Under Dogs

Kevin Bratton is graduating today.

The 18-year-old spent 4 arduous years sweating and praying for this moment -- his moment -- in the spotlight. And hell if he isn't going to enjoy it.

Bratton is neatly shaven for the occasion. His familiar chin-strap scruff has been streamlined. His beaming smile is unfettered by twisted, black brambles of facial hair. For once, he looks his age.

"I told him," Ben Lewis says, laughing. "All those liquor stores ain't gonna sell him beer no more if he shaves."

Lewis has had no such trouble. He totes a 12-pack of MGD, and his breath hints at a celebration in progress. This is a big day for Lewis, manager, mentor and surrogate older brother. The graduation ceremony is really his moment, too. But this rite of passage belongs solely to Young Kev.

Kevin "Young Kev" Bratton dropped out of Alta Vista Charter School for good last fall. But today he becomes a man. His cap is a tight weave of cornrows. His gown is a crisp, white T-shirt and a fresh pair of sagging State Property jeans. His diploma is the album -- his album -- Ghetto Gospel.

"You look down the block, and everybody is Cadillacs," Young Kev says. "If you a Bentley, you gonna stand out. I always wanted to be the person that stands out."

Young Kev is a Bentley, if only for this afternoon. This album-release party in the parking lot adjacent to 7th Heaven on Troost signifies his graduation from being just another rapper to being an artist of consequence. The KPRS 103.3 "Hot 103 Jamz" van is parked nearby. Smoke billows from a grill as volunteers serve free hot dogs off the trunk of a tricked-out Lincoln Town Car.

A light rain is falling, but few of the people sipping from blue plastic cups seem to notice. The corner of 76th Street and Troost is alive on a Tuesday evening in May, and there ain't a damn thing gonna rain on this parade, least of all rain. And with the arrival of the Pythons drill team, it is a parade. Thumping drums. Shrill whistles. Little girls in red and silver sequined outfits dancing like it's Macy's Day.

The spectacle has drawn a crowd. The percentage of people here for Young Kev rather than merely for free hot dogs isn't clear. But it's also not important. They're here -- as are the entrepreneurs. Doe-eyed young basketball players stand sentry outside 7th Heaven in their baby-blue Tar Heels uniforms, a deflated basketball serving as their collection plate. A man in an ice cream truck makes a screeching U-turn before lurching to a halt beside his new customers. Others hand out fliers ("This shit is sick") for their upcoming music projects. One struggling rapper hands out his CDRs straight from the Costco box that originally held the blank Memorex discs.

But today, traffic stops for Young Kev. At least it does when a photographer runs into the road -- oblivious to oncoming traffic -- to snap a picture of him with the Pythons. The kids beam. Young Kev smiles.

"People do look at you different," Young Kev says later. "I'm not a role model, but to those little kids, you might be. You never know what's in the back of that child's mind."

But the fame is fleeting. Tomorrow is the grind. Tomorrow is federal agents storming 7th Heaven -- "Young Kev Ghetto Gospel In Stores Now" still on the store's reader board -- for allegedly selling drug paraphernalia. Tomorrow is going back to being another struggling artist.

If you stand in the middle of Prospect Avenue and toss a 20-inch rim to the wind, it's bound to hit at least three rappers before it comes to rest. Most are mediocre. Some are talented. Few grasp the complexities of breaking into the music business. But virtually all are desperate to do so.

Their music isn't like Ludacris' club-thumping anthems or the mind-expanding sermons of Dead Prez or the soul-baring soliloquies of Atmosphere. These are hard rhymes and harder beats. This is what people called gangsta rap before that genre was all but buried with Tupac Shakur.

Before Eminem could finish saying Hi, my name is ... , the fickle suburban audience drop-drop-dropped gangsta rap like it was hot. Real gangsta rap -- not the 50 Cent version -- faded from consciousness for everyone but those still living it.

In Kansas City, though, the music thrives underground. The circle of local artists churning out albums and mix tapes is ever-expanding, even as the most promising rappers wrestle to escape the ghetto within the ghetto that they've created for themselves.

Young Kev has graduated into the upper echelon of this fragmented fraternity with a style he describes as "gangsta but conscious." He has moderate talent, but he's also savvy. Ghetto Gospel is a relatively well-produced album put out by a fledgling independent label, Cheez Factory, run by Ben Lewis, the inspiration behind the dormant Kansas City hip-hop publication Mo Cheez Magazine. Through Lewis, Young Kev also is ahead of the admittedly stunted curve of self-promotion in a scene rife with bloated egos, unrealistic expectations and dangerous in-fighting.