I’M HATING
The year was 1987, I sat down in front of my grandmother’s floor model
television and in the midst of channel surfing I landed on MTV. This muscle
bound dude wearing a red Kangol hat caught my eye, I couldn’t make out
everything he was saying but his song was killing it. The beat sounded like
something straight out of a scary movie when the monster was getting ready to
attack. The song was “I’m Bad” and it was the ugliest, meanest song I had ever
heard and I loved it! Like a fiend chasing a hit every day I would bounce back and
forth from Ducktales to MTV waiting
to see if they would play my video. I began to memorize every word even acting
out the moves, stomping my grandmother’s red shag carpet cause I WAS CRUSHING
THEM FOOLS LIKE A JELLY BEAN! That day in 1987, wasn’t just my introduction to
Todd Smith, that day was the beginning of my love for Hip Hop. Yes it is just
music to the average ears, but to me the beats and the rhymes are just skin
deep to our love affair because this relationship would influence the way I
walked, talked and dressed.
Inseminated with Jazz, R&B, Blues, Funk, Scatting, The Dozens,
Spoken Word, Poetry and metaphors Hip Hop wasn’t just a genre of music it was a
movement. A movement that didn’t just entail music there were DJs, Mix Masters,
B-Boys, breakdancing and graffiti artists. Armed with a complex personality
this movement was clever, intelligent, egotistical, competitive, braggadocios,
humble, rebellious, original, creative, tough and violent. It was “underdog
music” that was made for and by the have nots of society. Conceived in the 70’s
and growing up in the 80’s, Hip Hop spoke up for the inner city voices that had
been silenced for years. Screaming “Fuck the Police” to crooked ass cops,
joining together to fight against violence within the African American
community with “Self Destruction”, responding to the unnecessary and untimely
death of Latasha Harlins with songs like “Black Korea” and “Something 2 Die 4”
Hip Hop was airing America’s dirty laundry.
Atrocities that normally never made it past the gutters of the ghetto
was now being put front in center on stage for the world to view. Social
commentary was just one aspect, Hip Hop taught us how to party. Artists entered
the game with an axe to grind, fighting for respect from their peers within
this music and for the city they represented. A movement that flipped hustlers
into music moguls and drug money turned record companies. Yes, Hip Hop came
from the gutter but the world fell in love with it. It pushed beyond the city
limits and brought more people together from all races, backgrounds and
cultures than any other genre of music. Trust me this article is no “Brown
Sugar” type flow, it’s just simply to ask if we gave birth to Hip Hop why are
we letting other people raise it?
“But now as Hip Hop becomes this
legitimate genre of music and if we are going to last this test of time we
cannot be considered this niche genre of music. It has to be a music that is
centered around something…some type of truth…some type of emotion…some type of
revolution…or some type of love. The next generation of artists will determine
if it will extend beyond or just become some type of music.” –Jay-Z-Oprah’s
Masters Class
Watching the Grammys this year, I got a chance to observe the growth of
artists from other genres of music such as country, alternative and pop. Once
upon a time pop stars could only be skinny, sex crazed bomb shells who could barely
sing. But now we are seeing artists such as Adele and Kelly Clarkson murder the
pop charts with this new version of sexy called TALENT. I found it to be amazing
to see other artists push the envelope and own their craft in order to become
legitimate contenders amongst their peers in the music business. The truth
about the current state of Hip Hop is that is we no longer own our craft, our
craft and the people who bought it now own us. In this stage in the game there
are more comedians than artists, more rappers than MCs and more wrong than
right. Reality Shows, belligerent lyric competitions, plastic bodies, fake drug
dealers and toy gang bangers are replacing what used to be called TALENT. With
these elements being the constant theme aligning these beats, at what point do
we stop singing along?
With talent dissolving into thin air, female MCs
have done the same. When Female MC’s hit the scene they commanded respect and
they stepped into the booth knowing their skills would level any male MC in the
studio. Messages that range from
intolerance of disrespect to being in charge of their own sexuality, it was all
about fighting for their place in the game. But things in the game have changed
and it’s no longer about what you say when you step in the booth, it’s about
how you look saying it. And unfortunately that look is going to cost you, it’s
all about how much are you willing to pay.
The brilliance of an Outkast,
Kanye West, KRS-One, Tribe Called Quest and Common can be credited to simply
being different; it was not a message of dope dealing and killing but that of
thought provoking creativity. Unfortunately we’ve grown so desperate to be like
everyone else, we are willing to single white female another
man’s life in order to erase our own.
