El Mizell was clowning me for this video the other day and I promised him I’d blog about it. What to say. Ok. Yes, as some of you know my uncle is in this video. It’s Xperience’s dad, Bern (hence the title of our crew being “Step Cousins”). He’s the smooth looking brother that drapes the endangered animal over his shoulder. I almost forgot about this video (and would have liked to) but my friends, alcohol and secrets don’t go hand in hand.

Anyway, it’s crazy because I have so many childhood memories revolving around that jacket. Uncle Bern bought one for XP when we were like 11, and I traded him my Cowboys Starter jacket for the Cheetah. I remember coming home in that thing, and my mom was all kinds of disappointed in me. She’s always been on the more liberal side of big game hunting, particularly when the species wasn’t used for food. My dad however was super into skins, fur, beef jerky and this cheetah, so eventually I got my way and spent the majority of the summer in the jacket. While my friends were swimming and stuck in baseball camp, I was in cheetah. That’s when I started rapping.

Looking back, that skin had a big impact on the beginning of my identity. A lot of ignorant people associate Leroy’s Mens Wear with “Pimp/Player” clothes. Not at all. It was, is and always will be an establishment of Luxury for the men of downtown Seattle. But Leroy’s was more then just a clothing store to me and XP. It was a hang out. A place where we could go to learn about what it meant to be a man. It taught us how to manipulate women (in a good way) by using clothing to get what we wanted. It taught me that in order to be “man enough” you didn’t have to wear denim and plaid. I think there’s a big stigma, particularly hear in the Northwest about how you’re “suppose to dress”. So many men think you need to cut down a tree and piss on it before you grow a dick. Not true. You could wear a jacket made of cheetah, a silk shirt or a cape made out of a Cheetah and still be man enough. My uncle Bern was, and still is to this day.

Before GOODS there was Leroy’s. Now go buy something. I’ll probably see you down there.

204 Pike St. Seattle WA 98101.