Hip-hop artists are getting very mouthy about their bling
November 23, 2005By Chris Lee, Special to The Times
Before Nelly's "Grillz" (featuring Paul Wall, Ali
& Gipp) became a radio hit this month, flashy dental jewelry was a
phenomenon seen in hip-hop videos and magazine pages but seldom
heard about in rap songs. Nelly's ode to the removable gold- and
diamond-encrusted tooth ornamentation commonly known among rappers as
grills has helped shift hip-hop's latest fashion trend into high
gear.
"I put my money where my mouth is and bought a grill," Wall
raps in the song, " ... I got my mouth lookin' like a disco ball."
Grills,
which typically cover the upper and lower front teeth, are becoming
ubiquitous among the Southern hip-hop artists currently dominating the pop
and rap charts.
As it turns out, most of them purchased their
million-dollar smiles at the same place — a small shop in Houston's
Sharpstown Mall that's owned by ... Paul Wall.
The rapper — whose
own album "The Peoples Champ" debuted at No. 1 on the national album sales
chart in September and features a cover image of Wall's extravagantly
begrilled mouth — says he has made custom mouthpieces for Kanye West, Sean
"Diddy" Combs, Usher, Snoop Dogg, Lil Jon, Omarion and Bow Wow, among a
constellation of hip-hop stars.
Wall's shop, TV Jewelry, also does
a booming business with Houston rappers, including Slim Thug, Mike Jones
and Bun B.
"It's definitely abstract," Wall said about the appeal
of the oral adornment. "It's an alternative piece of
jewelry."
Hip-hop has had a well-chronicled love affair with
conspicuous consumption. Gold "rope" necklaces and "iced out" wristwatches
covered in precious stones have become standard issue within the field.
And over the years, rap paeans similar to Nelly's "Grillz" have been
devoted to sky pagers, Adidas sneakers, chrome hubcaps and the diamond
affluence of "bling-bling."
But according to Bun B, whose grill
spells "Trill," the title of his recently released album, across six top
teeth, dental jewelry is more than simply an assertion of rappers'
purchasing power.
"Gold teeth have evolved from being just pieces
of metal on your tooth," said the hard-core rapper. "For some people, it's
an expression of who they are: their 'hood, what they represent.... It's
marketing, a promotion."
Long a fan of rappers Slick Rick and
Public Enemy's Flavor Flav, who are considered hip-hop's pioneers of the
gold-tooth look, Wall met a visiting rapper known as Crime who had a
sideline making and selling grills in 1996. They were the first removable
models Wall had seen. The rapper taught him how to design and mold them,
and Wall set up temporary shop selling his jewelry at a Houston record
store.
"Down South, gold teeth were always a symbol of poverty,"
Wall, 24, explained. "But the hustlers — gangsters or drug dealers — made
them a symbol of respect on an extreme level."
By day, Wall did
street promotions such as handing out fliers and putting up posters to
advertise local music acts. But by night, he concentrated on hip-hop,
performing at clubs spreading word of his grill business to peers and then
subcontracting the work to a dentist, Johnny Dang.
"Up until that
point, Johnny didn't have a store, just a workshop," Wall said. "As I
started getting popularity as a rapper and bringing him clientele, he was
like, 'Let's go into business together!' "
In 1998, they opened TV
Jewelry. There, grills can be ordered in either platinum or one of three
shades of gold, costing as little as $50 for a single diamond-less gold
tooth and as much as $50,000 for a full grill with 30 carats of
diamonds.
Wall said the youngest customer to buy one of his grills
was 13. Anecdotal evidence suggests that the trend has already begun to
spread beyond hip-hop.
"People originally thought it was a ghetto
kind of style," said John Hallett, office manager of Mr. Bling, a jewelry
store in Las Vegas that sells an average of five to 10 grills a day. "But
now a lot of white people from L.A. come down to buy them. Punk rockers
and alternative people with tattoos and piercings."
At TV Jewelry,
molds of customers' mouths are taken in dental clay and then recast in
metal.
"We can take the mold at our facilities and make everything
from scratch," Wall said. "There's nothing dangerous at all. When you do
it the way we do it, it's pure jewelry."
While grills are not
subject to any specific health ordinances, dental experts caution that
there are risks to wearers who leave the jewelry on for more than two
hours.
"The mouth is not a clean and tidy place," said Dr. Matt
Messina, consumer advocate for the American Dental Assn. "And anything
that has crevices and rough surfaces, bacteria and plaque are going to
stick to. If somebody's going to snap one of these in and then leave it
for a long time, they've basically installed a bacteria condominium
complex.
"That could have long-term effects in terms of decay on
the teeth and gum recession. Plus, if you have all that bacteria, you can
have some really foul breath."
Grill wearers have discovered their
own do's and don'ts.
"It's not really comfortable to eat in," said
Bun B. "It's mainly for photo-ops. As much as a grill costs, you want to
make sure as many people are going to see it as possible."
Whatever
their visual effect, the jewelry makes it harder for rappers to serve
their primary purpose: rapping.
"[Grills make it] real hard to
talk," Bun B said. "It builds up saliva."
Although Wall doesn't
plan to quit his musical day job anytime soon, the security his jewelry
business provides has allowed him a new level of creative
freedom.
"It's putting a lot of food on the table and a lot of
money in the bank," he said. "It's great for me because it takes the
pressure off me in music. I already have success!"
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