Also performing from sUPERIORBELLy: Intricate Dialect, D.Allie, Sun Hammer, Fahrenheit 2040, Level Jumpers, DJ Woonz, Love Terrorist, Jefferson, Todd Cochell, Frankie Bank$, and Beverly Fre$h’s main man in BED, DIAL81, who will be celebrating the release of his hip hop trilogy, SweatShop DeluXXXe.
Email motorcityblog@earthlink.net for a chance to win free tickets and a limited edition copy of BED, pressed on translucent red vinyl.
Listen to "Dead Millionaire" from BED while you read (from bed?):
Jane Fader: How did you come up with the name Beverly Fre$h?
Beverly Fre$h: The name Beverly Fre$h came from a woman named Sandy Lavender. She was a rep that would come in to this architecture firm I used to work at and show carpet samples. I always thought, "if I was an R&B singer, my name would be Sandy Lavender." But when I got back into rap and needed a name I thought Sandy Lavender was too R&Bish, so I had to look at other women’s names...I liked Alice Cooper...Beverly looked good and had a nice ring to it and I added the Fre$h to make it more hip hop.
Jane Fader: To be honest, I was kind of disappointed when I realized you weren't a female rapper.
Beverly Fre$h: Yeah, after I sent out the press release I re-read it and noticed there isn’t a single "he" in there. I was like, "I bet a lot of people are going to think I'm a female rapper." I think it might be confusing. But, you know, I'm down for that.
Jane Fader: What about the title of your album, BED. Is that an acronym?
Beverly Fre$h: Nope. I don’t remember how the title came to me but I knew that’s what it had to be, and as soon as I started telling people the name they felt it right away.
Jane Fader: I can’t help but think that your label, sUPERIORbelly, has something to do with similar themes of gender and sexuality. My first thought was “pregnancy.” Am I right?
Beverly Fre$h: That's something that just came about. When we started sUPERIORbelly, our first inspiration was the body (we were like 18). We just went through an anatomy book and found that term superior belly, which is a muscle in your neck, and thought it would sum things up because it's superior--it's grand, it's important--but it's funny at the same time.
Jane Fader: You have been writing, recording and battling since you were 8 years old. Basically you’ve been an artist and on the hip hop scene your entire life. Why are you releasing your first “real” album now?
Beverly Fre$h: I wouldn’t say BED is the first real release. It’s my first commercially available record under the name Beverly Fre$h but all of my previous work with Prologo has been available in certain stores and online. The quantity we put out was about the same as BED they just weren’t digital because that wasn’t an option back then. This was the beginning of sUPERIORbelly and we also released one album on Motion Recordings. The sUPERIORbelly compilation V1 was the first release we had a decent distribution deal and after that came out I just focused more on art and design. I just didn't have an interest in the music business and especially wasn’t excited by hip hop so I took a few years off. Then I met DIAL81.
Jane Fader: You’ve performed in unique places all over the world such as on top of the great wall of China and in the Sedlec Ossuary (Church of Bones) in the Czech Republic. What is the significance of your performances to your work as a whole?
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| Beverly Fre$h (left) and DIAL81 (right) |
Beverly Fre$h: It started in China. I just happened to be there. It was really early in the morning and and we climbed the great wall. There was nobody there and--spur of the moment--I asked my friend to tape me performing. I always went back to that footage because I realized that something was there. Because historic sites have become over-populated and -visited, you don’t really appreciate what happened there. It’s a heavily mediated experience. Performing stirs up some of that original energy. All of a sudden there’s some humor, some violence, some emotion that’s brought back to that area. And that's kind of some of the stuff I’m building on now. I want to explore the opposite of these landmarks, these culturally loaded locations, and see what happens a performer is introduced to an environment that has not really had any history or anything interesting about it.
