Mynt is the latest downtown venue to welcome hip-hop

Mynt (135 Calhoun St.) debuts live hip-hop night on Wed. Jan. 30. Four local rappers — Clayton James, Louii Jazz, OG Riv, and rgn — will perform multiple sets with beats from DJ Downtown Rich starting at 9 p.m.

After months of performing house shows with Semkari, James is grateful to have a downtown club fulfill their efforts to break onto Calhoun Street. Hopefully this means expansion for the scene.

“Why doesn’t Charleston have a super defined rap scene?” asked James, considering Charleston is too far from Atlanta to get the fringe benefits of an established network.

“We are out here on this musical island,” he says. “There are so many talented rappers and artists down here doing the independent thing and the house show scene, which is a hard thing to do in this city anyway.” James is referring to the single family homes-turned concert venues that guarantee a limited scope, no matter how much fun they end up being.

Mynt is the latest in several downtown venues to offer a space for hip-hop in a city with a history of shunning the most lucrative and popular genre in the country.

“It’s nice to have places like Mynt, Purple Buffalo, and the Royal American letting young artists use their spaces,” says James.

Let’s see Charleston hip-hop continue to get liberated from the living room. [location-1]