The Ghost of Coventry
As much as I would like to provide a lot of detail, I will keep it brief like the late Aaron Carter and just give you the facts.
Recently, my brother-in-law Mike Hamme (also known as East Coast Mike) has been asking various artists and bands who covers the music scene in Cleveland. Most of them responded with disappointment, followed by a shrug or the answer “no one”.
Seizing the opportunity, we grabbed our slightly broken iPhones and a Best Buy microphone rig and set out to the east side of Cleveland with high hopes. Our journey took us to Coventry, where we parked our car and walked to the Grog Shop.
We spent the first hour exploring the venue, listening to the echoes of the bands from every seat in the house. We heard that Cleveland Scene’s best rapper of 2021 was sitting on a stoop outside the venue. We knew this was our chance to “seize the day” and approached him with our recording equipment.
He was an excellent rapper, and we were pleasantly surprised. However, shortly into the performance, someone started beatboxing and rapping in our peripheral view. We didn’t know his name at the time, but he later introduced himself as Jynx. He was easily twice as good as any other rapper we had heard on the stoop. Our jaws dropped as we listened to his talent and wit. It was like listening to Chance the Rapper on the south side of Chicago before he became famous.
We thought we had captured a great moment on camera, but we didn’t know what would come next. That’s when the headliner of the show that night at the Grog Shop, M.O.O.K.Y, descended on the stoop and took it to another level. With the soft glow of golden hour and our cheap microphone, we recorded something organic and special. It was one of those rare moments where you know you are experiencing something memorable in real time.
For two minutes and thirty-six seconds, M.O.O.K.Y and Jynx essentially recorded a song, and we captured the whole thing on camera. Afterwards, M.O.O.K.Y invited Jynx on stage to play with him, but he vanished as quickly as he had appeared. We searched Coventry for him but couldn’t find him anywhere. M.O.O.K.Y, on the other hand, can be found on Spotify or you can watch him on American Idol in March 2022.
As for Jynx, he cannot be found. We even spoke with Wallace, the manager of the Grog Shop, who said “He just sits out there and raps. We’ve tried to get him in the studio or up on stage, but he’s not interested”. He is Cleveland’s best rapper, but he doesn’t want the fame. He does it for the art.
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