Cause it looks fairly monochromatic on the national scene. I was pondering this on the drive to work this morning - while there’re white crossover hip-hop/rap artists, I couldn’t think of any black rock or alternative bands. In fact, I struggled to think of one that had a black member at all - though I ultimately recalled Dave Matthews had a black musician or two the last time I saw him on SNL.
N.E.R.D is a somewhat rock-oriented band.
Dave Matthews band has two white members and three black members, unless they’ve switched the lineup around in recent years.
Fishbone has several black members, as did the legendary hardcore punk band Bad Brains. Many ska bands have had multi-ethnic lineups, such as the Specials.
There’s always Lenny Kravitz and Darius Rucker from Hootie, but neither one is very “rockin’.”
What…no Living Colour?
Look into my eyes, what do you see?
Cult of personality.
Sonia Dada is a somewhat rock/funk band, and the current lineup is 4 black, 5 white.
Robert Randolph and the Family Band definitely qualifies. They rock, and they have but one white person in the band. They are really good, and I would check them out if they were playing anywhere within 500 miles of me this year. Their first LP, released last year, is excellent. Here’s their website:
Unfortunately, it’s pretty much “Dave Matthews … and friends”. However…
Mr. Kravitz had entirely slipped my mind. Hootie was mostly white, as I recall, and is now mostly gone from the pop culture scene, with the exception of Darius’s new career as a Burger King shill.
As for the other answers - thanks! I don’t think I’d ever seen Living Color perform, so I had no idea what they looked like.
Ben Harper & The Innocent Criminals. Harper, his bass player, and his aux. percussionist are black. His first drummer was white, and his keyboardist is white. I’m not sure about his current drummer.
Yeah, whatever happened to them? I didn’t care for there albums so much, but live they put on a hell of a show. The guitarist was amazing, and unlike too many other super-talented axe players he worked to better the song, rather than to show off.(His name was Vernon Reid, right? it’s been a while.) The rest of the band was pretty tight too. I always wondered why they seemed to suddenly disappear.
You know, I think that’s my eighth post where I’ve written “there” for “their,” or vice versa. If this keeps up I’ll have to pit myself.
Thanks for reminding me of one of the hardcore bands that most influenced my misspent youth – the Bad Brains. Oh man, did they rock.
Burnin’ Vernon Reid was incredible on the guitar.
Ice T. had a rock/metal outfit for a while. Really pretty good as well. If I recall correctly they were called Bodycount
Legendary Detroit frontman Mick Collins is black. He doesn’t exactly have the national prominence of, say, Eminem, but his late 80s underground lo-fi punk outfit The Gories was pretty influential. His current band, The Dirtbombs, has an all-star cast and is arguably the best band in the great Detroit music scene.
The alternative band TV on the Radio has been getting a lot of press lately. The current lineup, as far as I know, is four black members and one white guy.
Front man Corey Glover was also “Francis” in Platoon.
Sevendust has one black guy, so I guess that counts.
In his book Sound of the Beast: the Complete Headbanging History of Heavy Metal, Ian Christe observes that the metal scene of the late 80s/early 90s was pretty well integrated, but as soon as hip-hop took off, metal became pretty monochromatic.
Fishbone is actually all black members. Even when they’ve grought in new members it’s all black. Great band.
If I remember correctly there are a few black members in The Mighty Mighty Bosstones.
The horn section of No Doubt is all black (but never pictured, which i think is a shame).
1 out of 4 Dead Kennedys was black. The drummer D.H. Pilegro (sp?)
The lead singer of Skunk Anansie (a ska-ish punk band) is a black woman. I think some other members of the band might be POCs as well but I’m not certain.
Just thought of another band. Morcheeba, mostly black.