People with Passion: rapper Psalm One

CRISTALLE BOWEN AKA PSALM ONE

Interview May 17, 2010

The people who are still down on hip-hop for reasons that maybe lack depth, what are they missing?

(Laughs) Pure American entertainment. For sure. It’s in everything. You can’t escape it. You don’t have to drown in it, but you can’t escape it. So there must be something to it. I will put my bid in to be your favorite, but that’s marginalizing. I mean, favorite female. That’s marginalizing. But I’ll be that too. But even if you don’t like my joint, there’s so many other females out there doing it thoughtfully and doing it well, and doing it differently than the dudes. If you only listen to male rappers, that marginalizes yourself. I couldn’t deal with that, all day all the time. Hearing new voices is a good thing.

I got into rapping simply because there was a lack of good females. There weren’t a lot of girls in crews, and a lot of girls who would step up and rap sucked. I just come from an elitist sort of hip-hop background, especially from Chicago and the Midwest. We always thought biting was a sin, that being wack was a sin, and we always challenge each other to just be better all the time. For me it was not being like, “Oh, just another female in rap because they were underrepresented.” We were represented but not necessarily the best. I came in to be the best. My music at first was just a showcase of skill, whereas now my music is getting more introspective. Shedding more light onto who I am as a person, because I’ve been shedding light on who I am as a rapper for a while.

To READ THE REST of this interview at rapreviews.com, click here.

Stay tuned for more of my work at Rap Reviews, including this updated interview with E-Train…

For the Dorothy Claybourne PWP interview, click here

PSALM ONE, WOMAN AT WORK 2 (trailer)