Cody ChesnuTT seizes the moment with his guitar
by Joe Tarr
It was 1991, and something new was blaring out of the radio, something that didn't fit into any of the radio formats of the day but couldn't quite be ignored. It was loud and scary, with lyrics no one could precisely decipher, and lots of people had it in their heads.
The song was Nirvana's "Smells Like Teen Spirit." At the time, it seemed like this song by a white, shy, angst-ridden young man from Seattle, would change everything.
It didn't of course. But, for a while, radio got a little more exciting. It's easy to dismiss the song now or to overstate its importance. But, what it most certainly did was capture the moment, along with the imaginations of a lot of listeners.
One of those listeners was Cody ChesnuTT, an African American born in Atlanta who grew up listening to soul, R&B, and pop music. A drummer since he was about 6 years old, ChesnuTT heard "Smells Like Teen Spirit" and decided he wanted to play guitar.
"When Nirvana came onto the scene, I understood you don't have to be a virtuoso," he says in a phone interview. "It inspired me to run with it and play what I felt.
"I thought [the early '90s] was a beautiful time in music. Just the honesty and the energy of [Nirvana] made it feel like, 'OK, this is my time in history.' For my black friends, it was like a new hip-hop record. There was a truth about it."
Today, ChesnuTT is trying to claim his own moment in the pop music time line. Last year, the New York Times dubbed him the "undisputed aesthetic leader" of a new "black rock movement," which also includes Martin Luther, Stiffed, and Mos Def's band Black Jack Johnson.
It's too soon to know whether this will be the next big thing or an interesting footnote. But ChesnuTT has produced an audacious and compelling debut with The Headphone Masterpiece, released last fall.
ChesnuTT played nearly every instrument on the two-CD, 36-song collection, which he recorded on 4-track tape in his Los Angeles home.
The music isn't grunge. It's lo-fi rock and soul music, reminiscent of Sly Stone, Prince, the Beatles, and the Rolling Stones. There's also clear indie-rock and hip hop influences running throughout.
The album was made after his band, Crosswalk, disintegrated and their debut went unreleased.
"It came out of five or six months of making music and not really having a concept," he says. "I needed to hear music.... Everyday, I found myself waxing musical on my 4-track. I played everything but saxophone. I'd be sitting around my room, playing a beat here and I'd just hit record."
Although ChesnuTT says he's inspired by hip hop, he never felt it a means for his own expression. "It's not as inspiring as melodically structured music or the artistic instrumentship that I was looking for," he says. "Everybody was sampling and I was looking to create. [Hip hop] fell short for me. Lyrically and for conviction and honesty, a lot of good stuff is coming out of the [hip hop] underground."
ChesnuTT sees a shift on the horizon with a blending of hip hop and traditional pop, with artists like Lauren Hill and the Roots, whom he's opening for at the Tennessee Theatre.
"We're coming to the realization that it's all about music. There has to be a creativity," he says.
"It has no where else to go but up. The whole thing, pop culture period, is at a rut right now."
ChesnuTT has been amazed by the arc his own career has taken since last fall. Opening for a number of different groups, audiences at first were enthusiastic. But, now they're singing along.
Sour from the major label experience with his own band, ChesnuTT went the indie route this time around. It's shown that you don't need to compromise yourself as an artist.
"This is the best thing in the world," he says. "People are looking for a new life experience and music is probably number one on the list. Which is showing me there's no reason to sell yourself short.
"To go from being a nobody to feeling the groove and appreciating what I have to now where I see 50 or 60 people singing along—that's where the payoff is," he says.
February 6, 2003 * Vol. 13, No. 6
© 2003 Metro Pulse
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