“When a vanload of Lil’ Bastards from Portland unloads at your spot, be afraid. When they’re named after a particularly vulgar sexual defiance, it can only get worse. But dudes have got skills!” -XLR8R, November 2006
...the Cleveland Steamers are a match made in heaven. The Steamers mouthpieces, Mic Crenshaw and Gen.Erik... are Portland emcees who rightfully demand to be taken seriously, but theyve also all got a dirty/drunk side that Im hoping to see them bring out in each other at this show... the Steamers are also wrapping up work on upcoming releases that they cant wait for you to hear, and itd be damn worth your while to peep a sneak preview. -Willamette Week
Seriously, Mic Crenshaw is one busy dude. How he has the energy to juggle projects like Suckapunch, Hungry Mob, Womb Dialectic, and Cleveland Steamers, the world may never know. -Portland Mercury
Man about town Mic Crenshaw (Hungry Mob) and emcee Gen.Erik light up the stage once again as the Cleveland Steamers, with hip-hop that challenges the thick gold chains and Benzos of commercial rap music. -Portland Mercury
Whereas some mainstream rap stars rap about sex, drugs, and money, those underground intellectuals in Cleveland Steamers cover, well, "Sex, Drugs, and Money." To their credit, they do so with unusual eloquence. However, Gen. Erik and Portland poetry slam champ/Suckapunch emcee Mic Crenshaw also explore less obvious topics, most notably the destructive advertising imagery detailed in "Brainwashed." Gen. Erik probably spent many of his sauciest rhymes last weekend, so the Steamers should be at their well-rounded best for this gig. Catch the vapors. -Portland Mercury
Cleveland Steamers are pretty much summed up with the chorus of their track "Muse in the Music": "It's the muse in the music/it's a tool so I use it/to bring truth to confusion/some fools abuse it/producing an illusion." Consisting of local hiphop activist Mic Crenshaw (Hungry Mob) and emcee Gen.Erik, their explicit message is to take down those materialistic and community-destructive images built by the media, pop-rap artists, etc., AKA "rap clichés," as it were. -Portland Mercury
Mic Crenshaw and Gen.Erik team up to form Cleveland Steamers one thing you can be sure of: Crenshaw and Gen.Erik spit out verses hard and fast, sometimes getting dirty, but always remaining intelligent. -Willamette Week
Fans of off-center, lyrics-obsessed hip-hop a la Aesop Rock may dig Gen.Erik, who mines a similar territory of sexed-up, all-intellectualized-with-nowhere-to-go storytelling. -Willamette Week
Gen.Erik sometimes approximates the over-enunciated consonants and anti-dialect delivery of Eminem, but his subject matter is far less... well, violent, postured and, you know, loco. He points out spiritual hypocrisy--both that of others ("Stereotypes") and his own ("Sex, Drugs, Money")--turning around pretty clever phrases and rapping with humor in lieu of preachiness. (Also, it helps that DJ Aero's production is pretty tight.) -Portland Mercury
I had the pleasure of attending a Mic Crenshaw show at the Ohm recently and realized that this guy is serious about his shit. There was a nice crowd of people and the music was on point! This is the sort of thing that's important to support in this town, because it goes a long way in showing bar owners and the media that underground hip-hop is a legitimate force in the city of Portland. -Portland Mercury
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