The Who
I didn’t believe it was Tajai on the phone when I received a beep from a “510” area code on my pager one fateful day in 1995.
My friends and I, including Meech from the City Pigeons Podcast, featured in the video below, were on our way out the door to see a Goats concert when I got the page.
“Hold on one sec,” I said hastily, as curiosity got the better of me and I decided to return the call.
To my surprise, someone claiming to be Tajai answered and started talking about how much they loved my Tha Threshold website—specifically the section dedicated to Hieroglyphics.
“We want to make it the official website of Hieroglyphics,” said the person claiming to be Tajai.
I was beyond skeptical. I passed the phone around to my friends, and we all took turns listening, snickering. “Sure, sure…” we thought, exchanging knowing glances.
When the phone came back to me, I had to come clean. “I get emails all the time from people claiming to be members of Hieroglyphics, and none of them have ever been real. I need proof,” I confessed.
“You got it,” the voice on the line said.
Sure enough, not two weeks later, a package arrived filled with Souls of Mischief and JIVE Records promotional materials: SOM water flasks, an autographed photograph, stickers—tons and tons of stickers.
It was real. Tajai was exactly who he claimed to be. The rest, as they say, is history.
City Pigeons
Below is a transcript of Meech’s conversation from the City Pigeons Podcast. Thanks to the crew for allowing us to share the video. Be sure to check them out!
Meech: “So, I was at my buddy’s house, and my buddy lived in Bensalem—shoutout, Stinke!”
laughter ensues
Rodg “Rock” Matthews: “Shoutout, Stinke…”
Meech: “He watches [the podcast].
“He started Hieroglyphics.com: Del the Funky Homosapien, Souls of Mischief, Casual, Extra Prolific. It was a fan site.”
Jesse Rendell: “To tie that back to some of the other stuff that we’ve talked about in the past, that kind of music—all of the Souls of Mischief and Hieroglyphics stuff—was in all of the skate videos I used to watch.”
Meech: “Yeah, Plan B skate video, classic. That’s why I was into skate videos, because of the music.
“So, anyway, my buddy had started Hieroglyphics.com. We’re in his house on the way to a concert, and he gets a text, and it’s an Oakland area code—”
Jesse Rendell: “No, no: a page. No texting.”
Meech: “Right, a page, on his beeper, from an Oakland area code.
“So he calls it back, and it was Tajai from the Souls of Mischief. And Tajai was like, ‘Yo, man, I just saw the website, I love it.’ And my buddy is passing the phone around the room, and Stinke’s like, ‘This guy says he’s Tajai…’
“But it ended up being Tajai and A-Plus on the phone. My buddy ended up connecting with them, and that became one of the first and biggest rap group websites ever.”