I really liked Heavy D. He was officially one of the legends in the rap game, having moved from the mic and the stage to the board room, with occasional - successful - forays into acting. He had started back when rap was fun and bright, before everything was how hard you are, or how gangsta you could be. Back when you could switch between suits and jams, be bright and colorful or dark, depending on how you wanted to play it, not just what the audience was expecting. He performed back when you actually had to have a stage show, not just a gathering of your friends and hangers-on wandering around the stage screaming. Back before there was a "gangsta formula" for rap success.
He was conscious before conscious was cool, and had songs about subjects in terms that aren't heard today in modern rap.
My favorite song of his was "Nuttin but Love", where he showed a deftness of lyrical skill not heard much anymore. I still use that phrase from time to time. And I thought he was the business along with Omar Epps in the badly timed and thus horribly underrated "Big Trouble" (2002) where he played FBI agent Pat Greer out to stop a nuclear bomb during one crazy night in Miami. He doesn't show up until about halfway through, but he and Omar make the movie.
The Overweight lover. That was how he had billed himself, from "money earning Mt. Vernon". True he had slimmed down a little, we all have, but he was still Heavy.
Heavy in thought. Heavy in soul. Heavy in style.
And the world is a little less bright.
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