The Union
The Ying Yang Twins unite their image and Atlanta on new album, U.S.A.
It’s a sweltering Georgia afternoon as a Chevy Caprice Classic rolling on 24-inch dubs pulls off I-85 South at Exit 76. It’s a ride with a finish so green and upholstery so yellow, you gotta wonder if it’s pulling onto Sesame Street, not Cleveland Avenue. It don’t help the confusion that the driver - Eric “Kaine” Jackson, one-half of the crunk group Ying Yang Twins - has just described himself as Oscar the Grouch, “a grouchy motherfucker who says, ‘Fuck people,’ don’t tolerate no bullshit.”
“We were just in Atlanta, and once we past Pleasers club, we’re fixin’ to be in East Point,” says Kaine. “And that’s just around the corner, same as Kennesaw, Stone Mountain, College Park. But that ain’t Atlanta. I love Atlanta, I spend the money I make in Atlanta - ‘cause I feel it be like spittin’ in faces if I don’t. That’s one the reasons we named the new album U.S.A. - the United State of Atlanta.”
Kaine drives to East Point to meet up with the other Twin - D’Angelo “D-Roc” Holmes, his brother from a different mother whom he’s been rapping with since 16 - for the second half of an exclusive Creative Loafing photo shoot, which is split between an Exxon at the corner of Ponce de Leon and Moreland avenues, and a Chick-Fil-A on Cleveland. The two 26-year-olds who came up from the East Atlanta projects are serious about defining and redefining themselves and their city with U.S.A.
Kaine’s day certainly begins among his peoples. Even before he finally pulls up to the full-service Exxon - two hours late - a half-dozen people who somehow heard he’d be showing up are already there. They buzz around to hand Kaine a CD or roll him a blunt. When the Exxon mechanics are told the Ying Yang Twins are doing a photo shoot, they know “Wait (The Whisper Song)” track (U.S.A.’s intimate, “Drop It Like It’s Hot”-booting first single). When Kaine first rolls up, the kids at the Midtown Magic Car Wash behind the Exxon seem more excited about his rims than the man himself. Some Emory summer students driving by stop and watch as Kaine happily poses for some pictures. But the students are too timid - and high, they confess - to approach him.
Kaine isn’t holdin’ it down at the Exxon just to sign autographs. He’s here to be photographed because cars and mechanics have always meant a lot to him. Kaine’s father does engine and bodywork in the SWATs, and tricked-out cars have always been trophies in this city. Kaine’s refurbished cars - Caprice Classics, Monte Carlos, Mustangs - are signs of success more immediately attainable than a Rolls or Bentley to someone coming up from the ghetto. “Not everyone in the city can be valedictorian, so you don’t always acquire that taste for winning, for reward, from something someone else has given you,” says Kaine. “But if you work like hell, anybody can reward themselves.”
After observing Kaine for even a few minutes, you wonder if cars also hold another special meaning to him: speed and mobility. Born with spastic cerebral palsy, Kaine shuffles as he pumps gas for strangers. In cars, however, Kaine’s in complete control of his movements. Having both grown up with and bonded over disabilities - D-Roc was born with a premature left hand - the Ying Yang Twins toughened their minds to get by how tough people made it because of their bodies. Never hiding but never so forthright in discussing their disabilities before, the Ying Yang Twins previously distracted the public with slick whips, gleaming gold grills and rowdy behavior. Now, with U.S.A., the Ying Yang Twins’ fourth album, Kaine and D-Roc have found themselves in the position where they can expand on the childish imagery used to help sell their earlier material and address the war and poverty of the streets.
“We the Ying Yang Twins, man, but we always told we got our sign from the yin yang, which means we are on the balance of war and peace,” says Kaine. “You would have to consider ‘Salt Shaker,’ ‘Get Low,’ ‘Whistle While You Twurk,’ ‘Say I Yi Yi’ as yin songs - uplifting, happy. And you would have to consider ‘Naggin’,’ ‘What’s Happnin!,’ ‘Smoke By Myself’ as yang songs.”
On the new album, the Twins are at war with the people who want to dismiss them as one-sided. On U.S.A., Kaine and D-Roc vary up their gruff, barkin’ style by hosting MCs from throughout the South, including Houston’s Mike Jones and Bun B, and Miami’s Jacki-O and Pitbull. Song titles including “Put That Thang Down,” “Hoes” and “Shake” are self-explanatory in their subject matter, and the tracks themselves are steady slammin’. But then Anthony Hamilton appears on a hook interpolating Al Green’s gospel “Belle” for a song about spiritual conflict, as does Adam Levine of Maroon 5 on a track about escaping the strip club life. Instead of being all bangers, half of U.S.A. is slow burners. Almost even more than providing a solid album - which they do - the Ying Yang Twins’ new goal seems to be to show that determination can overcome almost any disadvantage, even if it’s just by showing Kaine willing to keep it on the one-to-one, manning a gas pump as if to say you work to create yourself and shouldn’t expect to be given nothing.
