Blackalicious represent imaginative side of rap

Gift of Gab (left) and Chief Xcel.

Gift Of Gab just giggles if you mention the term "nerd rap". Then he reveals his real name, Timothy Parker, and the tag almost makes sense. Call us what you like, says the guy who, with producer Chief Xcel, turned the joys of the periodic table into a hip-hop track.

"Everybody has their own way of looking at it, y'know what I mean?"

Then again, Gab's rhymes don't come with bikini-laden videos and leering gold-toothed gangstas, nor do Xcel's beats sound like the kind of thing you sit around polishing your gun to.

Over five albums, Blackalicious have earned a reputation for being quick in all facets of the word, as anyone who has heard Gab's dizzying, metaphor-packed rhymes will attest. Xcel's beats, on the other hand, are as leisurely as the coastline of San Francisco's Bay Area, drawing on soul, jazz and samples ripped from classical music.

One critic, getting to grips with their new album The Craft, noted their extensive use of live instrumentation might seem like a nod towards conventional songs but has "resulted in some of the weirdest tracks of the group's career".

Perhaps it's that experimental nature that explains why Blackalicious have remained in the hip-hop underground while artists such as OutKast have broken into the mainstream.

"I'm not mad," says Gab. "For the last five years I've been making a great living and loving doing what I love to do. I feel very grateful because a lot of people can't really say that, y'know what I mean?"

He cites university students, kids and elderly people among their diverse fans. They've also worked with the likes of George Clinton, Ben Harper and Gil Heron Scott.

After their fourth and best-loved album Blazing Arrow the pair went their separate ways, Gab to work on his solo record and Chief Xcel hooking up with Lateef. Then they regrouped to make a conceptual album, Gab focusing on storytelling rather than just busting rhymes to exploit his skills.

"Art is like a plant growing. You never know if it's gonna grow fast or slow. Sometimes it just happens. Other times it takes a little bit of time for it to fully grow into what it's going to be."

The two-year project is so diverse it goes from the free-flowing funk of World of Vibrations to a track like The Fall and Rise of Elliott Brown, which charts the progress of a jailbird who turns his life around.

"I'm not a preacher," says Gab. "What I write is based on experience. I never want to come across as a rapper who says, you should be this way, because I am learning myself and trying to be a better human being. I'm not a perfect person. I have my vices."

Geographically, Blackalicious had a rich training ground. Gab learned to rap in school playgrounds, street corners and behind apartment buildings with kids from different neighbourhoods. His first rhyme was a battle.

"It was bragging, it was dissing, I'm the dopest, I'm the freshest."

Later he combined his aggressive streak with influences including Boogie Down Productions, Public Enemy, De La Soul, A Tribe Called Quest, Big Daddy Kane, Freestyle Fellowship and tha Pharcyde, not to mention his university education.

Although battling is something he gave up long ago, it still influences the way he raps.

"If I hear a lyricist come out who I think is really dope, I have to ask myself what I would do against that lyricist, not on a disrespectful level because nowadays when cats battle each other, it's more about the insults than it is pure skill level. But I'm on a pure skill level. If I was to battle this individual, what would I have to do?

"Writing is part of my spiritual practice. I try to write at least a verse every day. And most of the time it ends up being more than a verse because the creative juices just start flowing.

"I make it a daily practice to write. Even if it's something that I'm not gonna end up using. I could write lyrics in my sleep, y'know what I mean?"

* Blackalicious perform at Studio, tomorrow