Hip - Hop Is Dead/what I have learned

I just got done writing a paper over Nas CD 'Hip-Hop Is Dead.' When I first skimmed through the songs I was like oh my gosh I really need this extra credit, and I have no idea what he is saying. However, after I set down and listened to it again and talked with Scooby about what I thought it was saying and I felt a little better. My overall opinion was that the cd was really good. He talked a lot about how the music today is not the same as it was back when it began. Not only from this cd, but from class I have learned that people are not singing about hip - hop for the love of it, but now more for the money. This love for the money is also causing the wars between the East and West coast, they are all trying to be the best and are not just singing because they love what they do. He also talked about in one song called 'Not Going Back,' about how in his last cd he talked a lot about his life in Brooklyn, and how he was not going back to those days, but in this cd he was going to move forward.
I have not had a lot of experience in the background of hip - hop, but through our dicussions in class, and having to review the music I have learned a lot about the music and what it means. I just want to say that I really appreciate all the help the people in this class have done for me that know about hip - hop. Thanks so much because I know you have helped me more than you know. I have learned that not only is hip - hop about music, but it is also about life in general. The way you act, what you wear, ( I know this doesn't define you as hip - hop), and how you live your life.
I have really enjoyed this class though, at times it was really hard for me. I think that it has also made me dig a little deeper into the history and meaning of hip - hop, and through that I have made the first step in becoming a more knowlegeable person. It has been a lot of fun and I am kind of sad it is over.

Links:
http://www.nobodysmiling.com/hiphop/news/86206.php
http://www.rundmcmusic.com/
http://www.murderdog.com/archives/nas/Nas-1.jpg

Fair-N-Hyte, Liquid & DJ Mass

I really enjoyed the guest speakers today in class. I liked hearing the insight coming from someone who is out in the hip-hop world. One of the things that I wrote down that DJ Mass said was that once again 'hip-hop is a way of life.' I also think it is interesting to hear it from other perspective from outside the hip-hop world. Take Morgan for example, she and I both don't really understand what it means completly to have it as a way of life. She has asked me so many times about how it is there way of life because she and I both have religion, family and so on.....but my response to her and if anyone posts on my blog feel free to correct me if I am wrong, but I said that they still have those things that are important in their lives but it is referred to the clothing the music the way they talk and sometimes how they feel about certian issues. I just like her have a hard time grasping the who concept. He also mentioned when asked by Scooby if hip hop was dying that it was....and I was so excited to finally have someone tell me if they thought it was or not. He said it is dying because of the language that is used in it....that I not the only reason that it is dying, but that is the one I wrote down. He mentioned that back in the beginning of hip hop you didn't have to worry about covering your little kids ears when hip hop comes on. So in that instance it is not reaching out to as big of an audience. Then something that Liquid said was that getting out and becoming big is now like a pro sport...it is all about who is going to get drafted first. This was in response to the Common being in a Gap commercial. They also all mentioned that they didn't feel that doing commercials was a way of selling out, that it is just surviving in today business world of music. They said that it is 90% business and 10% fun. And to sum it all up, in class someone made a very valid point of if the music is ever going to go back to the way it was that you have to change the audience who is listening and buying it. Without the audience on board the whole genre and artists will not make money and eventually not exist. After listening today it showed me just how cut throat it is in the music business. I hope that all three of the gentlemen in class to great in all they are trying to do. I wish them the best of luck.

Links:

http://www.ninjaarrow.com/
http://www.daveyd.com/edithipdie.html
http://www.cbonline.org.au/index.cfm?pageId=12,38,3,454

