Local Rap Singer Mental Mid Releases New Song "B.O.M." On Reverbnation.Com, Shows Signs Of Widening Audience Appeal...

Facebook photo used under First Amendment Fair Comment and

Criticism, lack of asserted copyright is also fairly assumed from

"promotional" aspect of the photo, blog post by John Hoff

Define "Favorite" Rapper 

Click here for Mental Mid's Facebook, where video can be found of his new song B.O.M. 

Click here to find a downloadable list of his songs 

One anonymous commenter recently described Minneapolis rapper Mental Mid as this blogger's "favorite" rapper, which might be fair from a certain standpoint. 

But from that same standpoint, he'd also be the "favorite" rapper of the Minneapolis Police Department, plus at least one local news station, plus any number of unknown street enemies who probably watch for new Mental Mid downloads to get a clue to his whereabouts and murder him over that "Kobe Diss" song...

Minneapolis Murder Rap 

In fact, I call this genre "Murder Rap," though to be specific this would be "Minneapolis Murder Rap" and it's hard to tell if songs like "Kobe Diss" which reference the murder of local gang leader Tyrone "Ty Crack" Washington could have appeal outside of the Twin Cities. Actually, make that half the Twin Cities, specifically Minneapolis. I'm sure St. Paul could give a damn. 

The key aspect of "murder rap" is the songs smash the line between art and evidence, dropping clues even while dropping beats. It is a dangerous art form, and therein presumably lies its appeal and attraction, at least to whoever is downloading and listening.  

But Mental Mid's uncanny cunning continues to protect him while this local musician seeks to carve out a rap career while avoiding both street enemies and criminal indictment. 

New Song, New Faces 

Check out this photo, above, from his Facebook. It looks like a guy casually holding a bottle of Cola, right? But the image is actually a clever and probably spontaneous visual word picture that spells "Mental Soda," the name of a song. (Actually spelled "Mental$ota") 

See? There's "Mental," which is his nickname. Next to him is the "soda." So "Mental Soda." 

I watch this guy on the internet and I think, damn, it would be interesting to actually and formally test his intelligence in a lab or something. Every day Mental Mid's still alive is living proof he's smarter than the average bear. (Click for musical tribute) 

Not only is he still alive, but suddenly Mental Mid is taking his music to a whole new level and showing signs of broader appeal. Check out his latest video, B.O.M., which is different than all his other videos in one important way.

White faces.

It's impossible NOT to point this out. Rap music, which is a genre utterly dominated by African Americans with only rare exceptions, still has broad appeal across all races and, indeed, growing international appeal. Mental Mid's previous videos featured his comrades in music and dangerous lifestyle choices, all young African American men. His new video "B.O.M." starts out with a vignette of a couple guys coming through a door--one of the guys a pasty faced, chubby little white dude who looks like a naive suburbanite in the hood trying to score weed--and the two fellows sit down to play video games together. One of the guys has a pistol tucked in the front of his low-riders, and it's not guy from the suburbs. 

Different Day, Same Songs

Then the song starts. The lyrics have a fresh and clever quality, though it's the same rap crap: Behold, I dominate other men through violence and have sexual access to many females. 

Uh huh. Duly noted. 

Despite the interesting and original snippet of video at the beginning of B.O.M., the rest of the video is almost indistinguishable from at least one of Mental Mid's other music videos--a sausage party of young men dancing, some brandishing firearms. A few of the faces seem paler. That's the only difference. The B.O.M. song is fresher, but the music video is more of the same, mostly. 

It would be interesting to see Mental Mid commenting about...I don't know, something different than 95 percent of the rap songs on the planet. Something political or newsworthy or, at any rate, something different. 

I should point out that while I wasn't looking, Mental Mid also released a song called "Fa These Hoes feat Monsta." (Sic) Since there was no video associated with the song--not one I could locate, anyway--it just wasn't that interesting to me.