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The last time I was at rapper Carter Costello’s house in Seattle, I was under cover of the night. I was invited to an art and music show – Seattle photographer and artist Baby Clay Pools, fire dancers, duo of rappers Novi and Costello – by local photographer James Gerde. As we stepped onto Costello’s property, we followed a cement ramp and past a fence spray painted with yellow flowers. . As I went, a row of yellow happy-face balloons taped to the railing greeted me.
Celebrating Baby’s 12th year of service, ‘The 12-Year Void’ is the first event at Costello’s House, a 3,250-square-foot, three-bedroom, two-story residence nestled in a quarter acre of woodland was. Acres of land directly across from Carkeek Park in North Seattle. He bought the house to make it his community hub of music venues, event spaces, and recording studios. In the middle of Broadview’s quiet, plush residential neighborhood, it’s a seemingly strange place to broadcast loud music or display graffiti on the fence, but for Costello, that’s the point.
“I didn’t like money or the idea of it,” he says. “I come from a drug addiction and am pretty cool in a pretty dirty environment.”
His home is filled with quirky, eclectic decor, like a golden retriever-sized stuffed white tiger casually lounging on a brightly colored Keith Haring rug in the middle of his living room. He is currently building a recording studio in the basement, and his house is like a giant interactive museum of him for adults. At the conservatory, he showed me his box of shruti, an Indian harmonium-like instrument. He has been using it for meditation after his friend Jaden died over a year before him.
The night of the inauguration at Costello’s house was like witnessing the birth of a phoenix. But it’s also because an undercurrent of life and light versus death and darkness ran through the night, and Costello dedicated his song “The Gates” to Jaden and Costello talking candidly about their own drug addiction and recovery. Naked corpses hung on the garage walls, from Baby’s bloody clowns to pictures of creepy alleys.
The way Costello acquired this space sounds like the next best Netflix original about rising from the ashes: Canlis’ Dishwasher. He was outside telling new employees where to find non-slip kitchen mats. His estimate is when the car turned into a sidewalk and from 45 mph he sped off at a speed of 60 mph.
Another employee was hit on the left side, causing the car to roll over and land next to the restaurant. Costello was hit on the right side. He flew his 35 feet, hit a tree, rolled down a broken branch, went all the way down a hill, and landed under the underpass of Aurora His Avenue. He wasn’t found until a construction worker signaled Brian Canlis that he was the owner of his Canlis. The woman riding the rideshare, Pamela Richards, died from her injuries. The seat belt broke her neck.
Costello had 14 fractures (4 in the skull, coracoid process, collarbone and multiple ribs). It took him two years to heal his shoulder. He suffered brain damage and is now diagnosed with mild neurocognitive impairment, which is affecting his ability to read and focus on speech. He has lost about half of his hearing in his right ear and also suffers from tinnitus.
“I can hear you [the ringing in my ear] As always, I’m more visible in the recording booth,” he says. “Since it’s easy, we record in an open room with room noise.”
Two weeks after the accident, Costello should have been in Los Angeles playing shows with other recovering artists like Macklemore and Kesha. (Costello’s meth addiction began at age 12 and sobered at age 15.) Instead—incredibly—he performed at his Northwest Folklife Festival at Seattle Center. . He was wheeled onto the stage and performed with a sling on his arm. Call it the willpower of a 20-year-old child. He spent his summers in Seattle, Pop He performed The Residency, a youth hip-hop his boot his camp at the Museum of Culture, played Folklife, and filed lawsuits with rideshare companies.
Two years later, the company settled and Costello ultimately received a payment of $3.5 million. After deducting his taxes and legal fees, he took home about $2.1 million. And now he’s using that money to build homes in community spaces, event venues, and recording studios. He affectionately calls his homegrown in his basement (you can find it as such on Google Maps). It’s partly an ode to the basement of Crybaby Studios, where he made music with the other children in the residency, and partly an ode to Tupac’s poetry book. “A rose out of concrete,” and partly an ode to his experience with addiction.
“It’s like coming out of the dirt. It’s coming out of the ditch. I’m the bottom of the barrel,” he says. “It comes from the trenches of life and blooms like a flower. So my logo is a flower emerging from a flowerpot.”
Costello’s ultimate goal is to finish building the space and hire someone to manage it while traveling. He’s just laying the groundwork for the studio, but he’s already in talks with the residency about doing recording sessions and shows. Now he is organizing parties and events for his friends with the aim of expanding the scale.
“I want to give people this community space to have a great time, experience art in Seattle, and regrow the community,” he says.
Back in “The 12-Year Void,” the cement lamp I followed into Costello’s backyard spit me into what can only be described as an attached rotunda. but for Costello it was a bit more. He and his friends moved them outside and surrounded them with hot dog-style cut pool noodles. Properly welcomed the guest of the house “2 the void”.
Costello’s backyard, just outside the rotunda, led to a U-shaped two-story deck space. To my right, Costello was already on stage (deck), spotlighted against a background of fence spray with the words “12 year void.” To my left was an open garage full of pictures of babies. People with dark make-up peered at me from the frame and beckoned me closer.
I arrived at dusk, but it was pitch black, and as Costello finished his set, two fire dancers in matching flame-patterned leotards and black boots casually took the stage. rice field. They then took out a giant piece of metal that could only be described as a flaming wing to dance to Doja Cat’s “Woman.” When they got off the stage, I went down to the floor with them.
By the time Nobi took the stage, I felt like I was in another world, surrounded by art I had never seen and emotions I had never felt. But by the time Novi left the stage, the cops had been called in twice and Baby was ushering people in. She reluctantly pulled out a coat she had hidden behind a merchandise table.
On the way back, I snapped a quick photo of one of the happy face balloons to remind me of this feeling. The picture got blurry, but it somehow felt very poignant — what I was supposed to shoot tonight was that even if we were laughing on the outside, we were a little It’s blurry and the twisted comfort of waiting… reborn.
To keep up with Costello, his music, and homegrown in the basement, follow him on IG: @Carter Costello.
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