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Jimi Hendrix and black culture.

#141
JAUQO III-X said:
I don't think those recording were revolutionary at all, they just played of what was familiar. Most who listened to those recordings were pulled in by the underlying music(the sampled p-funk)that most had already heard. And exactly how many of these G-Funk CD's were recorded(I would like to say a handful)?

The revolution must have went over my head :)
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Big plus 1. Anyone that doesn't know what Jauqo is talking about, go and listen to Atomic Dog by P-Funk and then listen to Snoop Doggy Dog. Exact same song except the later has some dude named Snoop rapping over the top of it. It's the equivalent of tagging a Picasso with a Sharpie. I don't have a problem with sampling. Hell, I play dub reggae with a live mixer. We sample all the time. But there's a kind of a fine line between paying homage with a respectful nod, and just flat out ripping something off. Still, I like Snoop. I'm a big fan of Gin and Juice and in fact, I play it with my band, but I wouldn't call Snoop or Dr. Dre original, simply because of how little they broke up their samples. Doesn't mean it's not fun to listen to. I have everything Snoops ever done as well as Dr. Dre. All I'm saying is at least Cypress Hill sampled Black Sabbath. Cypress Hill revitalized my love of Black Sabbath funny enough simply with that little sample they pulled off.
 
#142
Yeah I guess I was wrong on that point. Most of the popular songs off of the Chronic and Doggystyle were pretty much clones of dr. funkenstein's best songs like atomic dog and mothership connection. I guess i just saw it as different because no one had been sampling George Clinton that heavily until Dre came along, and then after that practically every west coast rap act was sampling from p-funk. I'm not saying he was original in his sources (Prince Paul of De La Soul and Rza of Wu Tang Clan were much more original producers) but he did get the ball rolling.

All i was saying was that hip hop is usually cast aside as a lower form of music, when actually some of the more creative artists of the past 20 years have been hip hop artists. Also that while there is use of instruments in modern black music, like gospel, neo-soul, and some rap, they aren't represented as much in the media that is shown to most black kids and so Hendrix's style of music might not be accepted as quickly.
 
#143
ArchDuke said:
Yeah I guess I was wrong on that point. Most of the popular songs off of the Chronic and Doggystyle were pretty much clones of dr. funkenstein's best songs like atomic dog and mothership connection. I guess i just saw it as different because no one had been sampling George Clinton that heavily until Dre came along, and then after that practically every west coast rap act was sampling from p-funk. I'm not saying he was original in his sources (Prince Paul of De La Soul and Rza of Wu Tang Clan were much more original producers) but he did get the ball rolling.

All i was saying was that hip hop is usually cast aside as a lower form of music, when actually some of the more creative artists of the past 20 years have been hip hop artists. Also that while there is use of instruments in modern black music, like gospel, neo-soul, and some rap, they aren't represented as much in the media that is shown to most black kids and so Hendrix's style of music might not be accepted as quickly.
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Like all genres of music, hip hop is legit in the fringe.
 
#144
ArchDuke said:
All i was saying was that hip hop is usually cast aside as a lower form of music, when actually some of the more creative artists of the past 20 years have been hip hop artists.
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Like who?

Hip Hop sells, mainly because it's marketed with the force of a storm, if other genre's where marketed in a similar fashion there's a strong possibility that things would be a little more fruitful in the world of music business.

Lets not forget youth and looks plays a major key as well and how naive the inexperienced is and long they are willing to be :)
 
#145
JAUQO III-X said:
Like who?
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I'd put DJ Shadow, New Kingdom, Dalek and Andre3000 (among others) in that category.

Hip hop shares a lot of parallels with California and its movie industry. It's manifest destiny in musical form, an ahistorical retelling of American music with liberties (some excusable, some not) taken for the sake of repackaging and re-marketing. In that context it can be hard to differentiate what is creative and what is simply creatively recycled.

JAUQO III-X said:
Hip Hop sells, mainly because it's marketed with the force of a storm, if other genre's where marketed in a similar fashion there's a strong possibility that things would be a little more fruitful in the world of music business.
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You're mistaking cause for effect. The music industry doesn't have an agenda in terms of dictating what is popular, only a drive to make money. What happened after the success of Nirvana, Pearl Jam, Soundgarden and Alice In Chains? Every halfway decent "grunge" band* was given a record deal in hopes of capitalizing on a trend. Same with "Acoustic Jam Rock" following the success of Dave Matthews Band among others. Its the reason John Mayer has a career. Norah Jones' surprise success opened doors for a ton of women in the retro jazz vocalist mold.

In short, the record industry is about mining trends for all their worth. They only market what they already know will sell.

