R.I.P. Gajah
The original picture that the White Horse cover was made from. This is leaving San Francisco after a show in Berkeley. We were heading out to Reno here on an early morning. Our normal status, me driving and Gajah providing the entertainment with music or conversation.
Written By Uncommon Nasa:
I’m not sure where to begin, so I guess I’ll start by repeating what I posted to Instagram last night:
“I am in complete shock and more numb then I’ve ever been to learn that Gajah has passed away. I’m almost not in the condition to make a post like this but I want to make sure that people know how special Gajah was.
I did likely my two longest tours each with Gajah. We toured through places I would have never seen if not for his help. We are both dreamers. The kind of artists on tour that want to walk up and down the Ocean Beach boardwalk in San Diego, rather then spend more time at the venue or on someone’s couch. And that’s what we did. He was the most chill person I’ve ever known, which on paper with as fiery as I can be, should have been a disaster - but thanks to his calm demeanor and patience with me, always succeeded. We decided early on that if we were getting stiffed by a promoter, he would be the good cop and I would be the bad cop.
One of my fondest memories with Gajah was of us driving from Portland to San Francisco in one shot. An 11 hour drive. We slept in a Denny’s parking lot (inspiring our song) half way down after leaving right after the previous nights show. But in Northern California there is a town called Gilroy that claimed to be the garlic capital of the world. A stand had garlic ice cream. Without hesitation we were stopping. Even though it was a long ride to go and then some. Both us said something like “I love garlic” and for us, that was normal. The ice cream was amazing and it was enough to make an 11 hour drive work. This was the kind of guy Gajah was and who I’ll remember. There will be plenty of time to share all of the amazing memories I have of him on stage.
This is starting to set in and it’s tough. Live life to the fullest like Gajah did. You just never know”.
I only have 10 people saved as “favorites” in my phone and now one of them is gone. This kind of loss of a friend is unprecedented for me. I have so many memories of Gajah and but so much space, so I wanted to make sure I shared some of my strongest thoughts along with what’s above. Gajah had the talent to be one of the best battle rappers of all time and while he did show and prove in so many ways, he used his talent to talk about things in his music few others did. He was focused on the homeless, the jobless, people making minimum wage, personal responsibility, drug abuse and world peace (literally, world peace!). There was never a topic too large for him to tackle or a statement too bold for it to not fit coming from him. He was always after positivity, ethics and growth. This was all true of him off stage and behind the scenes, but there were not many that better put those kinds of sentiments into moving, powerful and fun music like Gajah.
I should also say that me and Gajah had so much respect for each other as artists. When he complimented one of my sets or verses it felt soooo rewarding and I could feel his energy giving off the same comfort when I did the same for him. On tours, some times there is a healthy but positive competition, but with Gajah that wasn’t the case, we were as much a team as I’ve ever been a part of. With Gajah (and all of Acid Reign for that matter), I saw an emcee doing things I COULD NOT DO. There’s a difference between performing with artists that may be better or worse then you at a given thing you share and from watching someone do something that you aren’t capable of at all. When Gajah would perform “A Little Too Much” he was a rock star, that song was always welcome to be stuck in my head after our shows during our long drives. It was the theme song to our treks.
The bonds we had on the road lead to bonds in the studio and in life after the road. I’m so proud of the work we did together on White Horse, each song inspired by real life circumstances. We were just talking about doing new White Horse material since the New Year, we’d chosen some beats from our friend Digdug and I believe Gajah was even beginning to write. We also talked about new solo material from him and Uncommon was set to release some of his older work that isn’t available. We had so many plans. Beyond that me and Short Fuze always tossed around the idea of doing a Four Horsemen LP/EP (me, Gajah, Fuze and Duke01) and I always toyed with the idea of producing a full EP/LP for Acid Reign. I’m not sure if I even verbalized those last two ideas to Gajah. I hope I did and wish we could have done them. Gajah will never not be a part of my life and I’m honored and proud to have made music with him.
Please find this Gajah Forever playlist on Spotify well. I made it so that we can all connect with the man a little closer today and every day. It features a variety of his work along with some of his favorite artists, Frank Zappa, Janis Ian and Kurt Elling (he played me all of their music in the car often, putting me on to largely to all of them). Also, take a look at the man in his own words with these two interviews:
White Horse Interview & Review at Back Seat Mafia (by MD Semel)
Gajah Interview (Hands of Gold era) at SYFFAL (by Ralph “Bloodmoney” Perez)
I’m also adding this gallery of all the photos I could find of Gajah, I hope to find more and will continuously add here as I do. I wish they weren’t mostly made black and white and effected with IG filters, but that was the vibe from the era of time most of them were taken.
Keep Gajah and his family in your thoughts, live life the way Gajah did. Ready for adventures, appreciative of every moment.
