Rapper Pharoahe Monch recently sat down with The Takeaway to discuss using music to help with trauma and pain.
Through his latest album, PTSD – Post Traumatic Stress Disorder , the complex emcee tackles the rarely explored issue of mental health in African-American and hip-hop communities.
“Monch tells stories that represent painful experiences for him,” says The Takeaway’s John Hockenberry . “But they have also made him a champion for people whose limitations and challenges have never made it into popular culture.”
“You talk about the black community and you even talk about [the] hip-hop community, it’s a very brash and chest-poked-out community,” says Monch. “Something invisible that’s troubling you is difficult to bring up in the first place.”
You’d never know from the way the 41-year-old lyrical genius unleashes a verse, but he has been a long time sufferer of asthma, and the medication he was taking to manage it almost killed him.
He speaks on the experience: “It began when this doctor figured out that this cocktail of medications was affecting me emotionally. I stopped and called my doctor and we re-did the medication and I’ve been out of that fog ever since. I can only imagine the soldiers and what they go through trying to get re-acclimated into regular society, especially now with what we’re seeing with the veterans…”
Take a listen to the full interview segment below and be sure to get Monch’s PTSD now on iTunes .