By Peter Bailey
Seven years removed from the musical landscape, a dicey terrain where one hit wonders fade beyond the horizon, would summon the end for most artists.
But true legend is often written in the chords that echo outside the studio and into the halls civic duty.
"At the end of the day if all I stood for was the music there would be no conversation," explains Wyclef Jean. "The only thing people gon' remember from you is were you able to push the race forward."
Sentiments like these have made the always amiable Fugees frontman a hero in Haiti and global ambassodor for the poverty-stricken Caribbean nation.
Now, after a failed run for presidency and an assassination attempt, Wyclef is set on his musical emergence with the forthcoming mixtape "April Showers."
I caught up with him on set at the video shoot for his new single "Midlife Crisis", an obvious poke at the 43-year old's comeback.
"It started when I was putting up my twitpic on my birthday. It started with my sister; she said, "You're having a midlife crisis,'" joked Wyclef. "Shout out to Dave Chappelle...he said he was going through a midlife crisis."
But he admits the landscape has changed since he, Pras and Lauryn Hill won us over while killing us softly.
"A lot of times when legends come back, they don't embrace what the youth is doing," says Wyclef.
And spoken like a true preacher's son -- a moniker we both share -- he elaborated on his civic duty to awaken hip hop's soul.
"The elevation of music is going to come from us who are little bit older, to be able to combine with some of the youth and merge it together and get some of that consciousness back into what they're saying."
But if the message doesn't resonate in the music, fans may look forward to his political memoir, "They Tried To J. Edgar Hoover Me."
Says Wyclef: "If I'm gonna fear anything, it's not the music. That's the easy part, bruh."
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