I don’t listen to too much hop-hop anymore. I was hella (rap-speak for ‘really’) into it in high school and into college; but somewhere along the line, my interest has dwindled to the point where I could honestly see myself never buying a rap album ever again. Get me a periodic Kanye single and I’m set for life. There have been a few exceptions to my loss of interest in hip-hop. Donuts by J Dilla could very well hold a seat in the PT All-Time Top Ten (Should I do countdown with my Top Ten like the bros over at P4K? LET ME KNOW) Other than that though, the last, like, six years hip-hop and I have been friendly, but hardly MusicBFF.
AAAAANYWAY, my biggest hip-hop pet peeve by far (beating out rhyming a word with the same word by a wide margin) is the holier-than-thou attitude displayed by many “underground” hip-hop acts. This trait is painfully visible and any of the array of acts to come from the Minneapolis hip-hop scene (Atmosphere, Doom Tree, et al).
I feel like this insistence on saying you’re making “real hip-hop” may come from some sort of regional inferiority complex. but…just…STOP IT! It’s not any more real than when that big black guy comes out of nowhere to rap in Burnin’ Up by the JoBros (check t about the 2:38 mark).
I just feel like if Grizzly Bear un-ironically told their audience “this is real rock, yall!”, people’d be majorly off-put. But in the hip-hop world, making such a fucking self-important statement sells you records.
Dear Ego-Driven Underground MCs,
You’re not doing God’s work. You’re not as innovative as you think you are. And if you feel the need to explain to me what free-styling is one more time, OR insist on me saying something back to your “When I say ___, you say ___” shtick, I’m going to summon the ghost of Eazy-E to come give you a venereal disease.
Am I overreacting? Do I just not get it because I’m not PART of the SCENE?
Underground is more commercial than ever before people! Try making something special that will get me interested in hip-hop again instead of rattling off the old drawn-out methods of your more seasoned hip-hop brethren.
THOUGHTS??
Also-this was probably the most whitest-sounding blog post in Acme Valley’s history. If you have other great moments in my blog’s whiteness, please feel free to share.
October 2, 2009 at 2:31 pm |
The whiteness was only excruciatingly evident when you cited The Johnas Brothers in your argument.
But, you could be half black, so I look to you for all musical incite, since your people invented Rock N Roll. Because Elvis was black, right?