LACALAW2

OPENING SCENE Aerial footage of Los Angeles. Dawn. The city is still quiet. The camera moves slowly over familiar landmarks — the 110 freeway, Crenshaw Boulevard, the neighborhoods of South Los Angeles. Street level shots follow — corner stores opening, morning light on sidewalks, ordinary people beginning ordinary days. The city looks like itself. Beautiful and hard and full of…

Witness to some shit that you shouldn’t seeWhisper to yourself what you wouldn’t beVictim to the block where your mama moved, now your mind-state is I’mma do what I got to doIt’s really quite logical, if you was me you wouldn’t shoot at them if they just shot at you?No trust funds but my daughter do, first generation that’ll start with lootMy first record deal probably saved my lifeSo shout out…

What’s your life like nigga mine’s greatI done made it out despite my city’s crime rateEvery single rule nigga that’s what I breakHit me like a omen seize the moment Hussle why waitOne thing I never do is exercise hateBut I’m the illest nigga doin’ this in my stateProbably my country, probably this worldAnywhere I see myself I bet I get thereIf there’s a throne to be sat on I bet I sit thereIf…

Look at where I started and look at where I’m standin’Y’all can say it’s luck but I know that it’s plannin’Shout out to the pain that gave me understandin’Shout out to my gang, it turned me to a savageSo niggas could say what they want to but I go through what you haven’tBut it’s not ego driven, it’s not me boastin’ and braggin’This road I chose to go down, hard to slow down when in trafficIn…

I don’t want your love, it’s not why I make musicI owe myself, I told myself back then that I would do thisAnd I always look so out of reach, it just seems so confusin’That I felt my place in life, a young black man, it’s seems so uselessBut I don’t want no help, just let me suffer through thisThe world would not know Jesus Christ if there was never JudasThis knife that’s in my back’ll be the the…

Part One: A Number Calls My Name In 2005 I put the number 109 on my car. My personalized license plate read “109LAW2” — my birthdate, October 9th, and my initials. It was a deliberate act of personal claiming. Looking back I recognize it as the beginning of a pattern I wouldn’t fully understand for years. That same year I visited the major Jean-Michel Basquiat retrospective at the Museum of…

On this day, May 15, 2026, I am at a crossroads. As of late my marathon is focused on drawing the world’s attention to a connection between Basquiat and Nipsey through the artwork entitled ALL COLORED CAST PART III. I want the world to see that there are elements in Basquiat’s artwork that precisely parallel Nipsey’s life. I want the world to recognize that a Basquiat was a shaman of sorts even…

When I look at Nipsey Hussle’s life I see a man who was equally ambitious. He did not have the luxury of being raised with the advantages I had. His mother and father separated. He did not earn his high school diploma. He did not earn a college degree. Yet Nipsey was a reader. His acumen could not be contained. His tenacious nature and demand to improve his life shone through. Although he died…

I wasn’t deliberately attempting to train-wreck my career. When I was in high school I was being prepped to study English at best. However, when I went to college, I chose a math intensive major — Finance. I did so because I felt that becoming a teacher would be the best option for me with a degree in English. I didn’t want that. I had big dreams. I wanted to learn about the stock market and grow…

The Blue House Speaks I didn’t know she was watching me. As I exited the Uber somewhere in Coyoacán, I caught a glimpse of the radio station — 100.9 FM. A small thing. But, for me, it was monumental. I snapped a photo for posterity. To be certain, for anybody else, the radio station is barely worth noticing. Except that October 9 (or 10/9) is my birthday, and the mind does what the mind…

Nipsey Hussle, born Ermias Joseph Asghedom, was among the most visually compelling lyricists of his generation. Where many rappers traffic in abstraction or hyperbole, Nipsey built his art on concrete, specific imagery drawn from the streets of Crenshaw and the interior landscape of a man determined to transcend them. His lyrics function less like boasts and more like dispatches — vivid, grounded…

Dr. Cornel West often refers to Paidaeia – a Greek word meaning pedagogy. Ermias Asghedom referenced Greek marathons and the legend of Pheidippides when he named his brand the Marathon and his debut album Victory Lap, respectively. Was Ermias trying to draw connections the way Dr. West does? Or was Ermias highlighting the east African tradition of award winning marathoners that have come from…

The Hasmoneans were a Jewish priestly dynasty that ruled Judea from roughly 164–63 BCE.Origins They emerged from the Maccabean Revolt, led by Mattathias and his sons — most famously Judah Maccabee — against the Seleucid Greek king Antiochus IV, who had desecrated the Jewish Temple in Jerusalem. The Jewish holiday of Hanukkah commemorates their victory. Who They Were They were a priestly family…

Jesus archetype fits Nipsey Hussle because Nipsey wore Pumas, and rode the 108 bus. Jesus was a son of a Roman Soldier of the Hasmonean Dynasty whose family created includes a puma. The number 108 is a sacred number and aligns with Nipsey because he rode the 108 bus to Watts. This is an interesting attempt at symbolic connections, but a few of the historical claims here need some pushback: On…