Originally, when I picked up Sentences: the Life of MF Grimm I thought, “Finally, real hip hop being put into a graphic novel in a real way.” This was something I had always wanted to see. I love the mixing, the crossing over of cultures, pop cultures and mediums. I love to see visceral producers like the RZA making music for movies like Kill Bill or Ghost Dog. Taking music that I love and movies or comics and putting the two together is nothing less than thrilling. But I wasn’t truly prepared for what fit between the covers. I confess, I love seeing DMX in movies with Seagal or Jet Li. Sure those movies aren’t as good as Belly, but I enjoyed the pop corn sensibility, the heightened pulp sense of reality, like a superhero movie or a two hour music video with cool action scenes. None of that is real. It’s a part of hip hop now, rappers making their way to the big screen, hustling whatever way they can to make money and that’s a part of the game as well, but that’s not at the heart of hip hop. In Sentences, Percy Carey (MF Grimm) paints his story in words, the way rappers spit, but without bling and posturing. He shows us an unvarnished story of his life coming up in NY and coming to Cali to rap, the bullshit that you get caught up in along the way and how he survived it all.
Grimm gives comics the credibility they deserve by not pandering to music video theatrics or gangster movie clichés. His thoughts are clear and honest and his story powerful. Almost more a confession than a contrived adventure, Carey uses Ronald Wimberly’s “Boondocks”-styled artwork as the beat for his words to flow over. This book was such a fast read; the pages seemed to melt away.
You can’t deny this book. Sure it was cool to see him toe to toe with Dre, Suge, Snoop and 2pac in their cameos, but the brilliance of the book goes deeper. I love hip hop, the culture, the music, I truly do. But I read this book and learned that even if I love the music, as a white kid from the suburbs I can never truly understand it.
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