Wat up? I felt like starting a thread just about rap, because, I dunno, I’m pissed whenever I watch a rap video or something, and I get unintelligent hate talk about how hip hop “is gay” and “is dead”, and another day of despair about rap culture generalizations from the “no spin zone” that sure “spins” it’s wheels about this issue. Know what I’m saying. So I decided to start a thread right here to get real intelligent views instead of these hater views, we call em.
Now, I’m more talking about “modern” rap and not the origins of hip hop that we might call “old school” that was going strong in some of you people’s days, it’s mainly this modern hip hop that gets critisized.
As for my opinion, pretty obvious. Don’t see much of a problem with hip hop, listen to it all the time these days. So let’s here your take.
I think it depends on qualifying “destructive” to whom and in what way and distinguishing between the music and the lyrics.
I think all art is destructive to something and to someone depending on who’s listening and why, when, and in what context.
Is it rebellious in general? I guess that’s debatable, but even if that’s narrowed down to gangsta rap for example then yes. But so is heavy metal and hard rock. But then you’d have to ask what’s wrong with rebellion?
I think the basic nature of gangsta rap, for example, could be said to be confrontational rather than conformist.
The rub between confrontational and conformist concepts in civil society has been ongoing since the beginning of time and there have clearly been times when confrontational approaches have been less destructive, in the long term, than conformist paradigms.
The one thing I will say about rap is that it seems to be a much more stripped down, elemental version of forceful expression as compared to say, many forms of rock and roll, since it seems to be a more raw, essential sound.
Do you want to discuss the art form or the social implications? If the latter, I will let this stay here for a bit; if the former, this thread would be better suited to Cafe Society where I shall soon send it.
I guess it is destructive, kinda. Tupac Shakur . . . Notorious B.I.G. . . . Is there any other musical genre where fanbase rivalries lead to assassination?!
Good point, but you’d have to pit that against “assassinations” inspired by Marilyn Manson wouldn’t you? More were killed there. It’s true that in the case of those shootings it was directed by the fanbase at the other performer, but the ‘destructive’ value in terms of lives lost would seem to be at least equivalent if not worse.
It’s difficult to understand your question, but my answer is yes, rap is destructive. It encourages intolerance, violence, and abuse toward women. The music style has become stagnant and impotent. The people making modern rap are less focused on art or expression, and more focused on a tough image they can sell. Rappers who don’t try to sell a tough image are dropped from the mainstream and abandoned, called sellouts, accused of going soft, and accused of not “keeping it real.”
It’s so predictable. Always so damned predictably confrontational in the same silly way, every single song. Real rap is dead, until fans can pull it back out of the dumpster that the labels and producers have thrown it in.
Aight, check it yo. Rap is like any other art form. People will be hatin’ on it just like people will be hatin’ on religious art, or any art form that matter.
Look at this piece:
If you’re hip agnostic/athiest, you may laugh and appreciate the art done (not all of them, but I’d suspect a good amount would). If you’re a believer in Jesus, it will be quite offensive. Some may label it as “gay”, just as people say rap is “gay”. So as 9thFloor has already stated, it is what it is depending on the audience.
It’s happened a few times among Scandinavian metal musicians; the murder of Oystein “Euronymous” Aarseth by Varg Vikernes is the most well known example, but there’ve been a few others.
As far as hip-hop goes, I think Bugs Cunny raises a good point about market pressures on artists to sell a tough guy image, and I agree that labels share responsibility for the music they publish and market. But that’s not entirely a one way street. The artists face pressure from the market, but they also play a role in shaping that market.
Yes, I was talking about that and I agree it’s bullshit to blame it on Manson.
But if we’re referring to crimes supposedly inspired by music by those that choose to take an artistic expression literally (including lyrics about killing that are in both Manson’s music and Tupac/Biggie’s), then there it is.
