OneTwoWatch: Action Bronson

I think it was Au­gust 2011 when my friend Jake Hoff­man called me up, say­ing, "You know who you need to man­age? Ac­tion Bron­son." Now, I'm not gonna front: I had no idea who he was ... Luck­i­ly, I was at my com­put­er, so I looked him up re­al quick on Google. I didn't see much ma­te­ri­al on­line, so I felt … Read more

I think it was Au­gust 2011 when my friend Jake Hoff­man called me up, say­ing, "You know who you need to man­age? Ac­tion Bron­son." Now, I'm not gonna front: I had no idea who he was ... Luck­i­ly, I was at my com­put­er, so I looked him up re­al quick on Google. I didn't see much ma­te­ri­al on­line, so I felt com­fort­able say­ing, "Nev­er heard of him." Jake said, "I keep hear­ing his mu­sic on Shade 45. I'm telling you, he's a star. You got­ta man­age him, sign him or just help him. He's ill. Be first on AB. Trust me."


Off on an Ac­tion Bron­son ad­ven­ture I went. First stop, Youtube. First video, "Ac­tion in the Kitchen Pt. 3."


The "Bron­son Burg­er" with Gaba­gool. What's Gaba­gool? Yea ... I Googled it. You know what I found? A video from "The So­pra­nos" where Mead­ow is serv­ing some kin­da spicy meat ev­ery­one wants ... some cool shit, right? Wait, isn't this guy a rap­per? I still haven't heard the mu­sic. I just wan­na hear him talk about food. I'm think­ing, "I could do an An­tho­ny Bour­dain type trav­el/cook­ing show. Ac­tion trav­els around to var­i­ous gul­ly neigh­bor­hoods in­tro­duc­ing 5 star meals that most peo­ple can't even pro­nounce." You wouldn't watch that?


Fi­nal­ly the mu­sic. "Shi­raz" had the most views. I clicked it. My friend was on to some­thing here, he had an ef­fort­less tone and flow. Skipped around lis­ten­ing to a few more songs and I re­al­ized ... this guy is hav­ing fun. This is ex­act­ly what I keep say­ing hip hop needs more of. No one is hav­ing fun any­more.


The spir­it of his mu­sic takes me back to one of my fa­vorite time pe­ri­ods of hip hop. It's sub­tle with great im­agery and its not con­trived. It's re­al. Just like he is.


But, if you're look­ing for those "in your face" dis­pos­able hit songs, this isn't for you. This is a slow burn. That type of mu­sic where, the more you get to know him the more you ap­pre­ci­ate it and lis­ten to it over and over.


By Scott Ven­er


Ed­i­tor's Note: This video con­tains ma­ture con­tent and in­cludes adult lan­guage and drug use. Please don't watch un­less you're over 18. Al­so, Mys­pace in no way con­dones or sup­ports drug use.