Streets by VICE: Atlanta (Ponce De Leon Ave.)

[Music] welcome to Atlanta birthplace of dr. Martin Luther King jr. and a cultural mecca of the South we're currently on Ponce de Leon which one of the most iconic streets and Atlanta although concentrated Ponce de Leon travels to some of the most famous locations in the city we're gonna travel a long class to explore the people and the places that define Atlanta [Music] this is streets live ice as one of the South's major cities Atlanta's known for its rich history that dates back to the early 1800s and the years of American slavery in 1864 during the Civil War General William Sherman came to Atlanta at the direction of Abraham Lincoln to rip up railroad tracks and burn down plantations as a result black people would follow Sherman to wherever he was because they knew they were protected because of this many freed slaves came to the city of Atlanta and were able to start businesses and established a black middle-class this helped cultivate Atlanta and to what it's known as today a black city part of Atlanta's cultural evolution was also due to the civil rights movement dr. Martin Luther King jr. an Atlanta native worked alongside a man by the name of Ralph Abernathy bringing light to the issues crippling the south I went to visit mrs. Juanita Abernathy raus Widow and one of the last surviving leaders of the civil rights movement what was the relationship between Ralph Abernathy and Martin Luther King oh they were best friends we went on vacations together our children grew up together whatever one did the other did they were inseparable when the Montgomery bus boycott started my husband was pastoring the oldest black Baptist Church in my country when Rosa sat down that day he called Martin King who was the new pastor at Dexter Avenue Baptist Church and the bus really changed America because that was the first successful boycott that had ever taken place in our country they threatened to kill us every day they decided they would make good on it one night they bombed our house Corman can you bring me that picture and I was in it if that dynamite had been one inch closer this is your main gas line we would have gone up in smoke and this didn't stop you oh no oh no anything they bombed our church 15 minutes after they've mined that house yeah this one is here in Atlanta instrumental it was Atlanta for the civil rights movement after the bus boycott was successful they needed to do the same thing in other areas of the south so they organized SCLC Southern Christian Leadership Conference in an effort to spread it and when they organized SCLC they came to Atlanta so that it could go throughout the country and to do it through non-violence naturally it took it took own people decided then there if you stand together on a common cause you can be forceful during segregation Atlanta was divided in such a way that certain streets became markers for racial divide within the city Ponce de Leon was one of those streets anything south of Ponce was considered to be black that was the racial line racing spaces where it's often called the idea is that Ponce was the dividing lines and this includes the Old Fourth Ward this includes areas that go just south of Georgia Institute of Technology the real conversation today is not necessarily about race per se but it's about class it's about who can afford to live where to find out more I met up with dr. Dax an artist and creator who grew up on Ponce to talk about the recent ways in which the street and Atlanta have evolved what's what's the significance of pausing Leon in Atlanta oh I think originally you know the street was very important this is what I consider the heart of Atlanta you know we're over here approaching the legendary clearing my hotel which has seen better days as you can see you know yeah this place used to be everything no this was definitely like our Chelsea Hotel man a lot of legendary people came out of here for instance we whip the out of GG Allin and in this place and now they say yeah yeah he lived in here I really hate to see it up like that man because uh this is the heart and soul of the street right there you know and like thank God that we still have the Clermont lounge the visit right you know Atlanta's historically segregate would you still say it's segregated not so much no I think I think we've gotten to a really good place yeah now but when I moved here in 85 it was totally segregated this is possibly on which crosses over some mainstream Boulevard being won Moreland is more than going that way but if you go this way becomes Briarcliff and that was for racial segregation that's the same Street two different names the white people lived on the north side and the south side of all the black people were always this way and that was the reason there was two different names for every street down here so what was special about Atlanta well special about Atlanta and I guess remain special by Atlanta's as we keep passing the test of time you know it hasn't just been a phase or a fad we keep setting the standards for dance - you know how music sounds we're kind of like the blueprint for what school [Music] Atlanta's dominance over the hip-hop landscape is now closing in on two decades this is partly due to the emergence of the sub genre known as trap producer Zaytoven is responsible for helping to craft rap music's present-day sound producing many mainstream hits so how would you describe and explain trap music to people who have never heard of it before I would say it's hustlin Muse music it's energetic music it's unpolished music its soulful in his hard core at the same time spontaneous music reality music you're an architect when it comes to this trap sound and it's actually more of a genre now yeah and when I was coming up it wasn't even a genre it's just a reality so I didn't really have any influence or making my music or try to sound like somebody else's it just me creating beats in five minutes cuz I know Gucci Mane want to make ten song today it's almost from being rushed or being a lazy man because when I'm making beats I'm making beats I'm not trying to make it on the radio and none of it I'm just making a beat because we're gonna record some songs so I'm making the Beast litter in five minutes [Music] and Gucci I think created the type of trap sound that it is now and our version of trap music it might be more comical it's more melody driven it's still Street at the same time but just the sound of it was just different and that's what's lingering on you know now that's what the kids they mimic that's what you know that's the genre of music that people are mimicking now I have been doing this for so long I have created almost a genre of music but I never look at it like that I'm just I'm always trying to create something new Atlanta has been incredibly dominant in hip-hop for a long time a lot of my come with a dance song a big dance song and Mike owned some like some waka flocka and it's gonna I think it's gonna continue to beat that man everybody come here to soak up the game as we know we got the flavor man that's why Atlanta is definitely got the number one spot you know in a rap game Atlanta's initial rise to the top of the hip hop world can be attributed to a dungeon family in Atlanta artists collective which includes the likes of Outkast goody mob killer Mike future and the legendary production trio organized Noize so we're headed to the Fox Theater which is the oldest music venue in Atlanta to meet with two-thirds of organized Noize was responsible for