosely dressed females prevalent in many images of hip hop. It’s no secret that the portrayal of women in hip hop has long been a source of controversy for the hip hop community. The standardization of sexual content in hip hop imagery and the pressures to comply are something of which Mecca is well aware. While there is no shortage of scantly clad bronze dancers in Mecca’s tropically flavored video’s, Mecca demonstrates why they are not only an acceptable but necessary part of his work.

“The truthful side of things is that women are very beautiful. Not to exploit them, but I think there’s still a way to show they’re beautiful. Yes there are beautiful women in the videos but our counter to that is, okay- now its time to show you how beautiful our Haitian women are. The stereotype is that you wouldn’t even think they were Haitian but here we are to present that so you have another outlook on how beautiful our Haitian sisters are.”

This is more than just talk, as Mecca has created Belle Femme Ayisen (BFM), one of the world’s few exclusively Haitian modeling agencies. The phrase means ‘Beautiful Haitian Women’ in both the French and Haitian Creole languages. Mecca has the unique ability to seamlessly blend his entertainment and social agendas without sounding forced or preachy.

“In order to talk to some of these young kids, you have to actually create the genre of music or add on to it in a fashion that they will adhere to it, and they’ll be able to absorb the message that your trying to create. If you create a wall right off the bat then the message is not going to get out.”

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In the summer of 2005 Mecca traveled to Haiti to star in The Miami Film Group’s Kidnappings, a docu-drama highlighting Haiti’s recent epidemic of the same name. In addition to being featured in “Focus Magazine” (May 2007) as one of the 100 most influential people in South Florida, Mecca aka Grimo was interviewed on Miami’s local NBC 6 news in February. He has also wrapped up the Danny Glover narrated Boat People project, a spoken word CD that stems from documentary of the same name that is currently in the making. Mecca describes the album as “Cranglish, because its in 4 languages - Spanish, English, French and Creole.”

Fresh on the heels of its album release party at S.O.B.’s, Mecca’s debut album Kreyol Konneksyon is set to be released in the coming months and will feature several established Haitian and American artists, including Wyclef Jean (who was recently named Haiti’s official Roving Ambassador), M1 (Dead Prez), Smitty (of “Diamond’s on my Neck” fame), Carimi, Dr. Zoe, Black Alex, and Sweet Micky.

Mecca aka Grimo has a loyal and ever-expanding fan base of Haitians and non-Haitians alike and is gaining the respect of influential industry personnel. He embodies hip hop’s growing niche culture movement in which artists can produce high quality material and carve out a substantial following without the help of major companies. As he solidifies his ties with the mainstream, Mecca aka Grimo is prepared to build upon the legacy of his predecessors become the next major representative of Haitian people worldwide.