MICK JENKINS with SWTO at the Hoxton (69 Bathurst), Tuesday (September 1), doors 7:30 pm. $15-$45. rotate.com, soundscapesmusic.com, ticketweb.ca.
Mick Jenkins is on the phone from the south side of Chicago, a city heavily scrutinized in recent years for its gun violence and murder rate.
“I think it’s like any other big metropolitan area,” Jenkins argues. “If you want to find trouble, you know where to find trouble, and if you live close to trouble you know how not to act. The amount of violence in Chicago, specifically the year [the murder rate] was higher than Iraq, was wild, but it’s also been fetishized and made out to be a whole lot more than what it is.
“That’s just the culture. We like to see negative, exciting things. It’s a better story to paint the picture that way for the media outlets that do. I understand it, but it’s not what Chicago is.”
Born in 1991, Jenkins is wise beyond his years and fixated on elemental truths. His gritty, politically charged masterstroke, The Water[s], was one of the finest albums of 2014. Working at a furious pace, he’s just released Wave[s] (via Cinematic Music Group), a vibrant record with more cooing love and upbeat club jams than fans might expect.
That said, any glimmers of romance are counterbalanced by his uncompromising perspective on the state of the planet, which Jenkins believes is “in shambles.”
“I’m raised with Christian values and I think the world is just getting more and more evil, know what I’m sayin’? It’s supposed to be ending, and I think people are just getting more evil. That’s what it is.
“Fundamentally, all the problems in the world – not even just America – there are alternative solutions that are better. It’s not rocket science. You see that there’s police violence and police problems? There’s alternatives to the way we train and choose the police. You see that people are hungry and in poverty? There’s ways we can help them.”
By Jenkins’s estimation, we could do things differently, but we simply don’t and now we’re fucked.
“The best metaphor I can use to explain what I’m saying is, the bathing suit used to not allow you to see above the ankle,” he says with a laugh. “And it has miraculously transformed into almost being naked, and no one has made any objection.
“That is literally what I think is happening with the world it’s just subtly and progressively getting worse and worse and worse.”
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