Readings

I thought that the readings we were assigned for class today were very interesting. The first one that I read was the purple one. I found it very interesting how the different professors had different opinions on the topic of the death of the civil rights. From one perspective one man by the name of Chuck Stone talked about how he thought it actually is dead, but it did do its part. He said that it helped keep all of the police brutality away from some of the blacks. It also helped the white suburban kids to embrace the black brothers in an attempt to help make everyone equal. A man by the name of Todd Boyd also talked about his new work called The New H.N.I.C: the Death of Civil Rights and the Reign of Hip Hop. H.N.I.C sands for the Head Nigga in charge, he was talking about how now there are lots of black people in the world that are black and hip hop that are making a name for themselves in this world. They are having high profile jobs and are very successful. Then in the pink packet I found it interesting that they were talking about the different approches that white rappers had when trying to make a name for themselves in the black rapping world. How they said that Vanilla Ice tried to act too black and stage a hard life like other blacks and that in turn killed his career and then you had Slim Shady who just kept it real and in the end was more accepted by the blacks than Ice. Then they discussed that the Bestie Boys were actually one group who didn't try to act black they were white as could be knew it and stuck with it. So I think it is really interesting how the ways in which you appoach a situation in terms of color in a specific genre of music can have such a huge impact on your overall success. I will say it again it all goes back to one thing. If you want to make it in hip hop just 'Keep it Real.'

Links:

http://www.beastieboys.com/
http://www.eminem.com/
http://www.usdoj.gov/kidspage/crt/crtmenu.htm

What I have learned

Well seeing that I don't really know much about hip hop, though I am learning a lot from this class I thought I would take this time to blog on what I have learned. Well starting from the beginning back on the first day of class I was so overwhelmed by the discussion about hip hop being a way of life and it being real. When I first heard that I thought there is no way music can be a way of life. But I went into this class knowing that I didn't know much more than a few hip hop artists and their songs, but I was going to go in with an open mind and hoping to learn a lot more. Having that attitude has helped a lot after the first day when M-Money expanded more on the hip hop being real and a way of life by the clothes you wear and the life you live it started to make more sense. One thing that I have talked about before is that hip hop music tells it as it is. I can't say that I really knew that before this class, because to be honest with you I don't really understand many words in hip hop songs. It is either written in a slang that I don't understand like Nann (which I am so glad someone explained that) or they just talk so fast I don't have time to figure it out. But after the presentations when people gave out lyrics with the people they were talking about and watching Letter to the President it started making sense. There are people out there who really grew up in a place of guns going off and their mothers going to jail so there is no reason that they should not be able to sing about it. I also learned that hip hop is also a booming insdustry with lots of artitsts having their own clothing lines and grills, and some even have shows likd runs house and making the band.
I don't really know if I can say that I know enough about hip hop to really understand if it is going to stick around or not but I would like for it to know that I am learning lots of new artists like Common. I really enjoyed the presentation over him and I was glad I got to listen to his music I really liked it. It has also been very helpful having people in this class that do live the life of hip hop so I can ask them questions about things that don't make a lot of sense to me. I know this class is almost over, but I hope in the remaining week I can become more knowledgeable in this area.
Links:
http://www.mtv.com/ontv/dyn/makingtheband3/series.jhtml
http://www.grillsbypaulwall.com/
http://www.kvsp.com/

Hustle and Flow

Well eventhough I was warned about the movie Hustle and Flow I will say it has still taken me off gaurd just a little bit. With that being said I have really enjoyed it thus far. It is very eye opening what some people have to do to make a living. The white girl in the movie I don't know her name but I can't believe she does was she does. I mean knowing that the only way you can make money is by going out and selling your body to people that you don't even know....wow that is just so sad. That is also probably because I have never been put in the position to have to be out on my own with no one. The other thing was from today in class when we were watching it they were just about to start recording. When the lady that was pregnant came in and gave him the lava lamp and then they had her come back and sing. I am not going to lie I got kind of sad watching how excited she got when she was singing on that track. It just was amazing how everything in their life was. They had no air conditioning and they had to sell drugs and themself just to have food and the little they had. It also showed a good representation of how hard it is in the music business to make it. After he went into the bathroom and found his tape in the toliet. That was really sad, because D-jay had put so much work into that and then he just treated it like crap. But eventhough it was really sad it was a great representation of what it is like in the music buisness. You don't just walk in there and make something of yourself you have to prove that you are caplable of being successful. Overall eventhough I have not seen it all yet I feel like this is a well made movie about the real lives of some of the hip hop people we listen to today.
I am looking forward to finishing the end of the movie because I want to know if D-Jay with got caught or if he made it in to the music buisness. I also want to see what happened to the girls along with Skinny. I guess that is all I have to say today.

