Sage Francis Never Afraid To Fight The System

By Will Jordan

Sage Francis is pissed off. He’s really pissed off, but that’s nothing new to anyone who’s familiar with the Rhode-Island-bred, politically conscious lyricist.
“Everything pisses me off,” Sage says from his reclusive Rhode Island home. “I’m not focused on one thing. The way the whole political system is run pisses me off.
“Nothing is improving,” he continues. “People just don’t care about how fucked up things are, so I decided to give up on that and try to initiate change by making people aware through positive means.”
In addition to rhyming about issues in his songs, Sage helped found nomore.org, which tries to raise political awareness by holding leaders accountable for their actions.
“I’m not naïve enough to think a song is going to save the world, but I can help plant seeds and get conscious-minded communities started.
On stage Sage spits about all of the things that tick him off.
He recently finished a 35-city tour and heads back out in November.
“I’m not a huge fan of the road,” he says. “It certainly takes its toll. After a couple of tours it begins to wear away the spirit, mind and body, but I do belong on stage. It feels natural when I’m there.”
Sage began rapping when he was 8 years old. Hidden in a closet in his parents’ Rhode Island home, he’d rhyme into a cheap tape recorder for hours on end, according to Sage. By age 12 he was sneaking out to battle other Providence emcees, entering talent contests and learning the finer points of showmanship, if not the sizeable advantage that, well, size offers where confrontation is concerned.
When his mom took him to a Public Enemy concert in 1988, he found his true calling as a lyricist.
“Chuck D set the standard for me and helped me learn something other than bragging about how big your dick is,” he says. “He was dropping so much science. There was a reason for the content. It fueled me.”
In 1996, Sage recorded his first official demo tape and within a year and a half, he formed a live band (Art Official Intelligence), created his own radio show on Rhode Island’s independent station, WRIU (“True School Session,” every Tuesday from 3-6pm), and a recording project with his producer friend Joe Beats. The duo released a 12” under the name Non-Prophets in 1999 on a friend’s label, Emerge Records, and managed to move a few thousand copies with virtually no promotion.
That was the same year Sage won the Superbowl MC Battle in Boston, and only a few months before he’d head to Cincinnati to claim the 2000 Scribble Jam freestyle title, the highest honor in the hip-hop underground.
He spent some time spinning beats at CBGBs for poetry slam events, and had his own spoken word featured in commercials on ABC, ESPN, and ESPN2 for the 2000 Winter X-Games (which paid his rent for a year).
With the cult following he’d amassed locally and through the Internet, Sage was able to support himself by bootlegging his own material and touring nationally.
In 2002 he released Enter Personal Journals on Anticon. He followed in 2003 with the Non-Prophets full-length, Hope, on Lex Records. The album was an extended homage to the music Sage grew up with, overflowing with Old School allusion and wordplay.
In 2004, Sage became Epitaph Records’ first hip-hop signing and in February, he will delivered his “most complete album yet,” A Healthy Distrust.
While there are echoes of both Personal Journals and Hope (intimacy and grace, posturing and force), A Healthy Distrust is more honest and uncompromising than either.
Today, at 27, the man has a reputation as spoken word revolutionary.
“I’ve never felt like I had to prostitute my talents,” Sage says. “I’ve always stuck top my guns and had a fuck-it-all attitude. People who like me have always enjoyed the music and supported me. I’ve never had any regrets and plan to help other artists I think could use some support.”

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