“I’m tired of people thinking [the Ying Yang Twins is] just this, this and this,” says Kaine, his eyes widening as he spits back at people thinking he and D-Roc are just strip club-obsessed fools. “And people haven’t perceived this because even if we going on about hell on Earth, the way we put songs out make you feel good. Period. But that’s they fault. It’s our mistake to pay that shit any attention when we know how gifted we are. So it’s all a learning experience for the Ying Yang Twins and our fans. That’s why I stay with people in my city, so we can learn on and improve the problems behind shit together.”
D-Roc - who is the more “people person” of the two - is briefly working the drive-thru at Chick-Fil-A, cheerfully handing out orders. At first, it seems like a peculiar job choice for someone with a hand featuring more nubs than fingers, a hand he still cradles behind the other when he sits down to speak. But D-Roc is always the first to shout out a greeting or go up to people. And the point of all this is for the Ying Yang Twins to show they’re about putting it all out there, succeeding because they made themselves resilient.
Outside the Chick-Fil-A, a crowd again grows as soon as the Ying Yang Twins roll up. Half the cars packing the parking lot and drive-thru are sitting on chrome. The Emory students even reappear, having driven from Little Five Points to get their picture taken with a Ying Yang Twin. Kaine obliges again, holding it down with the entourage as D-Roc takes part in some customer service. But once D-Roc gets serious, he’s quick to echo the image worries and DIY attitude associated with the release of U.S.A. (much of which, in hindsight, seems to originate from the Kaine brain).
“We thrive on working with each other so much, we don’t have to work with nobody else unless we both think it’s a good idea and can get us somewhere,” says D-Roc. “I want people to see we can hold our own, not that we need to go collaborate with people - we can consecutively do it by ourselves, and do more than just crunk.”
Before United State of Atlanta, the Twins earned a platinum record and some Billboard-charting singles, but never felt they had gained the respect they were due. “The South is the foundation,” says D-Roc. “The game had to come round to the South because the South is at the bottom. People need the ground to build up from, and that’s what Atlanta is. And Ying Yang Twins is Atlanta, and we happy to show the reality down here. Kaine and me worked our way up from the bottom, and we put that soul in the music.”
tony.ware@creativeloafing.com
“We were just in Atlanta, and once we past Pleasers club, we’re fixin’ to be in East Point,” says Kaine. “And that’s just around the corner, same as Kennesaw, Stone Mountain, College Park. But that ain’t Atlanta. I love Atlanta, I spend the money I make in Atlanta - ‘cause I feel it be like spittin’ in faces if I don’t. That’s one the reasons we named the new album U.S.A. - the United State of Atlanta.”
Kaine drives to East Point to meet up with the other Twin - D’Angelo “D-Roc” Holmes, his brother from a different mother whom he’s been rapping with since 16 - for the second half of an exclusive Creative Loafing photo shoot, which is split between an Exxon at the corner of Ponce de Leon and Moreland avenues, and a Chick-Fil-A on Cleveland. The two 26-year-olds who came up from the East Atlanta projects are serious about defining and redefining themselves and their city with U.S.A.
Kaine’s day certainly begins among his peoples. Even before he finally pulls up to the full-service Exxon - two hours late - a half-dozen people who somehow heard he’d be showing up are already there. They buzz around to hand Kaine a CD or roll him a blunt. When the Exxon mechanics are told the Ying Yang Twins are doing a photo shoot, they know “Wait (The Whisper Song)” track (U.S.A.’s intimate, “Drop It Like It’s Hot”-booting first single). When Kaine first rolls up, the kids at the Midtown Magic Car Wash behind the Exxon seem more excited about his rims than the man himself. Some Emory summer students driving by stop and watch as Kaine happily poses for some pictures. But the students are too timid - and high, they confess - to approach him.
Kaine isn’t holdin’ it down at the Exxon just to sign autographs. He’s here to be photographed because cars and mechanics have always meant a lot to him. Kaine’s father does engine and bodywork in the SWATs, and tricked-out cars have always been trophies in this city. Kaine’s refurbished cars - Caprice Classics, Monte Carlos, Mustangs - are signs of success more immediately attainable than a Rolls or Bentley to someone coming up from the ghetto. “Not everyone in the city can be valedictorian, so you don’t always acquire that taste for winning, for reward, from something someone else has given you,” says Kaine. “But if you work like hell, anybody can reward themselves.”
