J-Live

I've been around the sun 25 times,/
And I still find new ways to recognize shine/
It's like life gets better with age/
The way a song sounds better on stage/
And rhyme books get better with each page/

These are the first word of the song “A Charmed Life” from the album All of the Above by J-Live. Who is J-Live? That’s a question that is painfully all too common. J-Live is an emcee from New York. Correction, J-Live is a producer/DJ/emcee from New york. More than that, J-Live is a teacher with a degree is English from SUNY Albany. I came to find J-Live in the summer of ’02. My ace Moe was listening to something and I asked to hear it. After that I was hooked. J-Live is one of hip-hops overlooked gems. His first album The Best Part was buried by the label, bootlegged, and finally released in 2001. Since then he has released 3 more albums and 3 EPs. J-Live is a brilliant writer who expresses creativity in every line of every song. Whether he’s splitting a song in two and then recombining it on “All in Together Now,” using the letters M and C for all the word of the song on “MCee,” or talking about a beat as though it were a woman on “Kick it to the Beat,” J-Live practically embodies what a lyricist should be. His four albums The Best Part, All of the Above, The Hear After, and Then What Happened are all the things that the casual observer of rap music misses out on; intelligent, creative, complex, emotional, spiritual, and fun. You should be listening to J-live.