Out of the Ghetto
Hip-hop artist Liquid grew up in a Philadelphia neighborhood that's so tough they call it The Badlands. Though he's since left the ghetto behind, it's still a big part of his life—and music.
by Andree Farias | posted 8/21/2006
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Lauryn Hill once said that every ghetto she'd ever been to made her long for her heavenly home. Victor "Liquid" Oquendo would probably concur. Growing up in the streets of Philadelphia, his upbringing had all the makings of a life destined for the statistics books—especially when his father left and his mother became addicted to drugs. But on those same mean streets, Oquendo found God and music—and both were instrumental in his exodus from the hood and into becoming a producer and recording artist. Oquendo reminisces warmly about his hometown in his stunning debut, Tales from the Badlands (Gotee), a conceptual opus filled with real-life stories from the City of Brotherly Love. In this candid conversation, Oquendo traces his musical roots, relates the struggles of his youth, and demystifies the oft-glamorized realities of the ghetto.
How did you first get involved with music?
Victor "Liquid" Oquendo When I was a little kid my uncle had a salsa band. I used to sneak down in his basement, check his congas out, and play with them.
When I was 12, someone was selling a keyboard across the street. I begged my grandmother to buy it; it was a hundred bucks. So my grandma bought the keyboard, and I spent the next year and a half, every day, in my room just playing with the keyboard. I didn't want to go outside or nothing. I was just locked in my room, playing, playing—teaching myself, 'cause we couldn't afford piano lessons.
Tales from the Badlands is a case study of where you grew up. Is The Badlands the actual name of your old neighborhood?
Oqueno
20/20 did a documentary on my neighborhood like 18 years ago, and they named it, "The Badlands." Ever since that, that's been the name of the neighborhood. That's the actual name now.
So are The Badlands really that bad?
Oqueno Oh yeah, man. It's typical ghetto stuff—like living in the Bronx or Harlem. It's that kind of a neighborhood. Every story on the CD is true. There's actually songs I made for the record that Gotee didn't let me put on it.
How come?
Oqueno Because it was too much. They were too real. I had a song [where] I'm telling a young lady, how can a man hit a woman in her face and tell her he loves her? But Gotee thought it was too aggressive. There were two or three songs like that that I didn't put on the record because they were too honest. And there's a lot of other stuff that I haven't even written about yet. I'm getting ready to start the new record—it's going to be a more fun record, but there are still things I need to say, that I need to get off my chest.
The great thing about Gotee is that they allowed me to be honest. People in this industry are so critical. You can't say anything honest because everybody's like, "That's too … " But Gotee wanted me to be honest. You're right; you can't just do that with any label. Honestly, man, when it comes to urban music, the Christian industry is just [limited]. With rock, nobody says anything about the songs. But when urban music comes out that's trying to do something cutting edge, they're like, "Oh, you can't do that. It's too much." It's definitely a double standard.
Many evangelical Christians are oblivious to the reality of gangs, drugs, hard partying—the ghetto lifestyle you talk about on your album. Do you feel you're taking a commercial risk in exploring this theme?
Oqueno Of course. I'm taking a lot of risks. Gotee is taking a lot of risks. It's unfortunate that people are like that. You know, people talk about ministry: "Oh, we're ministry-driven." No, they're not, because if they was ministry-driven, they'd pay attention to everything, not just certain people or certain places. They say, "We're ministry-driven. We want to see people get saved." And then they won't step foot anywhere near a hood, you know what I mean?
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