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What Is Your View On Rap/Hip-Hop?

#181
Gaolee said:
I suspect that correlation would be pretty weak, relative to correlations of other kinds. I would expect age and geographic background to be a bit more of a correlation, but that's probably pretty weak, too. I'm sure there are old, white Republicans in Montana who crank rap music whenever they can and young, black, Democrats in New York who can't stand rap and would rather listen to Beethoven string quartets. I'm stretching the point a little, but I seriously doubt there would be much of an ideological bias shown by rap listeners overall. Some specific bands and artists, sure, just like Ted Nugent fans are probably not representative of all people who listen to 1970s hard rockers.
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well, you just linked being old, being white, being a republican, and [supposedly] not liking rap and being young, being black, being a democrat, and [supposedly] liking rap so that's something right there. :)

it's more of a correlation to racial makeup, which has a high correlation to wealth. it would be an interesting study, although i'm sure it's been done before. i should go check JSTOR right now lol
 
#183
Deoindra throws us some great topics!

So, yeah, I'm OG (that does mean "Old Guy," right?), but I love me some classic hip-hop too. Back when everything I had was on cassette, I had a bunch of BDP, Public Enemy, De La Soul... Also had a lot of Rai, which was an Algerian rap/Arab-music hybrid (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Raï), a lot of the stuff coming out in the 80's had that same feel as early hip-hop. And back then, Queen Latifah was a rapper, not a talk-show host! And, and, a Salt wi' a deadly Pepper!

Like everything which succeeds, rap/hip-hop quickly became a commodity with its own target demographics and marketing and all the rest. Which usually leads, alas, to various forms of crap. Same thing happened with rock 'n roll, doo-wop, punk, you-name-it, that's just how America works. Since hip-hop, like every other extant American music, originates with black people, the co-opting and commercializing process exudes certain familiar odors- like when Pat Boone did Little Richard covers, say- and today, I'd suspect, the "average" rap/hip-hop consumer is probably a suburban white person, and what s/he consumes is a latter-day minstrel-show version of The Black Experience, ie, lotsa pimps and ho's, drugs, fightin' 'n killin' 'n bling.

Then again, most of the black high-school kids riding the bus I take to work and back seem to be listening to that stuff too (funny how the white kids aren't on the bus?), so what do I know? Well, I know that kids like I was listened to tons of Led Zeppelin and other stuff chock-full of Sex and Drugs and Revolution, and most of us grew up to be more-or-less Normal Americans (sigh). Then again, again, most of us were white and weren't gonna get shot for the sake of some cop's bad mood and stereotypes. Here in Madison, WI, clubs have shied away from hip-hop shows after various incidents of violence, though a few are getting back to it now. Well, OK, there was violence; but you'll find plenty of violence any night at bar-time, perpetrated by frat-boys and such- but that kind of violence, for some strange reason, isn't considered a "problem," and the kinds of music those kinds of kids listen to isn't stigmatized. Even when it's (yup!) hip-hop! Let's see, black kids start a fight at a hip-hop show, it's a crisis; frat boys start a fight at a sports bar, hey, "boys will be boys..."

Myself, I don't really go to any kind of shows much anymore (lacking time, money, and so forth), but I know there's also "underground" and "conscious" hip-hop going on, though not at 50-Cent levels of commercial exposure. And I bet I'd still like a lot of that, if I knew what to look/listen for... Suggestions welcome! I have heard The Roots, and their version of Dylan's "Masters of War" is massive. I'll add that the person in the sorta-half-my-age category with the broadest musical taste is a brother I worked with here some years back, he grew up in Chicago, in high school when "the storm" hit (crack), used to do DJ battles, etc.; also knew all the Jazz and Blues stuff deeply. So I've never bought the stereotypes about "ignorance" which some folks seem to associate with hip-hop, sound un-heard.

In light of Pete Townshend's remarks noted by a poster way back there, I appreciate the effort- conscious or no- of hip-hop to be a style that either repels or defeats the white folks and/or the old folks. (Don't worry, there is absolutely no danger whatsoever of me rapping.) As for the technology used to make the style, what works, works. I've heard tracks made by computers with far more soul than half-#%%@! tracks made by real musicians. It's the result that counts...
 
