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September 23, 2013 · 7:32 pm

An interview with RWR, “…the hell you know about the 740?”

Last week, as I was busy working on my book about opiates in America, I was amazed to see the reaction to a rough-hewn video from some guys from Portsmouth, Ohio known as RWR (Raw Word Revival).

The song they put out, “What the Hell You Know About the 740?”, describes the several crises their town has lived in for decades — and describes a lot of heartland America as well.

Among them, Portsmouth was ground zero in the opiate epidemic that is now sweeping the country. I’ve been there four times for the book: twice to hear about the degradation that took place with economic decline and the rise of prescription pill use; twice to hear the stories of how Portsmouth is emerging from that hell and a recovery community is forming.

I hope to return a fifth time.

What I found electric about the RWR video was that it was not a celebration of thuggery. Instead it was journalism — a description of what these guys had grown up in, using Portsmouth as the video backdrop — and a call to rebirth for their hometown.

I suspect Bruce Springsteen and Merle Haggard would find a lot to value in the RWR and their song.

Plus it was DIY all the way, and, as a fan of early punk rock that pioneered DIY attitudes, I thought it looked great.

Anyway, five of the nine members of RWR took some time to talk to me about the group, the song, the reaction and more. Portsmouth born and raised, they are: Clint “Random” Askew, Nick “Big Mung” Mungle, Donricko “D’Gree” Greene, Barry “B.E.Z.” Munyon, Justin “JLew” Lewis. (Others in the group include Lexxy “Riide R Diie” Jackson, David Packard, Arrick “Lil Mont” Montgomery and Angelo “Anjo” Jackson)

You can listen to them at the link above or download it.

Check out their story. Tell me yours. Leave it in Comments.

Meanwhile, you can read the fantastic comments so many left on earlier posts I did last week.

And follow me: On Twitter. On Facebook.

Here’s my website: www.samquinones.com

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More posts from True Tales: A Reporter’s Blog:

From the 740: An addict talks about poetry and dope

What the Hell You Know About the 740?

Here’s what I know about the 7-4-0

Where have you seen the 740?

I who am your Mother … The Virgin of Guadalupe

3 Comments

Filed under Culture, Drugs, Podcast, The Heroin Heartland

Tagged as accent, Drugs, heartland, heroin, hip hop, Ohio, Oxycontin, pills, Portsmouth, Rap, Raw Word Revival, rural America, rust belt, RWR, samquinones.com, Southern Ohio, true tales: a reporter's blog, you know about the 740

September 19, 2013 · 8:40 am

Where have you seen the 7-4-0?

I said I’d never been there before I went to Portsmouth, Ohio.

Later, when I thought about it, and saw the video by RWR (Raw Word Revival), I realized I had been to the 7-4-0 many times.

Seems like the 7-4-0 is in the 6-2-0 (southwest Kansas), where the farming towns are empty, streets are vacant, and storefronts are boarded up. I was there several years ago.

One reader said this:

7-4-0 reminds me of my hometown, Elkhart, Indiana (574). Elkhart was built on the pharmaceutical, band instrument, and musical instrument manufacturing industries. Because of the mobile home industry, it tags along with the fortunes of Detroit. Don’t know about heroin, but backpack meth and home meth labs (one blew up across the street from the high school) are everywhere.

I was in Youngstown — which looked a lot like the 7-4-0, now that I think about it.

I was in the 7-4-0 in Pecos, Texas, where there aren’t enough food stores of any kind but the fast food variety.

In Huntington, WV (3-0-4), I did a story about the spread of black-tar heroin that had reached the city from one very similar small town in Mexico. More pizza joints in Huntington than there are gyms in all of WV, I’m told.

And having lived in Mexico, I can say that a thousand villages down there are in the 7-4-0, which is why those folks have left en masse, just like so many have left Portsmouth.

I was in the 7-4-0 in Marion, Ohio, where a guy got so upset at the lack of attention to the heroin problem that he put up signs saying, “Heroin is Marion’s Economy.”

And it seems like I’m in the 7-4-0 when I walk the aisles of any Walmart. I always imagine them haunted by ghosts of the storeowners who once sustained small-town America: one aisle by the departed local grocer; down another the former hardware store owner, and next to that, the long-gone woman’s clothier or that pharmacist.

Where have you seen the 7-4-0?

Tell me the story. Leave it in Comments.

And follow me: On Twitter. On Facebook.

My website: www.samquinones.com

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More posts from True Tales: A Reporter’s Blog:

T-shirts: What the hell you know about the 740?

Here’s what I know about the 7-4-0

What the hell you know about the 740?

Wanna Burrito? A prison tale

2 Comments

Filed under Culture, Drugs, Storytelling, The Heroin Heartland