True enough; and I think they shape the market that way (those that do) due to the fact that it’s often what their actual values are. That, of course, can be circular if one posits that the music helps to shape the values on the street that are then reflected through the artists and back into the studio. Personally, I think the central value of gangsta rap type hip hop is honor, as defined within their perspective. Honor vs. law, for example, has been at odds since before Shakespeare in art and is an issue Shakespeare often addresses (“conscience makes cowards of us all”) and wrestles with.
Act your ‘conscience’ and don’t avenge the slight; don’t avenge the slight and you’re a ‘coward’ (sacrificing your ‘honor’).
From an artistic point of view, there is something very compelling about the kind of rap that appeals to this basic, ‘macho’ aesthetic which is also seen in ‘practice war’ sports like football (which is why it was invented).
To me, rap is an excellent artistic expression of that zeitgeist.
<stretch> Well, I guess I’m off to Starbucks for a latte…lol
I hate to put my ‘myth bustin’ hat on, but I am afraid I have to respond to Mosier’s statement that positive rappers are accused of ‘not keeping it real’. Actually, positive rappers get tons of respect and support from even the hardest ‘gangsta’ rappers.
KRS-ONE, Rakim, The Roots, De La Soul, Tribe Called Quest, etc, are considered the godfathers of hip-hop, and I have never heard anyone accuse them of selling out. Rappers that used to be more ‘gangsta’ have even gone more positive, like for instance, Nas. Did it cause his sales to slide? Yes, I think it did. But that is because he lost ‘commercial appeal’ and I believe he still gets much respect from ‘gangsta’ rappers and from true hip-hop fans.
You speak as if being ‘dropped from the mainstream’ means that the hip hop artist is a failure, and hip hop is dead. That is not how it works in hip-hop, though. In hip-hop, too much ‘mainstream’ is considered not good. Those that are plastered all over MTV, looking crazy, doing some watered down version of what corn balls think is hip-hop are not considered great. They are considered successful in the same way that Avril Lavine is considered successful. But when she makes music, no one declares the death of Rock and Roll. They recognize that she does not embody true rock.
Also, if hip-hop encourages intolerance, violence, and abuse toward women, then I hope you are willing to accept that there is classic literature, art, scultpures, movies, religions (Christianity included) that do the same thing. I think it very strange that hip-hop alone should be criticized for it.
Now, if you want to criticize the propaganda machine for making the worst rap* glossy and pushing it to the suburban masses, then fine. But that crap on MTV is not the whole of hip-hop…it is the tip of the ice berg. Go underground to find the best of it.
*in my opinion, not all commercial rap is crap. Eminem used to make good commercial rap, and Kenya West is a master at it. Heck, 20 years ago, Will Smith did it well too.
"Also, if hip-hop encourages intolerance, violence, and abuse toward women, then I hope you are willing to accept that there is classic literature, art, scultpures, movies, religions (Christianity included) that do the same thing. I think it very strange that hip-hop alone should be criticized for it."
I think it’s criticized for it because while other forms of art have those same characteristics people that criticize rap don’t see that it has any redemptive value to counterbalance those aspects. All negatives, no positives (and for the sake of argument I’m talking specifically about gangsta rap). The problem with that is, in my view, that the moment you start to judge the ‘positive value’ of art for the sake of public morality you’re going down a slippery slope of limiting artistic expression and you’re not understanding the positive benefits that gangsta rap can have, for example. It’s also a moot point because art doesn’t need to have any positive effect on public morality even if it lacks it; art’s job is to be an expression, period. The value of artistic expression should be clear to any member of a liberated society. (I use gangsta rap just to pick the most notorious example to make the point. If you widen it to include the other artists you mentioned, the point is made even clearer.)
Let’s use gangsta rap, cause I think there certainly are redemptive elements to gangsta rap. And the more that I hear that there is not, the more I begin to believe that what we have here is a language barrier.
Is it possible that the people that criticize gangsta rap don’t really understand the slang terms enough to make out anything in the song outside of “murda, gunz, bitches, hoes”?
Yes, people who like to critisize rap don’t even know what these slang terms mean sometimes, don’t blame em. I had to listen to some a bit myself before I can really get an idea.