Links:

http://www.hustleandflow.com/
http://ec2.images-amazon.com/images/P/B0009OL7W2.01._SS500_SCLZZZZZZZ_V1119289665_.jpg
http://www.smartlyrics.com/Song562292-Djay-f-Shug-Its-Hard-Out-Here-for-a_Pimp-lyrics.aspx

Presentations

Today I just wanted to talk about the class presentations that we had. I thought they were all really good not meaning that I am commenting on mine this is in reference to the other three that were presented.
I am going to start off with the Milli Vanilli presentation. I have to say that before the presentation today I had not heard of them before. I know that is really sad, but it is true. I found it really sad when they were talking about them getting caught for lip syncing. I don't that that people or groups should do that, but it is still sad. I also found it interesting when we got into the discussion of groups or people being staged and not real. I just don't know why companies would want to do that maybe I just don't understand but it just seems kind of dumb I mean you are going to get caught sooner or later. I guess they could look at it as we will see how long we can go and how much money we can get until people find out. A question I have is why didn't the two guys have to pay back all that money when they were the ones that got asked to do it, why should the owners or record label not have to pay or did they???
Onto the other topic I liked the presentation about Dr. Dre it was really good. I didn't know that Dre was the one who founded Snoop Dogg and is now a producer. I knew that Dre had done some songs or raps. It was interesting to know that he founded Aftermath records and took Snoop Dogg with him and practicallhy made him who he is.
The most interesting thing discussed today was when the group talked about the east coast/west coast battle. It had been brought up in class but I really didn't know exactly what it was about. Now that I do I don't know how I feel about it. When they were talking about how 2pac got shot and 1000 dollars got stolen from him and then they said that it was Notorious BIG and he said it wasn't it just seemed kind of silly. Then 2pac died and the speculations continued to come up all the time and then BIG died and it is still unsolved. When I think about it I just want to know why rappers think that killing people, not that I am trying to say that it happens all of the time but in this particular case it did. I do plan on looking into this a little more because I find it really interesting. I just feel a lot better already having learned as much as I have this far.

Links:

1.http://www.snoopdogg.com/
2. http://www.vh1.com/artists/az/dr_dre/artist.jhtml
3.http://www.crimelibrary.com/notorious_murders/celebrity/shakur_BIG/2.html

Why White Kids Love Hip Hop

In the hand out that we read for our quiz in class about why white kids love hip hop was a very interesting article. It brought up a lot of topics that I don't think about when I think about hip hop. I thought it was interesting to find out that now there are just as many white people that love hip hop as african american. The quote at the beginning of the article was something I think is very true it said, "People are not born racist. Racism is a learned behavior that is part of American culture. If hip-hop can change that, then there is reason for hope." Haki Madhubuti. That quote is somthing that I have talked about to some people in my own family. I have always hated when people talked down to blacks or treated them as if they were not equal. I am also the person that when I hear it always make known that I am not okay with things like that being said. So I really do feel that this particular quote says a lot. I also found it very intersting when they discussed about the different magazines and news stations that before didn't want to have anything to do with talking about hip hop. But as the music and the artists began to become more famous they couldn't not talk about them or put them on the cover of the magazines. I think that is so good of the hip hop artists that if the media and other are going to go out of their way to try and keep them from not succeding that they make it where they can't help but give them the respect they deserve. Another interesting thing was about the real leaders and owners in the hip hop business not being the artists but being corporations which are mostly owned by whites. Just from reading this article I became more aware of what hip hop use to be to where it has become today. And to get back to something that was asked in the beginning of the class if I thought hip hop was going to die. I didn't really know how to answer that question at first because I didn't know how it got to where it was, but after seeing what it has gone through and the success it has had I think it will be a long time before hip hop dies. And now that it is becoming a very dominat music genre it could be around a lot longer than we think.


Links:

http://men.style.com/?mbid=google
http://www.forbes.com/lists/2006/53/O0ZT.html
http://www.billboard.com/bbcom/charts/chart_display.jsp?g=Singles&f=Pop+100