Letters to the Editor
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good music
Good music is where you find it whether it be hip hop, jazz, or even country western there is always someone out there who is doing cutting edge stuff. If you are a true music lover then you will search for it. If you are lazy about it however, you will drink whatever the mainstream feeds you. Also, it is ok to dislike what's out there. The term hating has taken on a whole new context in the music world. To paraphrase Common just because I don't like something does not mean that I'm hating. So let's stop with all this nonsense and let free minds prevail
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The Next "Big Chill"
This article, with its detached and quasi-ironic tone, made me wonder if we are on the verge of seeing a Generation X version of "The Big Chill" coming out soon. Gwyneth Paltrow instead of Glenn Close? Public Enemy's "Don't Believe the Hype" instead of Marvin Gaye's "I Heard It Through the Grapevine", perhaps?
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I beg to differ
On Friday night I happened across the weekly hip-hop show on our local community radio station KDHX. The stuff they were playing was phenomenal - everything from hip-hop classics to hot-off-the-presses singles. To this music fan, it was exciting to listen to. And not a single song was guilty of any of the charges you made.
You would do well to shed your myopic pop culture frame of reference. And tell your wife to stop watching MTV, it's only relevant if you let it be.
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Not old enough to be this out of touch.
I just did the math and this guy is 27-29.
If he's already complaining about kids these days using an idea of cool he formed at EIGHT YEARS OLD, that's pathetic.
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I don't like hip hop --
because it makes black people look like idiots.
And it's not just the videos or the bad influence of gangsta rap. I've never seen a hip hop lyric that impressed me or touched me. Now, if anyone can show me different, I'll listen.
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I was going to type "Get off of my lawn, you damn kids!" but someone beat me to it
Re Bo Ryan: "And yet there he is, online, dancing the Soulja Boy."
So what? Everything comes and goes, including musical age limits imposed on one’s peers by one’s…peers.
If it gets people of any age dancing, where’s the harm, unless one is a teen who is embarrassed to see their parents dancing to modern music? That’s their right.
So, what’s new about this stance by an old fart seething that the young generation doesn’t appreciate and is fed musical sewage? There’s crap in every generation. In my 20s: Air Supply, the Pina Colada song, the Captain & Tennile, that dude who sang “Night Moves.” Plenty more. And in the meantime, punk was flourishing elsewhere.
Re Soulja, listen up: it's the young'n's turn. Appreciate whatever next comes long or don't, but get out of the way. They're going to like what they like, even and especially if you think there is no style as dictated by your own tastes.
When I fell in love with "The Eminem Show" cd, my son was no longer interested it in. While he appreciates and listens to different types of music created over eight decades, he doesn't always want to be in sync with his mom, for godsakes.
Signed,
Old-Fart Middle-Aged White Lady & Mother of a 16-Year Old Teenager
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Kanye's show last Saturday was pretty good
He knows it's not to be taken all that seriously.
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I Love Music
And there's plenty of good music of all genres for those willing to take the time to search and listen.
The thing with Hip Hop and dance is simply that hip-hop is the club music of today. The environment for it is more in the club (Lil Jon, Lil Wayne, Lil ...all those Lil's. As a matter of fact, some of the more commercial hip-hop influenced artists & producers (Kanye & Timbaland come to mind) are using a lot of four-on-floor beats lately. And I'm hearing more techno and dance influence in the radio hip-hop.
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Finally
Someone writes a cogent article that explains my feelings towards the current state of hip hop. At a time when something like "Soulja Boy" passes for 'hip-hop', it's refreshing to see someone call it out for the mindless drivel it is.
I personally came of age in a time when hip-hop was extraordinarily controversial, and not only culturally but politically relevant. My early teenage years were immersed in the nerd-rock doodlings of Rush (and still are), but they were also exposed to the likes of Public Enemy, De La Soul, A Tribe Called Quest, among many, many others. The music had a creativity about it that is sorely lacking from many genres of music today. Chalk it up to the dumbing-down of music, which I personally think is a full-fledged epidemic at this point. The author mentions how some older rock fans are maybe frustrated with bands like Fall Out Boy. Mark me down as one of them. There are any number of bands that have blatantly copied that particular formula and have proceeded to sell lots of records. I can't tell the difference between the lot of them. And for every triumph of modern rock like Kings of Leon, the White Stripes (and by extension The Raconteurs), or Midlake, you've got ten times that number of bands that are musically inferior, yet orders of magnitude more popular. It's a bit infuriating, if you ask me. I wonder where our next Billy Corgan, Kurt Cobain, or Eddie Vedder is going to come from and take us away from all this mess.
Coincidentally, I wonder when the next great rap artist is going to stem the tide of mediocrity. The Roots are an amazingly talented hip-hop collective who keep churning out record after challenging record, but it seems as though their demographic is nerdy suburbanites with a keen ear for music, at least outside their eastern seaboard big-city bases. Not a lot of people seem to be able to appreciate it when a rap act issues a fantastic fifth, sixth, or seventh album. How often do you see that? Worse yet, does anyone of the "Soulja Boy" ilk even care?
Not bloody likely.
Kudos to Paul Kix for an excellent article. Great reading!