R.I.P. Eyedea (1981-2010)

 Eyedea and Abilities peppered a ton of my hip hop mixes when I was in college.  Them and the entire Rhymesayers crew, were played in heavy rotation during those years.

Although Eyedea could be too abstract for me at times, he was an undeniably gifted emcee.  His studio stuff was experimental, harder to grasp, almost too high brow and poetic for my taste.  Where he really gained my respect was his ability to freestyle.  He could come off the top harder, faster, wittier, and more skillfully than 99% of the people in the game today.  Guaranteed he could smoke your top ten emcees in a battle.

When I say battle I don't mean you spit a written, I retort with a written that I have had in my pocket for the last couple of months.  I mean battle in the true sense of the word, what it used to mean.  Two dudes coming at each other actually freestyling, no rehearsed shit, just real, on the spot rhymes.  I am not sure when the meaning of "freestyle" changed but in my eyes it has always meant spitting whatever you could come up with on the spot, and you would be hard pressed to find someone that could do this better than Eyedea.  It used to be if you couldn't rock a cypher you couldn't get on.  People honed their skills, learned the culture, appreciated all of the elements of hip hop.  I bet you a lot of the rappers on the charts now couldn't even jump in a cypher without looking foolish.

Eyedea was hip hop through and through.  A freestyle battle champ he paired up with award winning turntablist and God like DJ, Abilities for their first release, Firtsborn, in 2001.  Eyedea stormed the freestyle scene at the young age of 16, was signed to Rhymesayers which was a label chock-full of underground royalty and really left his mark on the hip hop world.  He was a large part of my college soundscape so the news of his passing was unexpected and tragic.  R.I.P. Eyedea.

From Billy Jam, “Emcee and renowned freestyle battle champ Eyedea suddenly passed today (Oct 17th). Actual cause of death is not confirmed yet but reports all indicated that the rapper born Micheal Larsen was found dead by his mother, Kathy Averill , earlier today. He was only 28 and a few weeks shy of his 29th birthday.” 


This is from a post on The Giant Peach.

"His mom posted on his Facebook page today, “It is with great pain and sadness that I tell you my son Mikey (Eyedea) has passed away.  At this time we kindly request your respect and our privacy as we process this devastating loss.

We do, however, welcome your kind words, memories, and positive thoughts. We have created a Paypal account and are accepting donations towards the cost of his services. If you would like to make a donation, you can do so by accessing this link:

https://www.paypal.com/cgi-bin/webscr?cmd=_s-xclick&hosted_button_id=DZ3EEMCVL6BG4

On behalf of Mikey’s family, close friends and fans. Thank you.

-Kathy Averill"

Check out his insane skills.  Eyedea and Slug from the Wakeup Show