Before you-know-who was president, I encountered something called Twitter, ran with it for maybe six weeks. That was in what — oh-nine? I’d been reading about hip-hop in The New Yorker, a starkly pale conveyance into the zone some would say, but well written by I forget who. The rappers’ go-by’s intrigued me: X goes by the name Y, performs with Z who goes by the name A.

Going by names held charm for me. An ecstasy of gnarly monikers. I had fun with it in a couple of tweets. Said something like “I’m so-and-so and go by High Plains Drifter.” Bad idea. Somebody went shut the fuck up. I may have been, what they say in football, offside. I dropped Twitter like a hot potato.

One good thing came of the putdown; I bumped into Earl Sweatshirt. Not for any gainful purpose, just that the name was genially ripe, had staying power. Wouldn’t you know? Earl is in my head again via The Times: 

Often, Earl has appeared to be hiding in plain view, an accidental superstar trying to stay grounded. Over the past decade, he’s been one of the most visible makers of lo-fi, subterranean, lyrically abstruse rap music, a style that has both earned him a fervent following of connoisseurs and kept casual peekers at bay.

Look, I read poetry — more of it than I understand. Anything “lyrically abstruse” is catnip for this pussy. If only someone called Earl’s songs something like “muddily intricate and knotty.” 

After crash-landing into the spotlight, he’s been inching his way out of it… one muddily intricate and knotty song at a time.

That does it, my heart leapt. Memo to High Plains Drifter: There’s a book* by a guy. Buy. Read. Learn. Listen. And zip it.

*What’s Good: Notes on Rap and Language, by Daniel Levin Becker (City Lights Books, 2022).

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