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GRITS @ Loud & Clear
GRITS:
Coming to Horizon
March 4th.
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GRITS performed at Loud & Clear on Sunday, March 4th.
About GRITS
Teron "Bonafide" Carter and Stacy "Coffee" Jones, aka GRITS, have helped to take Christian rap from the pulpit to the mainstream. Their music has been used as soundtrack material for TV shows (including MTV's The Real World, FOX's Boston Public and NBC's Third Watch) and a handful of independent films. Respected hip-hop publications such as The Source, Rap Pages and Rap Sheet have run features and favorable reviews, and the duo's videos have been placed in heavy rotation on MTV2 and BET's Rap City. In fact, after eight albums, GRITS has garnered two Grammy nods, three Dove awards, and a Billboard Video Award.
Their music, which uses elements of jazz, soul, rock and Latin music, is not "gospel rap," they are quick to point out. "Our bottom line is that we go onstage and we do what we gotta do and we command," says Coffee. "Not because we're Christians, but because we got tight beats, we got tight lyrics and we got a tight stage performance. Period."
"We really kinda look at it the way that Christ did it," Bonafide explains. "He even said, 'I speak in parables so that people will understand.' It's like the more that we read and study, we're like, man, when he was in the streets, he came at people like he was from the streets, and when he was in the temple, he would speak to the people in the temple in a way that they would understand. He didn't just walk out into the streets and start reading the scroll from the prophet Isaiah. He would speak to the people in a way that would directly relate to the culture and that directly related to their hearts. They wanted to hear him speak all the time 'cause they just liked the way he put it down."
GRITS has demonstrated by example that it is possible to exist in the secular world without sacrificing their higher calling. They can be Christian and still be active in hip-hop culture by working to change the attitudes of their peers and by making music that strikes the difficult balance between being of-the-moment and reaching for something greater.
More than that, they try to live out the very ideals they put forth in their rhymes. Despite their hectic schedules, Bonafide and Coffee remain active members in their church, and they take part in charitable projects such as the Chris Sanders Foundation and ERACE, a concept album and tour designed to combat racism.
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