Seattle, stand up! She houses the Space Needle and the EMP (which also contains the largest Jimi Hendrix memorabilia collection); she gave us No Clue and more recently, the Blue Scholars. And the coastal port city, formerly known as Noah Stealth can now add Common Market to its list of attractions, a duo consisting of rapper RA Scion and DJ Sabzi (who happens to be one half of the Blue Scholars).

After their self-titled debut (2005), Common Market rolled up its sleeves once again to offer a well put-together joint, Tobacco Road, which provides a breath of artistic creativity to an often bland world of today’s Hip Hop. Such originality can be heard in spiritually-reflective joints like “Winter Takes All” or analytical slices like “Nina Sing,” where RA shows off his insight and lyrical capabilities. The album is a guaranteed blend of concept variations, beats and melodies, with Sabzi showcasing both production and deejaying skills all the while the listener is introduced to hooks that resemble recitation more than ordinary singing. HipHopDX catches up with the Baha’i believers who are currently on tour, and discusses the concept behind the Tobacco Road, RA’s Kentucky work ethic, and the story behind the co-sign of KRS-One.

HipHopDX: What up? You guys are on tour right now?
RA Scion: Yeah, we’re on the road. We played in Pocatello last night.

DX: Where?
RA: Yeah, exactly. That’s my first time in Pocatello. But that shit’s hella fun to say; so all night we kept dropping “Pocatello” in the rhymes.

DX: How was the crowd?
RA: In terms of size, there was like 50 people in the crowd. It was a small show – it was actually a barn. Sounds kind of funny, but they made the old barn into a wedding reception center...but the thing about it is, the crowd, it was mainly composed of young folks, high schoolish kids. Some of them were looking forward to the show since early summer, so that’s what made it worth it.

DX: How long is the tour?
RA: This leg of the tour is about two and half, almost three weeks. I think it has about 15 days.

DX: For those that don’t know, who is Common Market?
RA: It’s one deejay and one emcee. I go by the name of RA Scion, I represent the voice of Common Market and deejay and producer is Sabzi also one half of the group Blue Scholars. And together Common Market and Blue Scholars have formed Massline Media, and that’s our independent label. Common Market is a little more global in terms of ideas…

DX: Where are you from?
RA: I’m born and raised in Kentucky. It’s like Pocatello, it’s not busy…

DX: [Laughing] what’s the scene in Seattle like?
RA: It’s hard to summarize. Mainly because we don’t have - the Hip Hop scene in Seattle doesn’t have that national identity in a way that a lot of cities have: Chicago, Houston, Atlanta; being in Seattle, we kind of struggle with that identity – it’s pretty hard to define. We got a lot of people going into different directions: the sound is different; areas of the city are different. In terms of its progress, it’s doing well; it’s growing; there’s a lot of promised talent.

DX: Talk to us about Tobacco Road.
RA: The idea of Tobacco Road came from my Kentucky roots. I’m born and raised around and working on tobacco roads in Kentucky, and for the most part the work ethic that I gained - working in the fields - is the same work ethic I apply to the music and the community here in Seattle.

DX: Will you expand upon that?
RA: Yeah, sure. Work ethic in the field is tough; it’s hard labor. And I’ve done everything from setting the tobacco to cutting it, housing it. Being involved in the process taught me a lot about the value of real labor. It’s one thing to plant the seed, and a lot of artists – this is where the parallel is drawn - a lot of artists do a great job of planting seeds but they don’t follow through: you gotta nurture the crop. Some artists like to plant the seed and then come around for the harvest. And if you don’t nurture the crop, it’s not really in your heart. That’s what I’m trying to apply in an abstract sense and in the literal sense.

DX: How did you and Sabzi meet?
RA: We’re both Baha’i, so we had the Baha’i friends in common. I had moved to Seattle in 2001 and he was already making a name for himself as a deejay and producer, and people that I talked to suggested that we work together. And we met for the first time in 2002; he gave me a couple of beats for a solo project and it led to the Common Market thing.

DX: What are the principles of the Baha’i faith for those who don’t know?
RA: The faith itself is about 170 years old; it comes from Iran; it’s born out of the Islamic culture much the same way Christianity is born out of Judaic culture. So a lot of people have a misconception that the Baha’i faith is a sect of Islam when it just ties into the Islamic culture. There are fundamental principles within the Baha’i faith that are similar to Islam: humanity, religion, one God – monotheistic religion. It became popular in the United States in the 1960s so a lot of people associated it with the hippie movement. But the faith is nothing without the practical application of those ideals: without service to the community – and I mean hands on, being in the trenches servicing the community. And all of that idealism is just superstition. One thing we try to put into our music is the idea of, “how we’re gonna serve the community.” Continued on page 2 »