After observing Kaine for even a few minutes, you wonder if cars also hold another special meaning to him: speed and mobility. Born with spastic cerebral palsy, Kaine shuffles as he pumps gas for strangers. In cars, however, Kaine’s in complete control of his movements. Having both grown up with and bonded over disabilities - D-Roc was born with a premature left hand - the Ying Yang Twins toughened their minds to get by how tough people made it because of their bodies. Never hiding but never so forthright in discussing their disabilities before, the Ying Yang Twins previously distracted the public with slick whips, gleaming gold grills and rowdy behavior. Now, with U.S.A., the Ying Yang Twins’ fourth album, Kaine and D-Roc have found themselves in the position where they can expand on the childish imagery used to help sell their earlier material and address the war and poverty of the streets.
“We the Ying Yang Twins, man, but we always told we got our sign from the yin yang, which means we are on the balance of war and peace,” says Kaine. “You would have to consider ‘Salt Shaker,’ ‘Get Low,’ ‘Whistle While You Twurk,’ ‘Say I Yi Yi’ as yin songs - uplifting, happy. And you would have to consider ‘Naggin’,’ ‘What’s Happnin!,’ ‘Smoke By Myself’ as yang songs.”
On the new album, the Twins are at war with the people who want to dismiss them as one-sided. On U.S.A., Kaine and D-Roc vary up their gruff, barkin’ style by hosting MCs from throughout the South, including Houston’s Mike Jones and Bun B, and Miami’s Jacki-O and Pitbull. Song titles including “Put That Thang Down,” “Hoes” and “Shake” are self-explanatory in their subject matter, and the tracks themselves are steady slammin’. But then Anthony Hamilton appears on a hook interpolating Al Green’s gospel “Belle” for a song about spiritual conflict, as does Adam Levine of Maroon 5 on a track about escaping the strip club life. Instead of being all bangers, half of U.S.A. is slow burners. Almost even more than providing a solid album - which they do - the Ying Yang Twins’ new goal seems to be to show that determination can overcome almost any disadvantage, even if it’s just by showing Kaine willing to keep it on the one-to-one, manning a gas pump as if to say you work to create yourself and shouldn’t expect to be given nothing.
“I’m tired of people thinking [the Ying Yang Twins is] just this, this and this,” says Kaine, his eyes widening as he spits back at people thinking he and D-Roc are just strip club-obsessed fools. “And people haven’t perceived this because even if we going on about hell on Earth, the way we put songs out make you feel good. Period. But that’s they fault. It’s our mistake to pay that shit any attention when we know how gifted we are. So it’s all a learning experience for the Ying Yang Twins and our fans. That’s why I stay with people in my city, so we can learn on and improve the problems behind shit together.”
D-Roc - who is the more “people person” of the two - is briefly working the drive-thru at Chick-Fil-A, cheerfully handing out orders. At first, it seems like a peculiar job choice for someone with a hand featuring more nubs than fingers, a hand he still cradles behind the other when he sits down to speak. But D-Roc is always the first to shout out a greeting or go up to people. And the point of all this is for the Ying Yang Twins to show they’re about putting it all out there, succeeding because they made themselves resilient.
Outside the Chick-Fil-A, a crowd again grows as soon as the Ying Yang Twins roll up. Half the cars packing the parking lot and drive-thru are sitting on chrome. The Emory students even reappear, having driven from Little Five Points to get their picture taken with a Ying Yang Twin. Kaine obliges again, holding it down with the entourage as D-Roc takes part in some customer service. But once D-Roc gets serious, he’s quick to echo the image worries and DIY attitude associated with the release of U.S.A. (much of which, in hindsight, seems to originate from the Kaine brain).
“We thrive on working with each other so much, we don’t have to work with nobody else unless we both think it’s a good idea and can get us somewhere,” says D-Roc. “I want people to see we can hold our own, not that we need to go collaborate with people - we can consecutively do it by ourselves, and do more than just crunk.”
Before United State of Atlanta, the Twins earned a platinum record and some Billboard-charting singles, but never felt they had gained the respect they were due. “The South is the foundation,” says D-Roc. “The game had to come round to the South because the South is at the bottom. People need the ground to build up from, and that’s what Atlanta is. And Ying Yang Twins is Atlanta, and we happy to show the reality down here. Kaine and me worked our way up from the bottom, and we put that soul in the music.”
tony.ware@creativeloafing.com