Booty

Doesn't "Ms. New Booty" sound like the Boondock's satiracle booty butt cheeks?

It's sad when the satire isn't even satire any more. on a similary note, Jamie Foxx's Three letter word, sounds like a song he would have done on an In Living Color sketch as R. Kelly.

O, I like that!

The year in review - Mad Skillz ghostwriter extrodinaire!

No Religion

Worst Rapper of All Time?

The "Bible of Hip Hop" took a downturn some time ago however I still found quality news and politics pieces from time to time. That time ended about a year ago when I stopped thumbing through the mag at my local Barnes & Nobles. Anyway, this was one of my windows into hip hop when I was just a shorty in tha town so it was particularly dissapointing to watch its downfall. But this absurd tragedy has turned comedy with Benzino* acting a fool on Ozone Magazine Founder and EIC Julia Beverly's voicemail. Wow.

Just a sneak pic at Benzino's elementary verbal arsenal:

...F*cking prostitute, cracker, f*cking-man-b*tch, you!"

Get 'Em Daddy!

"...when I tend to think of Rosa"

*Freedom (Rap Version)* also listed on the full length soundtrack as "Dallas' Clean Half Dozen Mix"
*Freedom (Original)*

I want to say this is my all time favorite hip hop posse cut but I don't feel comfortable writing the word "posse." It's like raising the roof or furiously pumping one's fist while wildly woofing Arsenio Hall style, practices in which I, and my lifelong best friend L'Erin Asantewaa, still participate un-ironically. But I just can't get down with the word "posse" but I obviously haven't let that stop me from earnestly foraging through crates and CD sleeves for my favorite female rap collaborations.

Semantics aside hearing this song for the first time was like eating cotton candy on a rainy day.* "Freedom" was the theme for the 1995 motion picture Panther directed by Mario Van Peebles and scripted by his veteran filmmaking father Melvin. Producer Dallas Austin (Diamond D and Joi "copy cat, copy cat, get your own shit" Gilliam are also credited) assembled an impressive array of black female vocalists for the lead track. Vanessa Williams, Coko of SWV, Patra, Meshell N'degeocello, Mary J. Blige, Zhane, Chili and T-Boz of TLC, Aaliyah, Pebbles, Amel Larrieux, N'Dea Davenport, Tonya Blount, Monica who has the best line of the song: "I can make you run make you hide from all your ancestors transgression that you hold inside", Queen Latifah in her crooning Dana Owens incarnation, En Vogue and a host of other mid nineties R&B powerhouses traded lines blending their voices into one on the declamatory chorus: "Freedom for my body. Freedom for my mind. Freedom for my spirit." The arrangement was masterful. The women riffed and scatted allowing the spirit of the film, black empowerment and self determination, to guide their voices to poignant perfection.

Soon after the song faded into digitized oblivion I was met not with a instrumental or an acapella but an explosive rap version with an equally impressive smorgasboard of black female wordsmiths from LA underground legend Medusa to the 'Queen L-A-T-I-F-A-H in command' in her original gritty mic murdering form. First, Queen of the Pack Patra set it off exhibiting some pan-Africanist solidarity and subsequently held down the chorus which gelled verses by the aforementioned Jersey rap royalty and the LA luminary, YoYo, Left Eye of TLC, MC Lyte, Meshell Ndegoocello in an extended version of spoken word piece she delivers on the original, and Salt-N-Pepa whose dated elementary rhyme scheme is the only low point of the star studded affair.

Everybody but the well intentioned Salt-N-Pepa absolutely kills their verses exhibiting a fair amount of gender consciousness and, I'll say it, Feminism, even though to my knowledge none of them would self identify as such (Left Eye refers to herself as 'feministic' on her verse, which is, in my opinion, close enough). It's like the spirit of Sojourner Truth occupied these women's variegated brown bodies for one long studio session. My favorite verses are from MC Lyte and surprisingly, bubblegum lyricist Left Eye. Left Eye addresses her volatile relationship with Andre Rison, then a star for the Atlanta Falcons football team. She asserts her individuality and then her community mindedness. She's fearlessness, she's angry and everything in between in the space of a few witty bars:

Whoever said these are the things that you can do
And the things you ain't supposed to
So am I further when I think I'm getting closer
That's when I tend to think of Rosa how was it
Took a seat to make a stand
But now in standing we've gotten more demanding
They never thought in planning
That a wish for us to sit would be a dose of
This fucking rollercoaster
Whether tradition or religion
Why you question my decision
Why you spend up all your time trying to
Get into my mind
Why everybody and they mama
Gots to add to all my drama mad drama
Hell if I'ma keep my dominating feministic hell
Creating CrazySexyCool black ass
In the palms of your player hater's stands/(stance?)
My only chance of being free is to fly within me
And it's illegal to kill a fucking eagle
A bird is never more important than my people
I guess we didn't need him so I took away his freedom

This song is as important as it is a relic of a dynamic but now dormant moment in contemporary black popular music. I'm grateful that I was a little black stereo fiend in Seattle, WA then and not now 'cause I don't hear anything like this on the radio or see anything like this on the TV and I can't import this into every little black girl's iPod but I can't say that I won't try.

* I imagine Nikki G, who coined that line and is a Black Arts Movement Baby and a rap fan as demonstrated by her "Thug Life" tattoo, liked this song a lot and still does.

Q-Unit

Proper Post later today but in the meantime this Queen/50 Cent Mix (I refuse to use the word mash up since it's just a white word for something that already existed and but to be fair The Silence Xperiment who is responsible for this labels these remixes not mash ups) Anyway the best songs imo are: This Is How We Bite The Dust, If I Cant Be A Champion, Under Pressure All The Time, Old Fashioned Outta Control Lover & Bohemian Wanksta

Dear Mr. Leach

My name is Moya Bailey and I am a graduate student at Emory University. More importantly, I am black woman. As such, I am very concerned with the state of the music and videos your company produces.

