Human Nature

           Recently, I had an interview with one of DC’s best GoGo musicians in the game, Charles Garris. You may know him as “Shorty Corleone” who has created some of the GoGo hits that Washingtonians love such as: The Overnight scenario (which he co written and performed), The Holy Ghost and Bodysnatcher.  Mr. Garris is native to the District, he is from Ward 8, Southeast DC. He is a producer and musician that “loves to work with the community that has given to him”. Currently he is giving back to his community by working with the youth at Columbia Heights Recreation Center called the Capital Kids. 

           With the youth, Garris is creating a show called The Making of the GoGo Band where he is going through the process of what it is like to be a creator. One of his creations was the Crank Summer Program where GoGo is introduced to people and they get to dance and understand DC culture a bit more. His purpose with being a creator and GoGo music is to show the history of DC Culture to those who do not know it. Garris wants to show how GoGo music has influenced the music that we hear today all across America. Garris has the mindset of “feeding what fed you” because he wants to see his city thrive and be seen at the top like other cities such as Atlanta, San Francisco, Los Angeles, and Chicago. Additionally, while trying to bring DC to one of the top cities, Garris wants to show the education that goes into his art and creation. Garris also wants to see GoGo become mainstream, being that it is an underground music movement at the moment, but he believes “if the Hip-Hop industry donates a large portion of money to the GoGo movement, GoGo can become mainstream” which will fulfill one of his goals. 

          During the interview, I asked Garris “why GoGo is such a big part of DC?” His response was that “‘we own it and that DC will speak about it if something goes wrong”’. He describes GoGo music as “infectious and how people own that party when it is played”. He was right about Washingtonians speaking out about matters that they did not like because a few years ago the GoGo Store on Florida Avenue was forced to stop playing GoGo music. Many of the people in DC were in immense disagreement with that decision so they banded together, made a petition and shortly after the store was playing GoGo music again. Proving that Garris was right about how DC would stand up for something that they see as wrong. Although GoGo music is underground when artists who come to DC and hear going music they turn up with the culture. An example was Justin Timberlake beating his feet. Garris said he saw that as “showing love and that Justin was taking some DC Culture out of DC with him”.

         Aside from GoGo, I wanted to get to know Garris so I asked him “What makes him DC?”. He gave a general honest answer which was that DC has its own everything from lingo to food. He said that we had “Mumbo Sauce, everybody rocks New Balances and we have our own swag”.  He also said that even though we are the Nation’s Capital we still have our own “governing city and that we don’t answer to the people in the White House” which is true because even though all the legislation is here in DC we don’t listen to them without going through our own mayor. Garris also mentioned how we have our own sports teams which “our greatness will make us see a big city from an outward perspective”. Lastly he said our music, GoGo which had brought us all together as a big family in DC, making DC feel like a big village not a divided town. 

       The interview ends with me asking Garris “Is GoGo Bigger than when it first started?”. His answer was a tremendous YES! His reasons that it was a yes was because GoGo is not only being played in DC, it is being played globally with his radio station, Crank Radio. He said that “GoGo gives an opportunity for other artists across DC to be recognized and blow up” which is good to expand the GoGo family.  Although GoGo is more mainstream, Garris said “there is still more work to be done”. He said that there needs to be more “GoGo hits coming” from DC in order to make the music more mainstream. Let’s Go DC and the GoGo Movement!