Hip-hop a driving force in Detroit

DETROIT -- Like a hard rain, I've been driving through the heartland for this column since 1997. My first venture was the Beer Nuts plant in Bloomington, Ill. I've been to Cleveland, Milwaukee, Omaha, St. Paul, St. Louis and Kansas City -- both Missouri and Kansas.

And no regional destination evokes a response like Detroit.

"Deeeeeetroit?" they always ask. Then they begin riffing the darkest visions from a Bukowski novel.

I like underdog Rust Belt cities. I find real connections in these places. It's easy to park.

There's a guarded vulnerability in old urban centers like Detroit. So many people are going, they're glad to see you coming.

A couple of weeks ago I caught "Holy Hip-Hop! New Paintings by Alex Melamid" at the Museum of Contemporary Art Detroit, or MOCAD. The free exhibition features a dozen large oil-on-canvas paintings of hip-hop legends, such as 50 Cent, Russell Simmons and Snoop Dogg. Chicago is well represented with depictions of Common, Kanye West and my pal Don "Magic" Juan, who is more of a pimp than a rapper. I parlayed the museum visit with a little record shopping, specifically at the Record Graveyard in Hamtramck (pop. 21,615), the hipster city measuring two square miles within Detroit.

I stayed at the new $800 million MGM Grand Detroit Casino between old Tiger Stadium and new Comerica Park.

I wish I had the same jackpot karma at the casino that I had at the Detroit Red Wings hockey game. I was complaining to my empathetic companion about the bad luck I've had this winter: surgery, furnace problems, car trouble, etc. We were seated in a curved concourse behind protective glass and netting.

"With my luck I'll get hit by a puck," I said in hip-hop rhyme.

About 15 minutes later, a puck caromed off the glass and around the netting before smacking me in the right shoulder. It left a black mark on my white sweatshirt.

We'll always have Detroit.

You feel hopeful muscle around Detroit. Artist Martin Creed's exterior neon installation at MOCAD reads "Everything is going to be alright." MOCAD opened in 2006 just north of downtown. Melamid's old master style of depicting hip-hop culture in everyday clothing is effective in the loft-like museum, a former Dodge dealership.

"Detroit seems to be an appropriate place for this work to be shown," Melamid said last week from his New York City studio. "I was given a tour of Detroit. Young men seem to think rap is the only way out. It's not basketball anymore."

Melamid, 62, is the Russian-born American painter who once had his work dismantled and bulldozed by the Soviet government. His audacious approach has been compared to Andy Warhol. He was introduced to his hip-hop subjects by his son Dan "Dan the Man" Melamid, a music video director in the hip-hop industry. Between 2003 and 2005, the artist spent time with each of the men, photographing and drawing them for his paintings.

While hanging out at Snoop Dogg's recording studio, Melamid met Don "Magic" Juan. The Chicago West Side pimp is popular in Snoop's videos. Melamid painted Juan in a dashing lime-green suit with a cell phone around the neck.

"He's a nice guy," Melamid said in broken English. "They claim he was the biggest pimp around, but his car was quite beaten up. His rings weren't real gold. I'm afraid he is poor, but I cannot guarantee it. I paint portraits of people with whom I have no relationship."

Hip-hop is crossing over as a rich popular art form. The Smithsonian National Portrait Gallery in Washington, D.C., just debuted the multimedia exhibit "Recognize!" that's made up of hip-hop photographs, graffiti murals, paintings and videos.

Like Detroit, hip-hop is no longer marginal.

After seeing the "Holy Hip-Hop!" exhibit you can find hip-hop, gospel, soul and jazz at Damon's Record Center in Detroit or head to Hamtramck and spend an afternoon at the Record Graveyard, where there's more than 100,000 LPs, 45s and 78s. It's a favorite haunt of Jack White from Detroit's White Stripes.

"Our speciality is jazz, blues and R&B," said Graveyard owner Jeffrey Garbus, a native of suburban Detroit. "Business is booming because the American dollar is down. All the foreigners are buying up vinyl. We do good because a lot of our customers are overseas. We get a lot of old Detroit soul 45s that are in demand."

I miss good album cover art. I walked out of the Graveyard with a weird Mac Davis LP called "It's Hard To Be Humble." The cover depicts the topless country singer sipping a glass of wine. I also found a mint copy of the late Johnnie Taylor's 1978 release "Ever Ready," with some steamy urban disco that predates hip-hop.

Making the 10 minute drive north of downtown through Hamtramck turned out to be a definitive Detroit experience. Despite a raw and snowy Saturday afternoon, hundreds of UAW workers were walking the picket line at American Axle Manufacturing. They went on strike Feb. 26 in response to management's demand to reduce hourly labor costs to about $27, including wages and benefits, from about $65, according to Bloomberg News. I honked my horn in support. Workers gave me a thumbs-up in return. I was driving my Pontiac. (American Axle once belonged to GM. It was since taken public.)

During my visit, more than 230 artists appeared in the annual "Hamtramck Blowout," one of the largest and most organic music festivals in America. Musicians perform in funky Hamtramck watering holes like Whiskey in a Jar, New Dodge Lounge and Small's Bar. These places were originally taverns for predominately Polish workers at the Dodge Main complex that employed 35,000 people during World War II and closed in 1980.

But the engine that drives Detroit is more culturally diverse than you would think.

One of the best places in town to people watch is at the INT ICE piano lounge at MGM Grand. The eclectic parade of gamblers and dream catchers recalled Cleopatra's Barge at Caesars in Las Vegas. I saw rockabilly chicks, lots of cleavage and men's jewelry that would make Don "Magic" Juan blush. The lounge's regular vocalist is Gwendolyn Joy, who blends soul and jazz grooves in a style that reaches above typical lounge fare.

The casino's pulsating V nightclub, currently the hottest spot in town, attracts a unique 20- to 30-something crowd of whites, African Americans and Arab Americans who dance in between eight go-go dancers on a Saturday night. Nine flat-screen TVs capture dancers in special effects mode. The club is popular because it is new -- expect lines -- but also because DJs Mike Anthony and Tom T. spin house for all ethnic backgrounds. They drop Eurythmics' "Sweet Dreams" in between fresh, rapid bass beats.

Anthony has been playing in Detroit for 18 years.

"At V we started 'Global House Saturdays' where we take tracks from DJs around the world," he said. "This is what you would hear in Mexico or Europe. People are coming to experience this music."

Neighboring Dearborn has more than 30,000 Arab Americans, the second largest Arab population in the country. Dearborn is also home base for the Islamic Center of America, the largest mosque in North America.

The 400-room MGM Grand opened in October, making it the first luxury casino resort in a major metropolis outside Las Vegas. It looks like it tumbled into Michigan off the Vegas strip.

The casino, which has more than 4,000 slots and 80 table games, was packed during my visit. Detroit's budget estimates it will rake in $178,250,000 this year in casino taxes.

As a resident of Chicago, which is about to lay claim to the highest sales tax rate in the nation, I sat at the full bar and saw the benefits of an urban casino. It's worth a gamble, just like a hip-hop weekend in Detroit.