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#184
rx jr. said:
well, you just linked being old, being white, being a republican, and [supposedly] not liking rap and being young, being black, being a democrat, and [supposedly] liking rap so that's something right there. :)

it's more of a correlation to racial makeup, which has a high correlation to wealth. it would be an interesting study, although i'm sure it's been done before. i should go check JSTOR right now lol
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Yep, I did. Those are the stereotypes. You forgot to include geography. I stereotyped that, too. As a person whose ethnicity could accurately be described as Appalachian, I should probably have no teeth and have hay sticking out of my shirt. Plus, I'm old, so I shouldn't like rap or hip-hop very much. But I like some of it a lot. The sound of banjos should follow me around like the aroma of barn animals. Well, actually that might happen.:smug:
 
#186
Gaolee said:
Yep, I did. Those are the stereotypes. You forgot to include geography. I stereotyped that, too. As a person whose ethnicity could accurately be described as Appalachian, I should probably have no teeth and have hay sticking out of my shirt. Plus, I'm old, so I shouldn't like rap or hip-hop very much. But I like some of it a lot. The sound of banjos should follow me around like the aroma of barn animals. Well, actually that might happen.:smug:
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i'm first-generation asian-american and predominantly listen to extreme metal :D

i'm [supposedly] a total weirdo and a nutcase for listening to scary godless music lol. stereotypes...
 
#187
If John Cage's stuff is music and electronic classical music created by decisions made by flipping a coin is music, than there's no way rap isn't music.

There's unsavory themes's in many genre's and there's bland themes in every genre. Not liking something does not negate it being music.

Edit for fun-sies:: G-G-G G-G-G G-UNIT!
 
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#188
pklima said:
Well, I'm off to do a hip-hop gig. Not on bass, though, I'm taking my computer, though I did produce some of the beats and use my own sample libraries of my own basses in at least two, so I'm sort of playing bass in a roundabout way.
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Gig went well, small but fun. While I was still plugging stuff in, the venue manager asked me if I can DJ on New Year's Eve and how much money I'd want. And the rapper's girlfriend is a photographer and wants to do a photo session for a singer I play "real bass" with.

So, my view today is that rap is fun and really good for networking.
 
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#196
Funk$tar said:
It makes it really hard to appreciate rappers like Biggie and Tupac when they released songs like, "Me & My (insert bad word for girl)" and "How Do You Want It."
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That's putting it mildly.
I guess I just feel like those songs were there attempt to show everyone they were not to be messed with, but I feel like I really see there true sides in songs like, "Miss U" or "Thugs Mansion."
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I pity anybody who lives in a world where being "not to be messed with" is important. It's pretty close to the bottom of Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs.

I grew up near Detroit, and in the early 80's, one of the radio stations played original raps that may even have been recorded on site. They were witty, creative, provocative, topical, and political. But I got bored with it, and moved away from Detroit.

In my view hip hop is an artistically and socially redeeming genre, except when it isn't. That's a low bar. When the advocates of an artistic genre admit that 95% of it is offensive or banal, they shouldn't blame people for not being motivated to search for the other 5%. Such comments have also been made about heavy metal, or contemporary pop music. Instead, all I can say is that if it speaks to you, then enjoy it. I don't expect anybody to love the same genres as I do.
 
#197
Yeah, that's a tough one.
I can stand Beastie Boys because they use real instruments in their arrangements, but don't own anything of theirs. I own Cypress Hill's Black Sunday because I smoked A LOT in the 90s and that's what you did.
I don't have anything good to say, so I'll try to be as diplomatic as possible. Music is about an emotional connection between the musician and the listener via sound; if the emotion or the sound doesn't resonate with you it can come off as noise. I'm not the target demographic for the emotions and lyrics of Rap/Hip Hop, I have no connection to electronic sounds, and I don't understand dancing, so there isn't a lot for me in the genre. I was raised in a solidly lower-middle class family that frowned on being ostentatious or bragging, so some of the common memes in those genres also rub me the wrong way.
 

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