In April, Jose Guapo of Quality Control dropped off a highly underrated project, Extravagant Trench Shit, entirely produced by the rock-solid duo of Nard & B. Before his next project, he's decided to return to Jose's World 2, a tape he released all the way back in October 2013. Here's the new music video to the JW2 track "Changes," which is inspired by the classic 2Pac song of the same name.
Guapo chose to revisit "Changes" in light of the recent police killings of Alton Sterling and Philando Castile. Indeed, it's one of his most pain-ridden tracks, fraught with social commentary fueled by his own experiences. Guapo starts the "Changes" video by sharing his opinion on the current social climate, and his quote sets the tone for the video. "Right now I think, growing up in the hood or growing up in poverty as a young black man, it's like suicide."
Shots of Guapo's home neighborhood, often showing extreme poverty, are interspersed with news footage documenting incidents of the unpunished killings of unarmed black men. The video also presents the black males, young and old, who make up the community. Each person raises his fist in unity, proudly asserting the value of his own life.
The "Changes" video ends with commentary from a man who's fighting to bring about legislation that will cut the massively disproportionate funding that goes toward the prison system in favor of increased focus on institutions that can actually help the black community. Black Lives Matter and All Lives Matter, he says, but "ain't nobody showed us that Black Lives Matter for 600 years straight."
Guapo's next project, Osama Bin Guapo 2, is set to drop in August.