JAUQO III-X said:
Lets not forget youth and looks plays a major key as well and how naive the inexperienced is and long they are willing to be :)
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To bring this thread somewhat back to its roots as a sociological exercise, the biggest problem I have with mainstream rap is how it is marketed to the youth of America. Or more precisely, how it is marketed differently to black youth and white youth. Mainstream rap continues to thrive on racial inequality. Not to overgeneralize, but in large part it appeals to white kids who crave black style and to black kids who long for white wealth. That, to me at least, is disconcerting.

*has there ever been a more useless musical catchall term as "grunge"? I guess perhaps "emo".
 
#148
JAUQO III-X said:
You would like to believe that wouldn't you?

Who told you that lie?

They can make the sound of Dolphins crying, all the rage if they wanted to.
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Sweet! Somebody tell Sony Records about Burnt Infant!

I watched a documentary last night callled "Afro-Punk: The Rock and Roll ****** Experience". It was documenting the lives of several black men and women who were involved in the punk, hardcore, and metal scenes. It provided some interesting insights to what blacks in this country have to deal with if they step outside of their cultural norms.

Many of those interviewed said that they were ostracized from the black community because they didn't listen to "black music" and that they dressed like white people. They felt to be punk and black was to be doubly punk - they were an outcast twice over. The doc made it seem that the black community had a pretty strong hold on what was acceptable music to listen to and what was not - if black people listened to rock and roll, they were considered less black.

Sadly, it wasn't a very well put together documentary - rather weak editing and filming. But it was interesting to watch and see how the other side of the color line felt about it.
 
#149
JAUQO III-X said:
You would like to believe that wouldn't you?

Who told you that lie?

They can make the sound of Dolphins crying, all the rage if they wanted to.
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Jauqo I like you, but you're off the deep end on this one. If you're upset with what is marketed most heavily amongst popular music then you need to turn your ire to the consuming public.

The marketing of today's music may often be putting lipstick on a pig in my opinion, but it isn't the Emperor's new clothes. Freewill dictates that consumers still drive the market in most industries, especially the music industry.

Corporations beholden to their shareholders can't play titan makers simply to exert control over culture. If you want proof, look at file sharing sites, MySpace etc where users have access to a seemingly limitless array of music and yet the traffic for top 40 music still dominates in roughly the same proportion as physical media. And those same forces, which are encroaching on market share for the majors, are making record labels MORE conservative with their marketing. They really only can spend money on what they consider sure things.

Now, if you're talking about the industry's ability to take a pretty (if talent deficient) girl and import all the needed ingredients (song writers, producers choreographers etc) and sell that to the public, then sure that goes on as it always has in music. But it's still the public that stands as the final arbiter of its sales numbers.

The truth is that the public isn't this naive mass that has had the wool pulled over its eyes by marketing and would leap to "great" music if only they could hear it. The truth is that the vast majority just don't care. For those of us for whom music is one of our greatest passions, that is a difficult pill to swallow, but it's true.
 
#153
Benjamin Strange said:
I have thought that perhaps it's because Jimi played "white" music... but then I thought of how much Eminem has been accepted into "black" music.
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This is basically what i think it is. As for me, I'm black, i live in a 94% black community, and most of the people i know are - guess what? - black. And normally when people find out my musical taste (fusion jazz, metal, and various other genres that are not seen as "black") the response is generally "Man, why you listen to that white sh*t." And normally I end up answering "I dunno." because I don't really know. I just like it.

I think the reason behind the great increase in popularity of rap, which caused black disintrest in rock, which led to black people forgetting icons like Jimi is that when hip-hop first came out and began picking up speed, we saw it as something that was genuinely ours. Of course, many, many musical styles were originated by black people before then but hip-hop was the only one that gained much regonition as a creation of black people thanks to racism and all. After after that initial spark it was just "gravity" - more and more people began to like it becasue more and more people liked it.

Jimi was forgotten and replaced with people who traded their guitars for mics and riffing for freestyling. Early hip-hop (NWA, Public Enemy, The Fantastic 5) was cool but it has since evolved into rap (which i consider different), which is what all the parents are pissed about and, imo, for good reason, but that's another discussion.

What's funny though is that rock is becoming popular among black people now (and so is skateboarding thanks to Lupe Fiasco, but again, a discussion for another time). It started out with people wearing random band paraphenalia (not knowing anything about the artist) and i guess someone decided to actually listen to one of these bands and liked it. More people actually recognize Jimi now, lol. gotta love trends.
 
#160
JAUQO III-X said:
Or Ike Turner or any other black blues rooted artist.
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Ike Turner is not a legend on par with Hendrix. Hendrix is an icon. Perhaps if tons of white kids were wearing Ike Turner shirts I would have asked why black kids weren't wearing them.

My original question was asked not because I think that black people should be into Hendrix, but because Hendrix is conspicuous in his apparent absence in black culture.

I for one am happy that music transcends color, and that styles have been crossing color lines lately in ways that it hasn't before.
 

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