My Lament for Hip Hop

[TragicallyInept]

I wrote this last year, and still feel the same, just more things happening to reinforce this thought. Wondering what people thought.

My lament for Hip Hop

by Gary Anderson

Do you ever stop to think about hip hop? I mean, really? Not just about what artist you like the best, which rapper just destroyed another one on the latest mixtape, or which MC ranks the highest of all time. I mean think about how far hip hop has come. Used to be, hip hop music was just something that few people outside the urban areas knew anything about. It was kinda like "the best kept secret" type of deal. You know how you hear a song, and it hasn't lit a fire under the world yet? You hear it and are just blown away. You're like, "this is mine. Hardly anyone knows about this sh*t here."

It's cool to have something that is yours. You wanna share it with the world, but you know that once you do, it's out of your hands and you can't control it. It's no longer yours. So then the word of mouth spreads. The song begins airing on the local radio station. Then it spreads to a couple cities outside your town, then to the next state. Next thing you know, heads on both coasts are bouncing to YOUR song. It's in heavy rotation on Hot 97 and the video is out there being overexposed by MTV & BET. Now it's just not the same.

Rap music used to be pretty tame stuff in terms of lyrical content. I mean, yeah there were some pretty deep messages on some, but for the most part it was about partying and having a good time. RUN DMC talking about their Adidas, and LL lamenting about how he would die without his radio. Then rap started getting harder and harder. It was almost like once a line had been crossed, you had to continue outdoing the last guy or you weren't viable.

Reminds me of how the rating "XXX" came to be. See, when Midnight Cowboy and The Clockwork Orange came out they were initially viewed as too hardcore to be a R rating. These movies shocked the conservative sensibilities of the people, so they were given an "X" rating by the MPAA. Then when people started to make adult movies and release them, the first people out the gate slapped a "XXX" rating on it, to show that their movie was more hardcore. Something heretofore never seen. So they basically jumped the double X and advertised as XXX. See, no one could come out as XX now, because let's be honest. If you're in the mood for some porn, you're gonna want the full nine, not a half-ass version, no pun intended. So from that day on they were all listed as XXX.

Same with hip hop. This situation was basically summed up perfectly in Common's track "I Used To Love H.E.R.". Hip Hop has gotten to the point where the fun is gone. How many rap songs are out there now about strictly having fun. I mean not a single reference to kicking someone's ass if they step to you, or pulling out your nine and showing them who's the man. None about smacking a hoe if she don't act right.

And the sad thing is that we don't seem to care. Will Smith is a rapper who doesn't curse (aside from a few minor ones), doesn't put in sexual material (beyond a few minor things), and is someone who can put out music you don't have to worry about whether your kids are gonna be listening to it. So what is the result? In chat rooms and message boards he's slammed for being "wack" or "soft".

When Kid & Play came out they were pretty popular. A handful of movies and albums followed and then they just seemed to fade away. Now as popular as they were, how do you think they would be received now? If they came out tomorrow with the exact same routine, style, etc, they would be laughed out of the damn scene. People would probably call them a couple of "fags".

And I'm not saying that everything has to be light and fun. We need

diversiveness in the music, to branch out to all people, to experiment

and evolve.

But what is the obsession with being the hardest rapper alive. When did we make the jump from something that we could be proud of, that we could sit and say, "hey, this is cool...not many people know about it, and that's cool", to where we are now. Yeah, hip hop has grown beyond our wildest dreams. It's the one of the highest selling genre of music out there, and yet a vast majority of it is negative. As Chris Rock said, "I love rap music, but it's hard to defend this sh*t."

Not to get all spiritual on you but it's as the Bible says, "what does it profit a man to gain the world but lose his soul?"

Hip hop has lost it's soul folks, and I don't know what it's gonna take to get it back. I personally believe, and this is just my opinion, but I don't think it can be gotten back. I think it's too far gone. It's like the porn example I gave you. No one is gonna go back to double X when the XXX line has been drawn.

And it's our fault. We buy the ****, we support the ****, and we do it all in the guise of supporting our own. I say our, even though I'm a white guy. I don't look at hip hop as having any color lines anymore. The top rapper, by a lot of people's estimation, is a white guy. I've grown up with hip hop, and I love hip hop. Hard to defend it sometimes, but I love it.

And it's not just the music. Rappers are getting involved with the porn industry, and getting into gun fights, and then you have DMX's crazy ass driving high and trying to pass himself off as a cop. Chingy getting groped by a transexual, and a member of his group groping said transexual at some porn award show. And this is the **** that gets promoted.

The Fresh Princes and the Kid & Plays of the hip hop world aren't getting promoted. Radio stations are more interested in what is gonna sell, and what sells? Murder. Racist Lyrics. Drugs. Sex. Guns.