some of the biggest radio hits of the late 90s and early 2000s the Fox Theater on the corner of Peachtree and pons was originally built in 1929 and until this day remains one of Atlanta's architectural and cultural gems it was notable at the time for being the only theater in Atlanta allowing both white and black patrons the evolution of music in Atlanta it's been a great thing because you know we got James Brown James Brown is like and he's he's the backbone of hip-hop then bass music we called it which was more influenced by Florida that was a big influence on the Latin sound then we came in in the 90s into the 808 and good some funk and then we put some soul in there and anybody more on hip hop you know Atlanta didn't have a music industry we had talent shows yeah and everybody's trying to win the talent shows to get exposure to be seen and so the first hip-hop artists were like independent artists what did you all bring to hip-hop we knew that um it was very important to not be copying fiction that be repetitive we understood that keyboards sounded a little more plastic than the real thing that's what we brought authentic hip-hop so we got a chance to do waterfall [Music] I guess you were hip enough to be on a beat with pure power are they like the same bubble girl right the same throw away that's what I think about us and I was sound by even when we did so fresh so clean later of outcasts he listens to the diversity up there the Trump the hip-hop beat but they reach so many people because you get so many elements of music it right you started in the early 90s but it you can still see the impact of dungeon family today with future with Janelle Monae in a time where people don't really buy into artists you know saying they behind songs or whatever like are they just fine and whatever the sound is I think the fact that we are really are students of music you know I mean so I think you get a chance to have the rewards of a killer Mike or future even if we're not with those artists holding their hand they still embodying what we be represented we consider Atlanta the heartbeat of the urban sound like we're not gonna settle for the status quo a little further down the street on pawns lies in Atlanta landmark very different than the Fox Theater the Clermont lounge beneath the now rundown Clermont Hotel is a strip club unlike any other a strip club that reminds you how weird the street can really be so we're at the Clermont lounge right now which is the longest-standing strip club in Atlanta and we're gonna meet blondie who's the most famous woman probably on Ponce de Leon Thank You blondie for having us thank you but at the clam house 37 and a half years and I've been dancing for 40 years but we like women they're kind of curvy we have skinny girls the money could be a little bit curvy and I'm quite curvy but I've got the legs what's your favorite thing about Atlanta now I'm popular no no no what up that I've been given so many opportunities it allowed us great tell and I love it I have to go all right let's go pee and then I'm gonna go get some beers and some yeah Mikey [Music] the Clermont lounge first opened in 1965 and today is entirely owned and operated by women it is a truly special place in Atlanta and from the moment you step in you can see why [Music] Ponce de león's old soul can still be felt in pockets throughout the street but with it rapidly becoming more and more developed the neighborhoods that connects are feeling the effects particularly in the Old Fourth Ward so we're on Boulevard which links Ponce de Leon to the Old Fourth Ward which is historic King district and we're meeting Kwanza Hall who is a councilman for over 10 years out here in Atlanta and we're talking to him about how he's revitalizing this community which is one of the highest concentrations of section 8 in the southeast so currently Old Fourth Ward and Boulevard is still majority african-american correct yes it within the Boulevard corridor Bedford Pines in many neighborhoods you would have the notion of where the black neighborhood was where the Jewish neighborhood was and where the anglo-saxon white neighborhood was so on this street it was Jackson as the black community it was Parkway it's the Jewish community and Charles Allen was the white community and that was all and it's all on the same streets on the same street people actually don't mind living next door to each other black white gay straight rich poor for instance if you notice their units here that are definitely owned by Wingate management low-income units but then if you look right up behind us over me over here to your to your right those are at least $600,000 units if not more people chose to invest and build these houses basically in the middle of what many might say is a housing project and that's one of the beauties of it this diversity that exists here for people of different backgrounds okay just take me man so we're about a half a mile down Boulevard in the king district with the Kings that are down here so this is where dr. King was born January 15th 1929 and this great neighborhood raised him that is where Martin Luther King Jr's legacy began and it continued as he served as head pastor at Ebenezer Baptist Church one of the many iconic black churches in Atlanta's sweet Auburn district attending church is part of the cultural fabric not just in Atlanta but throughout the south to gain a better understanding of the important role churches play in southern communities I wanted to attend Sunday service at big Bethel a historic black church in the sweet Auburn district so we're at Afrocentric Network right now with Shelly from big Bethel and tomorrow is actually Heritage Day and for Black History Month they dress up in dashikis so we're buying one to attend church tomorrow let's see if we can find you something to wear well what color do you like what's your favorite color kill how does it fit oh it's pretty good let's see what do you think I like it you like it well I don't know this looks like this might be your Sunday best my Sunday best yeah this is your Sunday best it was big Bethel welcome let me be you [Music] the mission of the church is to go out and impact the community and do it in positive ways then we can have a very real impact on the community so so with big bet though you may notice that there's a 16 story high-rise riding back of us for section 8 housing well that's owned and built by a big Bethel back in the 1970s so what we try to do is put forth the positive programs that will impact the people and impact the community in such a way that we can have a real presence in the community who stands is one of the iconic churches on all burns and so there were all these black businesses that were here but as we went through post-civil rights than the black businesses went away and then a lot of buildings went into decay and other things but we're we're kind of now in the past seven eight years kind of making a rebirth [Music] you have liberated us you have set us free free free thank God Almighty I am [Applause] [Music] the spirit of Atlanta rose from the ashes of the Civil War and against all odds became a beacon for black liberation and culture in America from the civil rights movement to the uprising of southern hip hop there is both a struggle and power that is deeply rooted within this city Ponce de Leon once a racial divider now connects the many people in places that gives Atlanta its raw authenticity and truly makes it a city unlike any other [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music]

