I'll admit I hadn't heard of Broward MC Lyrikill until I read this post on Miami New Times' news blog, Riptide 2.0, yesterday. He might now be my favorite 954 rapper. Um, not really -- but I did spend a good long while checking out his web presence and laughing my ass off. Turns out, he's apparently suing the WSVN for "mental distress" after a news producer chased him with a bat.
But why would someone from the Fox-affiliated team do that? Was he just super offended by Lyrikill's caveman-like white-boy dreads? Nope. Turns out that after the regular channels of promotion didn't really help to break out songs like "You Can't Wu-Tang," he decided to take guerilla marketing to its extremes -- by interrupting local newscasts.
This amounts to stalking the live news vans through Broward and Miami, waiting until the helpless/hapless anchors begin the story, and then holding up a sign in the background and repeatedly yelling "Lyrikill dot com!!!"
Yes, it's utterly disrespectful, douchey, and just plain stupid. I
doubt many people trying to get news on, say, Broward County
Commissioners have ever seen him and thought, "Hmmm, that looks like a
man with interesting lyrical insights into daily life."
My
first thought was, homeboy obviously needs a day job, if he has enough
time to stalk these people in the afternoon. Second thought: Wait, how
DOES he know where they will be? Seems he's a pretty sharp
intelligence-gatherer himself. No wonder the media is in shambles.
However, the videos are kind of hilarious, no matter if you're laughing with or at them. Oh, and they did get me to watch the video for "I Love My Hooptee,"
by far my favorite Lyrikill track. If you (like me) push a whip born in
the last millennium, if you've ever considered taping a garbage bag
over a broken window, if you've ever driven with the intact windows down because your AC is busted -- there is your new anthem.
I was all set to post a run-down of his best news interruption videos, but it seems like in the last 24 hours, they've almost all been removed for copyright violation. Here's the last remaining one on YouTube (for now).
Lyrikill vs. WPLG Channel 10's Jen Herrera
Somehow, Herrera had escaped Lyrikill's harrassment... Until the fateful day she decided to report on corrupt Broward County Commissioner Diana Wasserman-Rubin. With the confused idea he's making a "Power 96 Super Bowl Commercial" (huh?), in this video he yells until producers are forced to switch away to a static infographic.
The best part of everything? Dude forgets to check that his sign was turned right-side up. Also, his boy leaves the camera rolling to catch Herrera flipping her shit on him after the news camera is turned off. Addressing his own camera, Lyrikill announces, "We're live--" until Herrera cuts him off, "You're NOT live! You don't even have a satellite!"
And here's the video for "I Love My Hooptee."
