<body><div><figure><img src="https://img.particlenews.com/image.php?type=thumbnail_580x000&amp;url=4XHEnI_0t3Nz0Wx00" alt="https://img.particlenews.com/image.php?url=4XHEnI_0t3Nz0Wx00" width="1024" height="683" ><figcaption>Goalden Chyld Credit: ThoughtPoet for Chicago Reader</figcaption></figure>City of Win is a series curated by Isiah “ThoughtPoet” Veney and written by Alejandro Hernandez that uses prose and photography to create portraits of Chicago musicians and cultural innovators working to create positive change in their communities.More than a decade after it broke out commercially, drill music has arguably become Chicago’s biggest cultural export. This hip-hop subgenre burst into the mainstream in the early 2010s thanks to the likes of Chief Keef, King Louie, and Lil Durk, and it’s now influencing the sound of music as far afield as New York, London, and Japan. But for its entire existence, drill has been marred by controversy due to the gang affiliations of its artists and their often violent lyrics.Chicago rapper Goalden Chyld wants to change the narrative about more than drill music. He wants to transform the way we see the city’s most violent neighborhoods—the ones the folks who live there sometimes call “the trenches.” Growing up, he moved frequently across the south and west sides and saw the effects of generations of systemic racism and disinvestment. Mainstream media paints these areas as war zones, incomprehensible to “normal” people, but GC understands that violence in a neighborhood doesn’t make its residents less human. You can demonize them as thugs and gangbangers, but their lives are nuanced and complex, just like the lives of anybody in Wicker Park or Old Town. GC chose to be proactive: he became a community organizer and stepped into conflicts between gangs to resolve them peacefully.“I was always taught that the best title any man can have is ‘brother,’” he says. “And I strive to be my brother and sister’s keeper—a unifier and peace warrior that’s genuinely for the betterment of our people.”Unity Concert 3Featuring Goalden Chyld, the Healthy Hood Cadre, Recoe Chi, Tyre Hakim, Teefa, and more. Hosted by Awthentik Poetry. Sat 5/25, 7 PM, DuSable Black History Museum and Education Center, 740 E. 56th Pl., $35, $25 in advance, $40 for two, $50 with meet-and-greetGoalden Chyld was born into a musical family in Geneva, Illinois, and raised between Chicago and Aurora, settling here at age six. His mother grew up singing in the choir at Gayles Memorial Baptist Church in Aurora, and his father performed under the name Landmine in 90s Chicago rap collective Soldierz at War. He vividly recalls his first time recording in a studio: when he was eight years old, his father wrote a poem called “Dear Dad” for him to memorize, then held him up to the mike so he could recite it. GC kept an open mind about music as a kid, and today he says he draws inspiration from all over—hip-hop, soul, country, techno. But drill is the sound he’s perfected. Despite drill’s chart dominance, many rap purists sneer at it because it’s not “lyrically conscious”—that is, it lacks constructive social messaging. GC doesn’t accept that drill isn’t conscious, though, and he believes he can spread positivity in a way that appeals to the younger fans who closely follow Chicago’s drill scene.“Drill is conscious. I believe oftentimes, the only setback with drill is that they’re telling the truth about the reality of what they may experience in the trenches, but without there being a solution attached to it,” he explains. “When I listen to drill music, I’m listening to the problems, I’m listening to the struggles, I’m listening to the pain. And for anybody that wants to help, you got to be able to understand the problems or struggles, the pain, so that in turn you can provide some type of remedy.”Goalden Chyld’s first full-length album, War Cry, came out earlier this spring.Goalden Chyld’s new debut album, the March release War Cry, attempts to offer those missing solutions. Its production is very much in line with typical drill—hard-hitting bass knocks, aggressive 808 drums—but its lyrics diverge from the genre’s template, instead promoting peace, self-improvement, and faith in God. GC often drops “Allahu Akbar” as an ad-lib. The final product sounds like a hybrid of two Chicago rap legends, fusing G Herbo–style beats with lyrics that might’ve come from Common.In the War Cry track “Trenches United,” GC raps, “We still cleaning up, I told them that we far from perfect / Brothers hit me ready to crash out, I’m like nah, it ain’t worth it / I need thinkers with me, we got too much work to do.” So many rappers exaggerate the truth to inflate their importance that Goalden Chyld stands out by actually living what’s in his lyrics, spending his days intervening in gang violence.War Cry surpassed all expectations, and within days of its release it’d peaked at number three on the Apple Music rap chart, right under Future &amp; Metro Boomin and Joyner Lucas—all with zero promotion budget. But to GC, what matters more than the commercial success of his recordings is his connection to the people he serves—that’s what makes everything he does worth it. After War Cry charted, some of Goalden Chyld’s friends and peers expressed their appreciation for that service. They insisted that while his album might’ve reached number three, he’s number one in the trenches because of how he pushes peace in the hood. In early April, they teamed up to present him with a golden trophy he calls the first and only “#1 in the Trenches Award.” Its base reads “#1 GC / War Cry / Trenches / Unity.” As part of his community work, over the past few years Goalden Chyld has performed at and helped organize several Unity Concerts, including a few hosted by Healthy Hood Chicago in Pilsen. On Saturday, May 25, he’s headlining Unity Concert 3 at the DuSable Black History Museum. The event is also advertised as the premiere of his “Trenches United” video, but its bigger purpose is to bring together people from different cultural communities and celebrate art that delivers a positive message.“The best religion I was taught growing up is to do unto others as you would have them do unto yourself,” Goalden Chyld says. “Unity is the solution to about 95 percent of our problems. A lot of the problems we face in our community is because we’re disconnected.” Sometimes disconnection is as obvious as not treating neighbors like neighbors. “I know some young men, 20 and 25, that have never even been downtown, let alone four or five blocks up the street, because that’s quote-unquote ‘enemy territory,’” explains GC. “Whereas if we were connected and able to communicate with each other, we will come to realize that we have more in common than we don’t have in common. Then on those bases, we’ll be able to work together more to make our community a safe and decent place to live.”Photos by ThoughtPoet of Unsocial Aesthetics (UAES), a digital creative studio and resource collective designed to elevate community-driven storytelling and social activism in Chicago and beyond</div></body>

Mountain View, CA

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Goalden Chyld transforms drill music by pushing for peace

City of Win is a series curated by Isiah “ThoughtPoet” Veney and written by Alejandro Hernandez that uses prose and photography to create portraits of Chicago musicians and cultural innovators working to create positive change in their communities. More than a decade after it broke out commercially, drill...