TCB

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Rhyme Pays

Local MC Bavu Blakes has been burning up the highways between Austin, Dallas, and Houston, making good on his 2002 album's promise to Create & Hustle; he estimates he did 11 cities in 14 days in one recent jag. While on the road, he's been slowly narrowing down a pool of instrumentals for use on his next album. "Kanye West is finally not playing in my car every day," he adds. On the rare occasions he's not behind the wheel, he's mining marketing books for ideas. His latest brainstorm is a promo disc with remixes of "Play the Role." "Something told me to start giving away stuff," he says. "So far it's working like a charm." Future editions of "Play the Role" will include a video he's premiering at Ruta Maya June 11 with Money Waters, the Strange Fruit Project, Tee Double, Element, and several DJs. Blakes, who opens the "Weapons of Mic Destruction" tour at Stubb's June 6, is also partnering with Austin DJ Phyfteen and Houston Texans safety Marcus Coleman in Southwest Conference Records. Elsewhere, sometime Blakes collaborators Soul Odyssey, aka Mirage and Arson Optics, have delivered a four-song preview of their upcoming The Offering to area DJs just in time for Hot 93.3's Memorial Day Mix-Off. The duo hopes to drop the full Offering in late summer.