This isn’t a message of hate or even anger; it’s a message of exasperation. I’m out of ideas on how to reach you and your clients, how to let you all know that a lot of the stuff you're making is toxic, that it is literally killing black women and girls in this country and around the world.

These images and lyrics, that suggest that black women are only hypersexual objects for male enjoyment are broadcast globally and are the primary images and representations of African-American women that people see. It reinforces stereotypes that white Europeans had about black women since we were “discovered” on the shores of Africa.

But you know this and it hasn’t deterred you because it’s a profitable industry. You all seem to say that “sex sells” and the ends justify the means if it means you get paid. I just wonder if at some point you’ll be rich enough to stop and think about what this says to the world about black women and black people. Black men are portrayed as violent, brutal, equally hypersexual, and materialistic. Doesn’t this bother you?

As I said before I’m not sure what to do but I’m offering up a plea for some kind of parity in terms of what is being said on the radio and played on MTV. It makes it seem as though black musicians can’t rhyme about anything other than sex, money, and violence. I’m tired of trying to defend hip hop when it becomes indefensible. I’m tired of hearing music that assaults my very humanity. I’m tired of hearing girls complain about being assaulted in clubs, or by boyfriends, or guys they know or don’t know, of being called a bitch and a ho, of being cursed out because I didn’t want to give someone a number, of trying to reason with record companies and artists and convince them their actions impact the daily lives of black women in this country and abroad.

I feel like I’m talking to a wall here but I’m not going to give up on your humanity and I hope that will remind you of mine. Couldn’t you put a black rapper on that raps about studying, or sunshine, or food, or something else equally random but not so destructive?

I feel like I'm rambling now so I’ll take my leave of you. Please do something to promote a more balanced (if not positive) perception of black women in this country. You have that power. Use it.

Sincerely,

Moya Bailey

Born into flames

It's so crazy how things come full circle so quickly. No sooner had I pondered when did Rapture come out? that my partner in rhyme had posted that info. This film features a blondie esque rhyme that really got me thinking about the revolutionary roots of hip hop. also had me questioning whether Palahniuk is a biter.

Joan has said that we need to loosen our death grip on the music. we should trust that there will be something else. i think she's right. at the same time we can't let rap go out like this. People need to be called out and so this is me, calling some people out.

Sumner M. Redstone
Chairman of the Board and Chief Executive Officer of Viacom
1515 Broadway
New York, NY 10036
(212) 258-6000

Bryan Leach, Vice President of A&R — urban
bryan@tvtrecords.com
label: TVT Records
address: 23 E 4th St, 3rd Floor
city: New York City
state: New York
zip code: 10003
phone: 212-979-6410
fax: 212-979-6489
http://www.tvtrecords.com/home/

Train of Thought

Sha Rock Can't Be Stopped

*"Funk You Up" MP3*
Bonus: It's My Beat patron saint Jean Greasy with "My Crew"

So I was thinking how I, we, don't want to replicate the gender inequity in hip hop in our blog by centering male artists even in our critique of them. Then I was thinking about what hip hop songs by female hip hop artists resonated with me in the past few months. Then I was thinking barely any female hip hop artists have put out any major label albums in the past year. Then I was like I wonder if Jean Grae's music is on iTunes. Then I saw that The Bootleg of the Bootleg, Attack of the Attacking Things and This Week are on there. Yay! (There was a time Fat Beats and Sandbox Automatic were vitually the only places you could find her stuff.) Then I saw that she also has music featured on an iTunes essential compilation entitled "First Ladies of Hip Hop." Okay! Then I read this rubbish (from the liner notes):

The Basics:

A quarter-century ago, when Debbie Harry slipped some slithery rhymes over the landmark new wave of Blondie's "Rapture" she did more than introduce rap to rock She knocked down the door to the boys club of hip-hop, allowing some of the most revolutionary MC's in the game to have their voices heard.

"Rapture", a single from the 1980 Blondie album Autoamerican, featured an elementary rap by Debbie Harry who along with bandmate and partner Chris Stein, members of the downtown art scene, were introduced to the nascent culture of hip hop courtesy of tourguides Fab Five Freddy and Jean Michel Basquiat. This same year Sugar Hill Presents The Sequence, an album by female rap trio The Sequence, was released and feautured the hip hop classic "Funk You Up" recently revisited by Erykah Badu with help from Queen Latifah, Bahamadia, and original The Sequence member, Angie Stone, on Worldwide Underground's "Love of My Life Worldwide." The Sequence does not appear on the "First Ladies of Hip Hop" iTunes essential compilation. The Sequence are not mentioned in the above cited iTunes liner notes. Neither are Sha Rock of the Funky 4 + 1 or Pebblee Poo (from whom Master P. bit his trademark "Make 'Em Say Unh") artists who had been putting it down prior to 1980. This essential list makes sure to include female hip hop collabs with white pop artists: Eve's "Let Me Blow Your Mind" with Gwen "appropriator" Stefani and Ms. Jade's "Ching Ching" with hip hop's favorite Canadian, Nelly Furtado. Countless female showstoppers; women of color who were steeped in the revolutionary culture and artform of hip hop put it down before Debbie Harry and will be putting it down when Debbie or Gwen and their ilk decide to pilfer equally 'exotic' musical styles. "I could go on and on; the full has never been told." And maybe I should, we should, or else iTunes, with their inaccurate and ludicrous decision to begin the liner note of their essential mix of women in hip hop with Debbie Harry, will tell the story for us.