They’re talkin’ about my ex-girl again. This time, though, I’m just kinda observing the fray. I’m not connected enough to really care any more. She’s just not what she used to be. Really, I hardly recognize her. The name is the same, and if I look reeeeallly deep, I can see the same traits that drew me to her in the first place, but that’s only if I look very carefully. On first glance, she barely resembles herself. She been eatin’ a little too good. She’s grossly bloated in all the wrong spots; where I used to find her irresistable, now, I can hardly stand to look at her.
Obviously, I’m talkin’ about hip-hop, which may or may not be dead. I don’t know. It hasn’t really been on my radar in quite some time. I’m looking at the comments on a post about hip-hop at Booker and I’m thinking, “I used to argue passionately like that.” Not any more, though. Hip-hop is still my ex, and when I loved her I loved her hard, but those days are over. I’m pretty sure there’s not gonna be another Black Star to come and enthrall me again. I’m just past that stage.
What’s funny, and possibly a little hypocritical, is that the stuff I liked back in the day that had negative content, I still like. I still listen to Talk Like Sex by Kool G Rap. Well, not so frequently, but I still appreciate the fact that I used to swear by that song when I was in high school. Reign Of The Tec by the Beatnuts, however, will still get bumped faithfully. Young Joc/Dro/whatever, on the other hand, gets no run. I’m not even interested to hear it. And chances are, that no matter what kind of madness they’re spitting, it’s nowhere close to being as bad as Talk Like Sex or Reign of the Tec.
Either way, I’m not at that stage any more. I mean, technically speaking, I have enough records to defend hip-hop against any charge vis-a-vis its “societally damaging” characteristics. I could trot out some Johnny Cash records and all that, but I just don’t have the interest. At some point, the fact that you love someone doesn’t trump the fact that they’re doing wrong. So to the people who adamantly defend hip-hop against, I say I remember when I was like you. I remember when I thought that the relationshp could be salvaged. I remember hopeful trips to the record store and constant refrains of “if only,” but I’m done. Actually, I’ve been done. Not completely-completely, but mostly. If I’m listening to hip-hop, it’s something old school or something new by an old-school artist.
We don’t talk much any more, but every once in a while, I holler back just to keep in touch. We’re headed in different directions, though, and I’m comfortable with that. It was what it was when it was.
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That’s some hot back n forthin goin on over there. My knees be too creaky to get up and join that dance (nevermind that I don’t have the moves anyway), but the the thing that concerns me here is the interlude.
Which is to say (it seems to me) there’s always been a lil overlap as one form of music recedes and a new one rises. Jazz to rhythm and blues to funk to rap/hip-hop to…?
I mean either it’s not really dead, it’s just a lull before a storm of “new wave” creativity hits (are Lupe Fiasco and K-OS the “future?”) or we might be going through the throes of Black music in general declining in mainstream influence.
If so, come what may, it’s been a good long run.
I too have tired of defending a form of music I can no longer relate to or support.
Now the battle for me has turned to explaining the difference between hip hop culture from rap/gangsta/thug culture as it is one and the same in the mainsteam’s minds.
While they share the same roots they have become the good vs. evil and all people know or care to know about is the bad side.
Overall it’s a good thing that “real” hip hop returned to the underground,however it leaves those without the motivation to search for it,only seeing the negative images that are thrown at them on hourly rotation.
I am also bothered that some of the people that used to be part of the good side of hip hop,that have not spoken out more and have let their desire to stay “in” and current,influence their material.
I will be taking DJ Jazzy Jeff to task about this when I see him tonight.
While I don’t expect or want “Parents Just Don’t Understand” fare these days,I want to know what happened to great party jams that didn’t need to be soaked in negative images and lyrics.
I never had a problem with lyrics that relayed the ills of society,just as long as they were protesting them not glorifying,glamorizing and celebrating the worst in our world.
It is like the recruitment ads for the military,the same money being dangled for education(if you live and kill others without question) is being dangled in videos(if you live and kill others without question).The down side in both is not accuratly potrayed on the screen and by the time you find out,it is too late
My last guilty pleasure was Geto Boys and was also when I started to move away from the world of rap.When that style became the norm I woke up to the formula and the fact that it was not the authentic representation that it was being marketed as.
That and GTA:SA on PS2,but at least I know that is a game.