LISTEN: Hip Hop Band Releases 'Lake Elsinore' Track

Hip hop music has embraced Lake Elsinore -- or maybe the city embraced (influenced) it first.

Either way, Rok T, lyricist for the hip-hop music group Rebel Side Seven, has delivered an ode to his hometown called “Lake Elsinore” that takes listeners on a summertime journey through the city that dreams extreme.

(Click here to listen to the “Lake Elsinore” track.)

“Great song. Refreshing to hear good music without it being laced with nonsense lyrics,” one listener writes about the “Lake Elsinore” track.

According to the Rebel Side Seven Facebook page, the band is a collaborative effort between Keith Davis and Tom Collins (otherwise known as Rok T), who were “united in the late 1980s by a common love of rap music and a respect for one another's gifts.”

“The duo set out to produce a brand of music that paid homage to the hip hop purists who strived to... marry a hard driving funk with a deft rhythmic poetic intellectuality. The result was Rebel Side Seven. The first incarnation of this vision included well-received and celebrated tracks that generated local buzz and brought demand for live performances in Los Angeles and San Diego,” according to the Facebook page.

Although the group didn’t sign a big music deal, and eventually the performers had to pursue other careers, the pair came together again in 2010, energized by the power of the Internet for independent musicians.

“RS7 seeks to enlighten a new generation of listeners while also reaching out to re-connect with their fans of old,” according to the Facebook page. “Their sole motivation: a love of music and the creative process.”