Exclusive: Common On Being ‘Super Proud’ Of His Lawyer Daughter And What (And Who) Keeps His Smile Bright – Essence

If you’ve ever had the chance to go to the dentist and be treated by a talented doctor who looks like you, count yourself lucky. Per research published in 2020 by the American Dental Association, only 3.8 percent of dentists in the United States are Black. Being able to see a dentist who shares your background could help assuage common fears and discomforts that many people carry about getting their teeth checked out, and more than anything, it’s just time for a change.

Rapper Common is helping to make that happen. The Academy Award winner is teaming up with mouthwash brand Listerine, which just launched its second installment of The Whoa Collection, a collaboration with creative agency Compound. This year’s rollout includes new colorful bottle wrap illustrations done by artists Frank Morrison and Hebru Brantley. The limited edition bottles, available at Target, are meant to drive awareness of the effort to bring about greater representation in dentistry. There will also be a documentary done by Set Free Richardson of Compound, shedding light on Listerine’s work to lessen that diversity gap. In addition, the brand is donating $150,000 to the Increasing Diversity in Dentistry Pipeline Program, a nonprofit assisting minority pre-dental students so they can obtain what they need, from help with test prep to scholarships and more, to make their dreams come true.

To help with this effort, Common released a new bespoke track called “The Art of Freshness” that manages to sound like a classic track from the Grammy winner while still sending an important message about getting to see Black faces in important spaces.

During an event at The Compound in Brooklyn on Thursday, Sept. 26, where the track was originally recorded, ESSENCE caught up with Common to learn more about what drove his involvement in the program, the power of representation in his life and in his own family, and what keeps his smile bright — from his dental habits to his form of self-care.

ESSENCE: To start, I must ask, are you blessed to have a Black dentist?

Common: Yes, I’m grateful to have one. I’m very grateful because it’s something about having your own take care of you, especially someone from your community. It’s a certain type of understanding, faith, and confidence you have, and security. That’s one of the issues that we want to target with IDID. I was inspired to be a part of this campaign because it’s there to help create more opportunities for Black dentists. And I think, throughout history, we, as Black people, have felt more trusting going to our own. I still use white physicians in certain ways and other nationalities, but at the end of the day, it’s great to have a Black dentist, and I think we should have more.

Yeah, for sure. You already touched on it, but I was going to ask you on my own: What drew you to support this initiative to help diversify dentistry? Because I know you have your foundation, Free to Dream, and it’s all about education, opportunities, jobs, and wellness, and that’s kind of like an amalgamation of what this whole initiative is about. So, can you delve a little bit more into that?

Well, I mean, wellness has been something that I’ve been wanting to offer to our communities. The more and more I learned about it myself, the more not only did I live it and try to be an example, but I put certain elements in my music. I wrote And Then We Rise: A Guide to Loving and Taking Care of Self that dealt with that, and it’s something that I feel like raising that awareness and people seeing it, not making it corny or just making it a natural way of life is important to uplift in our communities because our wellness is what keeps us alive. It keeps us in a happier place. It allows us to deal with difficult situations.

The wellness of having access to therapy and meditation is like feeling good about yourself. You took some time to take a walk or did a workout, all those work in building our whole selves and oral healthcare is a part of that. So when I was approached about this and knowing that it was targeting Black people for healthier oral healthcare, I thought it was important for me to be a part of that, too, because it’s part of the whole picture. That was one of the things I learned when it came to me developing and growing. It was like, okay, you can’t just be good at eating healthy and then not have your emotional health, not be working on that, or even your physical health, not continuing your spirituality. It takes all the components to get to that full higher self. So I’m definitely happy to be able to include oral healthcare in that.

And how did this effort inspire your track, “The Art of Freshness”? I know what I loved about it is that even though it was created to support the awareness of this work, it still sounds like an organic Common track. It is giving me Common circa Like Water for Chocolate. So how did it inspire you?

For me, sometimes it’s fun getting to create something for a whole other entity. It’s not my album, it’s not my single that I was putting out in alignment with the album. So it’s dope because you are like, okay, how do I approach this? It stretches you. And so I was inspired to do it. And writing around the theme of fresh was dope to me because Set Free, who produced the track, was like, “Yo man, the music is inspired by The Whoa Collection,” the Listerine bottles designed by Hebru Brantley, Chicagoan, and Frank Morrison. So I was like, oh, I could talk about what fresh is and talk about it from these different aspects. Not just one thing. Oral healthcare is one thing, but being fresh is the way you think about yourself. It’s the way you carry yourself. It’s how you handle certain situations. So I wanted to give that. Sometimes, we need those theme songs where you walk around and can say something, and it’s an affirmation.

I love it. And what does representation mean to you? For example, you are one of the very few MCs who are Academy Award winners; a very limited number, maybe like three of y’all altogether. So what does representation mean to you when you think about all the work that you guys are doing to diversify dentistry and just the importance of, like you said earlier, having our people in these important roles and spaces?

Representation is super important. And it was me seeing representation in Muhammad Ali and Maya Angelou, that made me know that I could do something. And it was even seeing my teacher, Mr. Brown, a Black man who was leading me. That was representation for me, having a Black teacher who was teaching me as a young Black man and boy about what it is. So that representation and seeing that affected my vision for myself. And I always say, man, President Barack Obama, not only was he just this beautiful president and did everything he could to make this country and the world better, but just by having representation in the White House changed a lot of young people’s visions for themselves. Shoot, even people of our generation and generations older probably were like, wow, I can accomplish anything. We got a Black president, and hope to have a first Black woman president.

And speaking of representation and examples of that, your daughter is a lawyer. How proud are you when it comes to that effort that she’s made to get herself to this point and to be able to represent people and impact other people’s lives?

I’m extremely proud. I’m super proud of her, that she had that focus and thought for herself early on in grammar school, fifth, sixth grade. She was like, “I want to be a lawyer.” And the fact that she put her mind to it and accomplished that is just a testament to what is possible. And to see her make that effort and go through the ups and downs of it, is showing me her character too and her determination, I’m proud of her, and happy for. She’s finding where she can be very impactful towards things that are greater than her. That’s what I had to do in the music.

In addition to using Listerine and seeing your dentist, what practices do you have to make sure your teeth and your smile are on point all the time?

Well, I think flossing is definitely something that I learned from my dentist, and now I have one of the water picks, too. That thing is helpful. But just flossing has been one of the keys to it, as well as making sure I brush consistently. And I think one of the important keys to a smile is your heart. Like who you are inside. It shows up in your smile, in your eyes, in your laugh, and in those things. So that’s some of the things that I do most.

Last question: In addition to that, since we’ve talked about wellness, what are some practices and things in your life that keep a smile on your face?

It’s not in the wellness category, but I guess it’s wellness because it’s emotional health. I love going to the movies and eating popcorn. I love popcorn.

The kernels kill me!

The kernels kill me, but it’s worth it for me. That’s why I’ve got the water flosser. So that’s one of the things I enjoy. I love watching basketball or playing basketball. I love hearing great music. And I also love just going to dinner with loved ones. Those are some of my favorite things to do.