Since I rap, it’s easy for people to call me a “hater” being that I’m not seen on MTV or BET everyday jiggling my behind, or heard on the radio talking about how good my “female anatomy” is. Since I was born in 1982, it’s easy for the younger generations to say that the golden era of the 90’s was nothing more than the asphalt on the road, and today’s Hip-Hop is the Rolls-Royce Phantom that’s driving on top of it. Since I am more than just a Hip-Hop head, but a lover of all things muse-ic, sometimes I think myself too judgmental when my soaring creative expectations aren’t met. Perhaps it’s a combination of the three, but in the spirit of honesty I decided to think a bit more critically about my likes and dislikes and to answer that familiar burning question… why?
There is so much talent out there. I can see it clearly, even in artists I don’t particularly like. There are clever wordsmiths, masters of creative visuals, marketing geniuses, shrewd, savvy business men and women, trendsetters, envelope pushers, and so on. I see them everywhere. The question then becomes, if I can clearly see their talent why don’t I connect with their music? At first it was kind of mind-boggling and I almost resigned myself to the hater position and made this a very short blog. Then I remembered one crucial element of songwriting that is sorely lacking even amongst the most talented artists of today—the concept song. For those not familiar with the term, its basically a song where everything centers around and reflects one central subject or concept.
The concepts currently employed by the vast majority of mainstream Hip-Hop have become so predictable that half the time when I’m listening to the radio I can guess what rhyme will follow what word. It’s gotten to the point where the basic elements of a Hip-Hop song are no longer the blank, white-walled rooms where storytellers like Nas, Slick Rick, and Scarface once painted pictures of inner city life like bold, expressive graffiti. Mainstream Hip-Hop subject matter is now a restrictive, confining space where the walls are already covered with acceptable clichés and corny, trite catch phrases. That in and of itself is enough to turn my stomach, but again the question is why?
In a world this vast, this beautiful, this full of wonder and laughter and cruelty and injustice, why are we always talking about the same things? Let me exemplify my point with a challenge, which I am literally thinking up as I type. I can name 10 words/topics right now where at least one of them is used in 4 out of 5 songs that play on Power 106 here in L.A. (You can insert your city’s popular Hip-Hop station here.)
1. Money
2. Cars
3. Fame
4. Sex (Body parts such as ass, objectification of women, talk of sexual prowess or ”freakiness” etc.)
5. The Club
6. Drinking or Smoking
7. Expensive Fashions (clothes, diamonds, gold, cars etc.)
8. A New Dance Move (twerking etc.)
9. Superiority (Being a boss, being better than every other rapper or the best rapper alive, being more attractive than every other chick or having the most attractive chick, etc.)
10. Gangster Mentality (violence, weapons, dominance, intimidation, gang affiliations, crime etc.)
That was way too easy. I probably should have gone for 15 or 20, but you get my point. One thing I want to make clear, I respect the right of any artist to talk about whatever they feel compelled to talk about. I don’t really care if people rap about the subjects I listed. What I do care about is all the things that aren’t being said. As a mother to a young son, I live in constant fear about the day he starts school and starts to learn from his peers because young people today are completely immersed in this “10 word Hip-Hop” culture. They are bombarded with sounds and imagery and ideas day in and day out at levels for which there is no precedent. This is a first for mankind; with the advent of the internet and social media we are more connected to the things we love than ever. That can be great or terrible, depending on what you love.
If you love music from an artistic perspective—meaning a perspective where music reflects the society we live in accurately and sometimes acts as its conscience—there might be one song on the radio or TV that will satiate you for 3 or 4 minutes out of your 24 hour day. The other 23 hours and 56 minutes, you’ll either be drunk, high, and twerking in the club waiting on Mr. Wrong to come smack your behind and say “You the baddest bitch I ever seen”, or ready to tear the place down, right after you shoot the bitch-ass-nigga who stepped on your kicks and get the hoe with the biggest booty to go home with you for a one night stand. (Without tricking any of that money you earned selling crack to your neighbors, of course. I mean it is YOUR birthday. She should be paying YOU to screw her once and never call again.)
So what is there for the rest of us, who don’t subscribe to the “10 word Hip-Hop” paradigm? Industry people seem to always say that there’s no market for any other type of Hip-Hop or urban music. Well, just about everyone on my Facebook friends list would probably disagree with that. I hear people asking for something different every day, but have yet to see anyone in the industry with the courage to give it to them. Rappers often say what they do is simply “entertainment” and not to be taken seriously. As an adult, I understand that. I have no problem with adult subject matter in music. I do, however, have a big problem with adult music being marketed to CHILDREN. (See 2 Chains & Kanye’s video for Birthday Song, where in one scene, (barely) teen-aged kids are sitting in front of a school watching a woman attempt to put her legs behind her head.) The word “entertainment” does not absolve the creator of said entertainments of all moral, ethical, and social responsibility. I also have a big problem with kids being told that their value lies in how much wealth they can amass, or young women being told that if they “ain’t got no ass they ain’t got shit”, or young men being told the kind of woman that is most desirable is called a “bad bitch”.
With all that said, I am deeply troubled by what is not being said far more than I am by what is. The elimination of the middle class, police brutality, the NSA spying on us, the dumbing down of America, the abuses of power by corporations, in Government, and on Wall Street, racial profiling, the slaughter of young black males, mass incarceration and the prison industrial complex, war profiteers, the bloated defense budget, education budget shortfalls, the lack of respect for women, the stereotyping of Black people, the endless cycles of poverty plaguing us, the positive contributions to society our people make every single day—none of these things are being talked about at a level that does them justice. It’s almost like everything that is important in the world at large is invisible in the Hip-Hop world which makes for a viewpoint afflicted by what I can only liken to a cancer, spreading through our communities malignant and unchecked.
I don’t want to tip the scales too far in either direction as that would not be a realistic portrayal of our lives either. All I want is options that are more reflective of our multidimensional beauty than the narrow scope of vision induced by current offerings. I want BALANCE. If that makes me a hater, then so be it. I really do hate it that so many people with so much talent and visibility can’t see the benefit of spreading love and integrity over lust, greed, and envy.
