Week 4: The Soul of Hip Hop

First, I wanted to share an anecdote that I thought was relevant to the last few readings. I went to a Murs show in DC about a year ago. Murs is riding a border between underground/mainstream hip hop, and he recently signed to Warner Brother Records. But at the show, I noticed tagged on his newly acquired tour bus "SELL OUT" in white spray paint. I thought that was an interesting dynamic considering all of the stories we are reading about people in "the industry" that really is not represented by Toure: the independent crowd that stands opposed to industry artists.

Anyway, I am going to stick to two ideas from Toure because I have been all over the place recently.

In the first part of the reading on some of the women of the Hip Hop Nation, I felt like there was a different character in their creation process. It seemed like Lauryn Hill and Alisha Keys have a raw passion to expressive in their music. This seems different than the first part of the Toure because I don't think that Hill and Keys are creating a character or developing an image. They both seem to be authentic artists trying to express something that is very real to them. Keys seems to reject being "iced out" and seeks to be "ghetto hot" calling on images and words that express some sort of reality, not a fantasy realm. Her concept for her song "Fallin'" and the music video express a sense of love and pain, accompanied by a social critique of incarceration stereotypes and the borderlessness of love.
At the same time Lauryn Hill wants to create respect for herself as an artist, a producer, not just someone who leaches off the creative talents of others. She would not be pigeon-holed as a pretty face. To a fault, Hill wanted to be given credit for developing dope music. As ?uestlove put it, she wanted her solo career to establish her as an independent artist from Wyclef Jean. Hill commented that she has created a public persona, but she hated it and had to break out of it.
For me, along with the article about Beyonce, showed me the side of some artists that were trying to create art that was powerfully moving and authentic, not create some kind of image.

Finally, I thought that the last two sections on gay and lesbian rappers was really eye-opening and thought provoking. I pride myself in knowing lots of artists, and I knew none of these gay artists. I think the questions posed by Toure were very valuable. The idea about homosocial interaction and brotherly love are connected to the homosexual tension that exists in hip hop. I believe the homophobia stems from the desire to protect Black masculinity because it is fragile in a white supremacist, male-dominant culture. Anything that runs contrary to the dominant construction of Black masculinity (such as being the penetrated or femininity) is a threat to the community if it is accepted. I look forward to finding and listening to Caushun and Juba Kalamka and Tim'm West.

OK, looking forward to Monday! Enjoy your weekend, everyone.