The jeen-yuhs Cast and Crew Take it Back to S.O.B.’s For Q&A Event: Recap
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The post The jeen-yuhs Cast and Crew Take it Back to S.O.B.’s For Q&A Event: Recap appeared first on Consequence.
It was family business for the cast and crew behind jeen-yuhs: A Kanye Trilogy at Sound of Brazil (S.O.B.’s) in New York City on Monday, February 21st. Over two hours, a panel of artists featured in the documentary, led by the project’s braintrust Clarence “Coodie” Simmons and Chike Ozah, gathered to share their memories beyond the film, full-circle moments, and the lasting impact of Ye on their careers now.
The night began with a poetic parallel, as fans eager to go back to The College Dropout era poured into the SoHo dancehall where Ye held his first headlining show in 2003. QR codes lined the walls with offers for an exclusive $225 hoodie that commemorated both the documentary’s release and S.O.B.’s 40th anniversary this year. The merch was only for sale that night.
The event started with moderator and former MTV VJ Quddus Philippe, who would be familiar to viewers of “act i: vision” as the interviewer that Kanye tries to persuade to give him a profile on the channel’s You Hear It First show. He kicked off the show with a humble confession, which became a recurring theme of the night: “When we first met Kanye, no one knew what to make of him.”
He was soon joined by Chike and Coodie, who noted how strange it was to be talking about a film rather than performing at S.O.B.’s, while he plugged his laptop directly into the large screen center-stage. They were followed by the night’s unannounced special guests: J. Ivy, J.B. Marshall, Devo Springsteen, and Abstract Mindstate’s E.P. Da Hellcat and Olskool Ice-Gre.
All fresh from the first part’s feverish reception and in the comfort of old friends, the group was primed for a wide-ranging, open conversation about themselves and their relationships to Ye. Abstract Mindstate went into gritty detail about their early-aughts dissolution caused by Kanye’s recruiting of OlSkool to New York, while Coodie addressed his transition from being mentored by Bernie Mac to walking away from comedy entirely with blunt honesty: “First of all, I knew I wasn’t funny.” The quip earned the biggest laugh of the night.
In terms of developing the documentary, Chike admitted he was “worried” when they were finally set to begin work on the final project, because he had no idea how much footage Coodie was sitting on. He claimed the cameraman would show the same clips over and over throughout the years, so when the time came, he remembered asking if they even had enough to fill out a full movie.
This ended up not being the case, as they were tasked with cutting down close to 400 hours of footage to just four-and-a-half. Their focus on storytelling led them to “kill some darlings,” as Chike described it, while Coodie later mentioned there was originally a nine-hour cut of the film.
The panel also heaped praise on Coodie, with J. Ivy calling him “everyone’s big brother, the glue” and the project “a masterpiece,” while OlSkool declared it a “testament of faith” after seeing it come to life after nearly two decades.
E.P. then gave Coodie the highest compliment of the night by reframing the title and label of genius for him. “When you see the title ‘jeen-yuhs’ you think ‘Kanye,’ and yes he is a genius, but the genius of this film was to document hip-hop in Chicago 25 years ago, and that was him,” she said, gesturing to Coodie.
There was plenty of wisdom to impart by the panel, who had each navigated their own route into the music industry by the time they’re introduced in “act i” and had their paths forever changed by their involvement with Kanye over the following years.
As a lesson in perseverance and patience, Coodie offered words of advice that changed everything for him: “If you can see and believe, you can achieve,” followed by, “You’re only going to get there in God’s time.”
OlSkool recounted a meeting with Ye after they both moved from Chicago to New York when the fledgling producer asked him, the more established artist at the time, for help with his promotional strategies. To OlSkool, it was a mutual lesson in humbling oneself as he stepped down to bring someone else up, while the braggadocious West did the now-unimaginable act of facing the fact he couldn’t reach the next level on his own.
J. Ivy also alluded to an upcoming moment in jeen-yuhs when he was brought in to feature on “Never Bring Me Down,” sharing the memory of a call from Coodie in 2020 about writing the film’s narration.
After an hour of round-table discussion, the event shifted to a screening, as the group broke down unreleased archival footage and performance video from Ye’s first show at S.O.B.’s. Though not as revealing as anything in the documentary proper, the clips perfectly preserve West to his smallest scale; the high energy pacing around the stage, the confrontational judgment as he asks the audience their favorite year for hip-hop, and the questionable “Free Kobe” call-and-response chants all seem like Ye tricks we’re all familiar with at this point — the only difference is he’s pulling them from a smaller stage.
Other clips made for great crowd-pleasers, like the image of West dancing in his College Dropout cover art bear costume, or a stray appearance by Pitbull in a random apartment session.
The real sweetener was a seven-minute preview of the next part of the trilogy toward the end of the event. The first scene opens to a recognizable but incredibly young Kanye in 1990 Oklahoma, swaggering up to the camera and rapping straight into the lens with his whole family watching. From that flashback, we see the through line all the way to where “act i” concluded, with West finally getting signed to Roc-a-Fella Records. But as a situation unfolds on the set of labelmate Peedi Crakk’s music video, it’s clear the struggle had only just begun.
The panel made the most of its onstage talent as well, featuring impromptu verses delivered by E.P., J. Ivy, and later, G.O.O.D. Music legend Consequence, who arrived ten minutes before the event concluded. J. Ivy got the increasingly excitable audience to repeat together his verse’s hook “can’t nobody stop you but you,” while Consequence led with his iconic verse from “The Good, The Bad, The Ugly” to some of the crowd’s most rapturous applause of the night.
Springsteen’s takeaway from the project’s release was its inherent source of inspiration that can now be shared with the world, finishing with, “Now you guys can feel what we’ve been feeling.” It was like he had just shared the secret to the bond between the group, and it instantly became clear that the effect West has continued to have on each person on stage is profound.
Throughout the night, the panelists shared their most recent successes, always with Ye in mind. Abstract Mindstate reunited after over a decade for the fully Ye-produced 2021 album Dreams Still Inspire, released on his YZY SND imprint. J. Ivy was just Grammy-nominated for Best Spoken Word Album against the likes of Dave Chappelle and President Barack Obama.
Those hoping for some clarity about whether Ye was given final cut approval as he demanded before the film’s screening at Sundance were left unresolved. In a question prompted by Quddus as to the difference between the making of the documentary and its coverage by the media with regards to the final cut situation, Coodie simply shook his head and said, “I can’t answer that.”
The host immediately rebounded with acknowledgment that Ye seemed pleased at the Los Angeles screening last week, to which Chike credited Coodie for executing perfectly. He said, “Exactly how [Coodie] wanted Kanye to experience the film is exactly what happened.”
As for the remaining entries for jeen-yuhs, “act ii: PURPOSE” arrives on February 23rd, while the final episode “act iii: AWAKENING” is set to drop on March 2nd on Netflix.
The jeen-yuhs Cast and Crew Take it Back to S.O.B.’s For Q&A Event: Recap
Bryan Kress
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