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DVS Mindz
The Twenty-Year Saga of the Greatest Rap Group to Almost Make It Outta Kansas
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Geoff Harkness
Language:
English
Published/Copyright:
2023
About this book
DVS Mindz might be the greatest rap group you’ve never heard of. Geoff Harkness takes readers on a unique two-decade journey alongside the members of DVS Mindz, chronicling their childhoods, their brush with success, and what became of them in the years that followed.
Author / Editor information
Geoff Harkness is associate professor of sociology at Rhode Island College. His previous books are Chicago Hustle and Flow: Gangs, Gangsta Rap, and Social Class (2014) and Changing Qatar: Culture, Citizenship, and Rapid Modernization (2020). He first met the members of DVS Mindz in 1999 as a music journalist in Lawrence, Kansas, and went on to direct their early music videos and a documentary film about the group.
Reviews
Joseph Ewoodzie Jr., author of Break Beats in the Bronx: Revisiting Hip Hop's Early Years:
Weaving together compelling and absorbing stories, Harkness presents a vastly understudied aspect of aspirational culture in the U.S.—the idea that hard work, in and of itself, does not guarantee or lead to success. And failure isn't always a step towards success, as it is often pitched.
Weaving together compelling and absorbing stories, Harkness presents a vastly understudied aspect of aspirational culture in the U.S.—the idea that hard work, in and of itself, does not guarantee or lead to success. And failure isn't always a step towards success, as it is often pitched.
Justin D. Burton, author of Posthuman Rap:
In DVS Mindz, Harkness tells the birth, life, and afterlife of a musical group in a way that is uncommon in hip hop studies, touching on some of the same narrative arcs that animate the biographies of successful musicians, but from the perspective of a group who was poised for a kind of success that never came. It's a remarkable project.
Topics
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Frontmatter
i -
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CONTENTS
vii -
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Cast of Characters
ix -
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Preface
xi -
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Introduction: “U-God Outshined by Topeka Group”
xiii -
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I 1970–1999
1 -
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II 2000–2003
107 -
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III 2004–2020
215 -
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Conclusion: 5105 Virginia Avenue
285 -
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Acknowledgments
291 -
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Where Are They Now?
295 -
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Research Methods
321 -
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A Beginner’s Guide to DVS Mindz
327 -
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Discography
333 -
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Notes
337 -
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References
345 -
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Index
347
Publishing information
Pages and Images/Illustrations in book
eBook published on:
April 18, 2023
eBook ISBN:
9780231557573
Pages and Images/Illustrations in book
Other:
50 b&w photographs
eBook ISBN:
9780231557573
Keywords for this book
DVS Mindz; underground rap; rap; hip hop; music industry; musicology; Topeka; Kansas; music biography; sociology; Wu-Tang Clan; Run-D.M.C.; De La Soul; Tech N9Ne
Audience(s) for this book
Professional and scholarly;