Channel: VICE

Views: 1,573,572

Rating: 4.7423658 out of 5

Keywords: documentary, interview, interviews, culture, lifestyle, world, exclusive, independent, underground, videos, journalism, vice guide, vice presents, vice news, vbs.tv, vice.com, vice, vice magazine, vice mag, vice videos, Streets by VICE, Zaytoven, martin luther king jr., Ralph Abernathy, Juanita Abernathy, Organized Noize, Atlanta Hip Hop, Clermont Longue, Blondie, Kwanza Hall, Dr. Dax, Fox Theatre, Civil Rights Movement, ATLANTA, Ponce De Leon Ave., Big Bethel Church, Black Church

Id: 9rCJYkZYeLY

Length: 19min 23sec (1163 seconds)

Published: Wed Mar 30 2016

Reddit Comments

[u/olenine]

Could have called it "Boulevard" or "O4W". I get it, but the divide and breadth of the city could have been better illustrated comparing Ponce and Boulevard to a number of other intersections, say, Ponce and Church in Decatur and Ponce and Montreal in Clarkston and the end of Ponce in Stone Mountain Village. Shit, YDFM, on Ponce, speaks more about modern Atlanta than Blondie. And there is...something...about going to west midtown to talk to a trap producer, and then walking around Boulevard and North with Kwanza literally surrounded by the most open and obvious actual traps going in the city and not talking about it.

[u/theguysmiley]

streets by vice by google

[u/jonathan-peterson]

spent more time O4W than on Ponce, but nice documentary anyway.

[u/CmdrSmoothie]

Ponce DAY Leeon?

[u/Mario_Speedwagon]

It's marginally about Ponce but whatever, it was still entertaining.

[u/[deleted]]

No Ponce special is complete without Dr. Dax - Network - FS - Worst Guys Ever mane!

[u/count_schemula]

no goofy gopher?

[u/jessikat13]

I would probably preface this with a mild NSFW to warn people... unless they really want to display some Clermont strippers to their colleagues.

[u/Monomorphic]

No Druid Hills love?