And I'm not really that different. My favorite rapper right now is Jadakiss, even though I've nearly gotten to the point where I'm through with almost all rap music. Aside from groups like The Roots, and artists like Mos Def, Talib Kweli, Dead Prez, Brand Nubian and some others, I don't see the point. I'd much rather sit back and groove to some Amel Larrieux, Jill Scott, Erykah Badu, Raphael Saadiq and artists like that.

Put in some Jamiroquai and just close my eyes and think of the possibilities. And the thought that if we could get into a time machine and go back in time to the era before the gangsta rap and before the 2 Live Crews and before all of that hardcore gun sh*t. Before all the hardcore beefing that eventually led to the murders of two of Hip Hop's Kings, if we could go back to the time when hip hop was still just something that was a little known thing that we had in the neighborhoods. Back to when we had our own little "Best Kept Secret". I wonder if we could do that...how many would?

Would you?

[bigted]

Hip-hop is not defined by what's on the charts by those who truely are fans of it, real hip-hop heads will check for the quality artists even if they don't get played on the radio all the time, and if you gotta always just go by what gets played on MTV then I think that you ain't really a fan of hip-hop and just a casual listener, those who love hip-hop will learn to think beyond what MTV feeds us and go for a different meal, hip-hop can't lose it's soul to people like me that respect the history of the game and the artists with diverse styles, I ignore the ignorance but I think that a lot of these kids who are exposed to it will come around like I said in another thread when they get older and discover the heart of hip-hop unless they're just gonna remain casual listeners, hip-hop is not for sale, it's true expression that'll never die as long as there's artists that have thoughts to say to those who wanna listen

Edited April 19, 2006 by bigted

[TragicallyInept]

yeah...you're right about that.

I was talking via email with Adisa Banjoko (www.lyricalswords.com) and I mentioned that a friend said that she felt that 99 percent of rap out there is negative. He replied that it's not that 99 percent is negative it's that 99 percent of what is PROMOTED and ADVERTISED is negative.

And that's an excellent point.

[bigted]

I think if more would search for quality hip-hop instead of complaining what the radio plays then in fact I think the radio'd balance things out more 'cause the quality artists would be selling more, btw welcome to the board

[TragicallyInept]

thank you.

Yeah, I think the bad thing is that it's not ALL the radio's fault...the masses seem to crave the mindless music, you know? Gotta get more consciousness in there...somehow.

[Hero1]

Well pretty much spot on there.. Good music is out there .. if you look. and the big question is ..do we blame the radio and media for only puttin out that crap? or the dumbed down masses for eatin up every last drop? Imagine if 5 million kids bought dead prez instead of 50 cent.. if it was 15 years ago that may have happenned.. Weird how things can change so much... At the moment I'm happy to check for my fav artists who most kids never even heard of..and ignore all the crap.. Hopefully theres more like us who will do the same

[Turntable]

Hip-hop is not defined by what's on the charts by those who truely are fans of it, real hip-hop heads will check for the quality artists even if they don't get played on the radio all the time, and if you gotta always just go by what gets played on MTV then I think that you ain't really a fan of hip-hop and just a casual listener, those who love hip-hop will learn to think beyond what MTV feeds us and go for a different meal, hip-hop can't lose it's soul to people like me that respect the history of the game and the artists with diverse styles, I ignore the ignorance but I think that a lot of these kids who are exposed to it will come around like I said in another thread when they get older and discover the heart of hip-hop unless they're just gonna remain casual listeners, hip-hop is not for sale, it's true expression that'll never die as long as there's artists that have thoughts to say to those who wanna listen

:word:

[bigted]

Well if there's that many real hip-hop heads out there, I think they should pay less attention to MTV and the radio and if their ratings go down then maybe you'll see a change happen, btw there should be less posts here about how 50 Cent is wack and more posts about how dope Public Enemy's new album is, giving attention to those who have a lot of attention already is not a smart thing to do, that's why I like posting on this board in the first place but lately it seems like there's been too much attention/complaining about who sucks than we think who's dope and I've been having less desire to post here 'cause of that negative energy, talk about what you're feeling, maybe I might discover something new, that's what I originally liked when I first came to this board...

Edited April 19, 2006 by bigted

[Hero1]

look out..ive picked up abt 3 classic albums lately .. dead prez lets get free masta ace disposable art and the new dilated peoples..reviews coming soon

[Hymn Strings]

Hell yeah! I was listening to that "Disposable Arts" today. I don't know if you can call Dilated Peoples latest a classic, but I guess you'll decide that.

[bigted]

I think people are starting to get bored with commercial rap 'cause no commercial rap album released this year has been certified platinum yet and we're 3 3/4 months into 2006 already, I was looking at the Billboard charts yesterday in one of the hip-hop forums and I see that 2 country albums were certified gold in the first week so looks like rap might be overtaken as the most popular genre, people starting to put interests into other music instead it seems, lol,maybe if that pace could keep up for the rest of the year, maybe BET, MTV, and radio'll change their program, real hip-hop fans are finally starting to ignore it looks like

Edited April 20, 2006 by bigted