“I’m into distribution, I’m like Atlantic/I got them mutherfuckers flying across the Atlantic/I know Pablo Noriega/the real Noriega he owe me one hundred favors.” ~Rick Ross
Word to the wise, if
you must go this route at least select a dead Kingpin it will save you some
legal fees….
Gang banging is a culture
that has been ever present in Hip Hop, better explained in Ice-T’s 1988 hit “Colors”
off the Colors soundtrack. Artists
such as Snoop and The Game have never been shy about waving their flag to let
you know the set they came from. Sad to say others have chosen, the Hollywood
Hogan route waving flags to their boost record sales.
In this era of so
called Hip Hop there has been in emergence of some young talent that is trying
to breathe some creativity into the game, but for every breath we take you have
100 Trinidad James characters sucking the life right out of you. Low and behold
we don’t control the music that is played over the air waves or the images in
which we are fed daily via television and internet but we do have a say so in
whether we chose to tune in. Clear Channel is the largest owner in full power
radio stations, to which a huge cluster of them are Urban and half of them
cater to Rap. Viacom is the fourth largest media conglomerate, owning BET and
MTV Networks which includes sister station VH1, controlling the majority of
images that you see on a daily basis. With VH1 tag-teaming our prime time hours
with shows such as Basketball Wives, Love and Hip Hop and Marrying the Game you
almost want to release a company memo that states “Not all black women make
their money on their back and there are majority of us who grind it out on our
feet, so if you feel so compelled can you come up with a different plot…please
and thanks”. The irony behind all of
this is bad artists continue to supply Clear Channel with material to flood the
airwaves and thanks to black women such
as Shaunie O’Neal and Mona Scott-Young we get hard-thought up-complex shows like
Basketball Wives and Love and Hip Hop.
And then of course there is the internet were World Star Hip Hop
continues to attract 1.1 million viewers per day. I would love to say that this
site was really about Hip Hop as it states in its’ title, but unfortunately it
is a cesspool of ghetto fights that continue to display society’s lack of humanity…all
in the name of Hip Hop. Connecting the dots would tell you that it’s no mystery
as to why in 2011 and 2012 BET named WSHH as the “top hip hop and urban culture
website”.
I’ve always defined
hating as disliking something and hoping that it doesn’t succeed, well call it
because I am HATING on rappers and the current state of Hip Hop. If insulting
my intelligence and pigeon holing my race into ignorance is the only talent you
have, then NO I do not wish you success.
I find it disheartening to hear Outkast say they refuse to put out an
album in this era because it will not be appreciated. The preservation of this
movement falls on the backs of talented artists, creative MCs, thought
provoking poets and writers who will change the direction of Hip Hop. In order
to change the direction, we as consumers and artists simply have to stop
FOLLOWING….PEACE
Follow me on Twitter
@ IAM_TEAGREEN
I used to keep the Barack Obama book "The Audacity of Hope" standing up on top of my cubicle wall at work. It was a glorious "fuck you very much" to all my pseudo-conservative co-workers. He was not President yet. He was a junior Senator who had made one of the most motivating speeches of all time at the Democratic National Convention in 2004. He inspired everyone listening to believe he could be President one day. It wasn't the charisma or golden tongue. It was the optimism. It was the sincerity. Just four years later, he decided to run for POTUS in 2008 (a lil' earlier than he was on target to be ready...according to the pecking order in Washington, it was supposed to be Hillary's turn to shine). He put together a team with cats like David Axelrod and David Plouffe and these dudes launched a revolutionary voter push. They blazed Myspace, Facebook, Twitter and Mass emails like a local rapper with a new CD coming out on a "momma's couch" record label. They got college kids to vote...in the damn Primary! That's serious biz. This team was something politics hadn't seen before. Hillary wasn't ready, McCain wasn't ready...but the world was.
OK, so I been off my shit recently. I know because you faithful readers remind me. Articles coming too damn slow...and my most fielded question/complaint/feedback is "Where the hell is The Nines???" So here we go. Back on my Nines flow. Back off the skinny chicks too! This here edition of the Nines is ALMOST a do-over because my spotlight beauty is Audra McDonald, who...happens to look almost exactly like Sanaa Lathan. Most of you will probably know her from role in the modern make of A Raisin in the Sun where she played with Ms. Lathan. Although she had that under her belt and just recently hit the small screen with her role as Dr. Naomi Bennett on Private Practice, her roots, branches and leaves have all been mostly on the stage. Not just fiddlin around on the stage either, this chick is hella accomplished. She won THREE Tony Awards by the time she was 28, so she's stacked //on the mantle and on the physique//. 
