Can music and music producers whose main goal is to sell as much music as possible successfully incorporate social or political messages into their product?
It's become difficult to find any redeeming social value in the hip-hop that sells millions of albums and the rap that gets played on the radio, other than entertainment and the pleasures afforded by a catchy pick-me-up jam.
Who are the best-selling rap and hip-hop artists this week? Well, obviously the ubiquitous Kanye West, but then there's Nicki Minaj, Eminem, Lloyd Banks, and Lil' Wayne. Those are the top 5. It is extremely enjoyable to listen to all of Billboard's top-ranking artists, but try to convince yourself or anyone else that their music stands for more than a love of money, partying, and sexual prowess. The producers have popular music down to a science and can crank out otherworldly beats faster than an alien heart. The lyrics don't even make sense a lot of the time.
Last Spring Break's anthem Bedrock by Young Money was the first song I heard over 500 times that I couldn't understand beyond the sexual content. Direct quote from the song: "She don't even wonder 'cause she know she bad/And I got her n****, grocery bag." Come on, can someone please explain the sociopolitical significance of that? And I was singing that song to myself for weeks, maybe even months. I wouldn't bat an eye if that song was just a fluke, or if it was meant to be a contemporary Dadaist take on pop music... but it seemed to be the beginning of a trend. Nicki Minaj, the breakout female rapper of 2010, is also fond of the same jabberwocky antics. From Massive Attack: "No one got the ammo, that's why I bullet-proofed the Lambo/In the Middle East on a camel/Runnin' through the jungle, Rambo, Liberace tango/Swingin' on a vine, mango." Mango?
Despite what seems to be a lack of activism on rap's main stage, what Kanye says and does is so paramount that George W. Bush acknowledged Kanye's criticism as the lowpoint of his presidency. It doesn't make sense to demand that artists with enormous young audiences shouldn't make apolitical songs, or that they should try to challenge their fans to think about pressing global issues in their music. Maybe the most they can do is take a personal stand when they feel the need to.
If the songs don't hold water in a political schema, maybe the artists still can. They stick in the spotlight after their songs fall to the bottom of the charts. My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy replaced 808's and Heartbreak, but the artist remains. Like Jay-Z said, "It's on to the next one."
It's become difficult to find any redeeming social value in the hip-hop that sells millions of albums and the rap that gets played on the radio, other than entertainment and the pleasures afforded by a catchy pick-me-up jam.
Who are the best-selling rap and hip-hop artists this week? Well, obviously the ubiquitous Kanye West, but then there's Nicki Minaj, Eminem, Lloyd Banks, and Lil' Wayne. Those are the top 5. It is extremely enjoyable to listen to all of Billboard's top-ranking artists, but try to convince yourself or anyone else that their music stands for more than a love of money, partying, and sexual prowess. The producers have popular music down to a science and can crank out otherworldly beats faster than an alien heart. The lyrics don't even make sense a lot of the time.
Last Spring Break's anthem Bedrock by Young Money was the first song I heard over 500 times that I couldn't understand beyond the sexual content. Direct quote from the song: "She don't even wonder 'cause she know she bad/And I got her n****, grocery bag." Come on, can someone please explain the sociopolitical significance of that? And I was singing that song to myself for weeks, maybe even months. I wouldn't bat an eye if that song was just a fluke, or if it was meant to be a contemporary Dadaist take on pop music... but it seemed to be the beginning of a trend. Nicki Minaj, the breakout female rapper of 2010, is also fond of the same jabberwocky antics. From Massive Attack: "No one got the ammo, that's why I bullet-proofed the Lambo/In the Middle East on a camel/Runnin' through the jungle, Rambo, Liberace tango/Swingin' on a vine, mango." Mango?
Despite what seems to be a lack of activism on rap's main stage, what Kanye says and does is so paramount that George W. Bush acknowledged Kanye's criticism as the lowpoint of his presidency. It doesn't make sense to demand that artists with enormous young audiences shouldn't make apolitical songs, or that they should try to challenge their fans to think about pressing global issues in their music. Maybe the most they can do is take a personal stand when they feel the need to.
If the songs don't hold water in a political schema, maybe the artists still can. They stick in the spotlight after their songs fall to the bottom of the charts. My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy replaced 808's and Heartbreak, but the artist remains. Like Jay-Z said, "It's on to the next one."
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