by Dan O

If you are familiar with the form of Avatar that is not James Cameron ,the different kinds of powers and realms are central to the storyline. I don’t know why they’ve been living in my head recently but all of a sudden I started mapping them to hip hop characteristics, and my family got into it…trying to name hip hop Avatars.  I want to expound on my theory and break down the comparative realms, once we all understand those we can talk Avatars.

Earth benders: the first realm I cross mapped, in the show/movie/books earth bending is simply the ability to manipulate the earth. In hip hop I was thinking about Boldy James, Eightball, Pusha T, and Jay-z as people who could tell a street story in ways you couldn’t look away from. The average street rapper provides sensational imagery but an earth bender spits at a level where you can smell the gun powder, visualize the beads of sweat on the trapped. No one can ignore this as a central element of hip hop, one that taught the whole world empathy for places they’ve never been. Another earth bending facet is shadow battlers of the highest order. People who don’t just battle but get on tracks and pulverize the beat, prime Canibus, Royce Da 5’9, Big L, etc. The shadow battlers and the street rappers might not seem connected but for me they are. The earth in this case is connected to something assertive in the form that should never die. Being able to manipulate that means being able to transport us to the scariest places whether it’s a beat down on the track or the trap.

Air benders: for this one, the power we start from is pretty obvious: control over the air/wind/etc. You get to fly, throw gusts of wind at haters, etc. In hip hop the flow is the show. Think about people who can always dazzle us with their flow: Quelle Chris, Method Man, Yasiin Bey, Juvenile. Think about the first time you heard Pun do “ Dead in the middle of Little Italy/Little did we know that we riddled two middlemen who didn’t do diddly.” It connected us to Pun in a way that could never be severed. Being a hip hop air bender is almost like being a magician. You can critique an air benders content, production choices, but you can’t look away. As many bad albums as Busta Rhymes has put out…when he starts spitting it’s a show. Good luck turning away from it.

Fire benders: in almost every fictional universe someone gets to control fire. For the hip hop world being able to provide fire is the ability to maximize output. I remember looking at TI albums and thinking about how many of his songs could have been singles. He just had a knack for turning an idea/concept giant sized. Jeezy is a fire bender who can amp your adrenaline up before the intro is over. Think about LL Cool J. He didn’t make hit singles in a way that felt like he was chasing success. LL could pump up the idea, mood, energy from kinda horny to supernaturally so. This isn’t just something for pop folks though. I believe lots of underground/indie artists are fire benders: Brother Ali, El-P, Brian Ennals, Cavalier, Curly Castro all have a knack for scaling up ideas. So if I am to give you a way of thinking about this without hit singles let me do it in a metaphor. As listeners we start the song in a big all white room. A fire bender doesn’t use the negative space for ambiance they FILL it. This big room becomes a packed subway car of sounds/ideas. Think about the progression so far; earth benders ground us in the imagery, air benders show us what is possible, fire benders constantly give us more than the market. Mastering any one of these abilities gets you a seat as an important person.

Water bending: this is where the arguing started. My family wanted water to be about smoothness of flow. Thinking about Snoop calmly saying “1, 2 ,3 and to the fo’” as Nothin’ But A G Thang begins. That’s already part of being an air bender. Water has to be something totally different from what we have mapped so far. I kept thinking about 2pac. As many media outlets and talking heads spend years and years calling him a terrible technician it never hurt his actual reputation. Why? 2pac was able to ground his music (even the political) in his life and feelings about his life. I’ve listened to Pac with white kids from Arkansas, hard heads from Cali with PTSD, old NY Italian cats, all of them felt Pac in a way that stuck. He has a song that soundtracked the end of a friendship of mine. I rapped it at dude loud and he left my house. MIKE is like that for a whole new generation, Ka as well. The counter to this one is that all rappers are pulling from their life. Everyone is giving you something personal on some level. I think that argument can be a bit coy. I’m talking about what you’ve built around. What do you really know about Larry June? Do you know anyone in his life the way you do Kim in the Eminemverse? Water bending is a commitment to heavy lifting, vulnerability in a state that can wear you out. Open Mike Eagle is a water bender. He gives us where he is, whether he is suffering divorce or reminiscing. Even he took time after Anime, Trauma and Divorce to just rap well over dope beats for a while. When you put yourself so directly into the work you give a lot and you can’t just pump out songs the way other people can. The power in it is undeniable. How many people have cried to Dear Mama?

For those familiar with Ang’s world of Avatar(live action or animated) they know the ultimate is to be the Avatar and have control of the powers of the four realms. In hip hop its not as absolute. Some of the best rappers ever might have 2 of these and that makes them special. Some might have all but one. That mixture is super powerful in the hands of the best and brightest. You will be able to name some Avatars but you’ll always be wrestling with some. What is Heems? MF DOOM? Danny Brown? Lil Kim? Megan Thee Stallion? The best case scenario for application of these realms into hip hop thought is that it gives a new lens to assess what makes these artists special. Through that new lens we will hopefully see what we’ve missed all along.