Deep Dickollective

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Image:Deep Dickollective - DeepDicPressPhoto1.jpg

Deep Dickollective

Deep Dickollective (or D/DC) is a black queer "homohop" group based in Oakland, California. It was formed in early 2000 by Juba Kalamka, Tim'm T. West and Phillip Atiba Goff. The three began working together after Kalamka and West met at a screening of black gay filmmaker and scholar Marlon Riggs' film Tongues Untied. Kalamka and West later met Goff on the campus of Stanford University, where West and Goff were enrolled in PhD programs.

Kalamka and West had been performing for years as MCs but had few opportunities to work as out queer artists until encountering each other and Goff shortly thereafter. Kalamka had begun recording an experimental spoken word project called Pre/tensions with San Francisco blues and avantgarde jazz whiz Dick "Deluxe" Egner and with groundbreaking queer hip hop group Rainbow Flava, but both were interested in the possibility of creating a project that would push buttons around race, queerness and masculinity in hip hop all at once.

Frustrated with the resistance they had faced from an allegedly progressive "conscious" spoken word scene, the three began jamming together in private on Stanford's campus and came up with the skeletons of about 20 songs, 13 of which would become their debut recording BourgieBohoPostPomoAfroHomo. In a moment of anger while discussing their difficulty with the local scene (West had been performing at readings and with bands since his arrival in 1998, but lost all of his bookings once it the scene became aware that he was gay) Kalamka blurted "well, if them girls can call themselves the Punany Poets (a then popular Oakland poetry group), we can be Deep Dick Collective!". The name was then shortened to "Deep Dickollective", but the initials "D/DC" remained as the three letter abbreviation seemed to roll off the tongue well. What started as a parodic exercise to vent frustration became a blooming underground yet internationally critical success, that has to date involved 11 queer men who have recorded as members of D/DC.

During the recording of BourgieBoho, Kalamka decided that it would be easier to promote and manage the group's work if there was a micro-label of some sort that served as a reference point for people that were hearing about the group. Taking its name from a comment on his and West's choice of clothing by an old black man in downtown San Francisco, Kalamka created Sugartruck Recordings, which has since released additional recordings by D/DC as well as that of rapper Katastrophe (the Outmusic Award winner Let's Fuck Then Talk About My Problems), and does micro-distribution of close to 20 titles by other artists in the scene.

BourgieBoho's release was followed by the 6-song EP Them Niggas Done Went and Said... in 2003, concurrent with a 7" vinyl single release of "Movin' b/w Straighttrrippin'(C-Phlavormix)" by the now defunct Boston punk distro Agitprop! Records.

The same year, D/DC won the "Best Hip Hop Group" category in the San Francisco Bay Guardian's Best of the Bay reader's poll. In February 2004, the group released its third project, The Famous Outlaw League of Proto-Negroes, which was a double nominee in the 2005 Outmusic Awards as well as being named to Out's Top Ten Gay Albums of 2004 list. March 2005 saw the release of the 9-song EP Live at Wildseed and Mo', as well as much more extensive touring as a group and solo following the premiere of Alex Hinton's documentary Pick Up the Mic at the 30th Toronto International Film Festival.

Deep Dickollective continues to tour and record though its membership has been spread to several cities. Its fifth disc On Some Other is slated for release in late 2006.