Leaders of the New School



	LM Ments: (Clockwise from top left corner) Noam Szwergold, Khalil Byrd, Ezra Masch, Akil Baker, Greg O’Donnell and Matt Little.

The young members of LM Mental have got skills to spare.

by Hamida Kinge

Grabbing the microphone at any open-mic hip-hop venue can be the beginning or end of your ego as a starving rap artist. Most times you’re assumed-corny before proven-dope by a doubting ocean of onlookers; the gamble often isn’t in your favor. But, in the city, like that old Tribe song goes, everything is fair. Even so, when Ezra and Akil of LM Mental busted a rhyme at one of the very first "All That" shows at a packed-in Footwork a couple years back, things were better than fair. Not only did they turn the skeptics enthusiastic, but The Roots’ ?uestlove, who happened to be chilling in the audience, made it a point to give them daps afterwards.

Perchance he heard a little bit of Roots flavor in them. LM Mental, which translates as Lyrically Motivating your Mental, have been likened to The Roots on quite a few occasions, sometimes to their chagrin. Haters accuse them of biting their style. Fans say it is a form of props. Though they appreciate the latter, they insist they do have their own style, and that the constant comparisons are merely a result of the fact that LM Mental also happens to be a live hip-hop band with jazzy inclinations. Nevertheless, the group’s youngest member, 17-year-old Ezra Masch, who was 15 at the time of that particular freestyle, calls the respect ?uestlove showed them a "turning point" in their confidence level.

Respect is definitely hard-earned by the six young elements of LM Mental, five of whom are 19 or under, that is, not old enough to get served alcohol at many of the gigs they play. Only a year out of Central High, where they all went to school and met, 19-year-old Akil Baker, whose stage name is Ad Lib due to his affinity for freestyling, has got a surprisingly strong grasp on school politics. "LM Mental’s information and we’re dropping the facts/ Education shouldn’t be funded by property tax/ And only money makes the legislators stop in their tracks/ Unless you have a million signatures to drop in their laps," which he nonchalantly runs off to me over the phone, is merely a drop in the bucket of fluid, thought-provoking rhymes he and Khalil Byrd — LM Mental’s older MC (24) — have got stored in their arsenal. Together, they spit heavy rounds of vocabulary.

To be fair, deft lyricism is only part of what separates LM Mental from hip-hop’s local clones. Noam Szwergold (guitar), Greg O’Donnell (bass), Ezra Masch (drums) and Matt Little (keys) are four easily digable players who orchestrate deluxe, original rhythms of the jazz and funk persuasion. One of the main reasons they shine so brightly live is that their shows are highly improvised, both on the mic and musically. "When we first got together, we were really concrete in our roles," Baker remembers. Now, their strengthened chemistry has afforded them the luxury of experimenting. "When we’re on stage, a lot of times we’ll come out with everyone on different instruments. The audience is already feeling us when we play our secondary instruments, so when we play our primary instruments, we blow the spot up," he marvels.

At New York’s Irving Plaza last August, they opened for seasoned hardcore metalists Bad Brains (who’ve changed their name to Soul Brains). "It was Soul Brains’ crowd," says Little, "but we got them vibing on hip-hop, probably because they saw how much fun we were having. I think it’s hard for a crowd not to recognize when people are enjoying themselves on stage." Little’s delivery is fed by this sort of active participation: "Every time I see someone’s head nodding, my head’s probably nodding twice as hard because I thrive off of everyone else’s energy during a performance."

Two months later in October, when they kicked it at "Hip Hop Is Ours" at the Church of the Advocate — a live show which featured panelists, including noted scholars — Wise Intelligent of Poor Righteous Teachers, who also performed, acknowledged their skills. "He was really feeling us and he gave us a pound," O’Donnell recalls ecstatically.

Some of LM Mental’s rhymes aren’t backed by instrumentals, they’re done over beats provided by DJ Man E, whom they’ve dubbed "the genius." He is also responsible for Web-mastering their site (lmmental.com). Man E’s studio smarts are the equal of Baker and Byrd’s verbal mechanics. Their song "Envy" is a lesson in musical sophistication, in which the lyricists paint conflicting viewpoints in order to expose each other’s character as prejudiced: (Khalil) "your attire and attitude mocks my disposition/ No loans for your tuition — financial stability/ your dual parent home/ Is all surreal to me/ I envy you." (Akil) "Guilty as charged of Caucasian/ No one’s giving props to me/ Building up my animosity/ My pride is occupied inside my insecurity/ Ignorant to inequity until I reach maturity."

Not bad for a handful of young local rhythm junkies who had an idea to form a band in high school and ran with it. Now, why does that sound vaguely familiar? Maybe, sooner than later, they’ll be the one’s giving out the daps and collecting Grammy awards.)

LM Mental will perform on Tue., March 7, 9 p.m., with Scienze of Life, The Xperiment, DJ Biski Rocks, Hezekiah & Raw, Shipwreck and Disciples of Discipline, at The Khyber, 56 S. Second St., $5, 215-238-5888.