Carl has finally taken a better look at Rap and had some insight as to what it's about, where it comes from and the messages in it. It glorifies life in bad neighborhoods, that's where it originates, and that's the message....how bad people live. They aren't singing about romance, boy and girl love, places, memories, summertime fun, surfing, cars, or other songs with a social message about bad things going on in the world as Bob Dylan did.
In fact I may(not sure) download the girl's rant and run it on my station(would try and contact for permission first).
Rap is not music. There's no tune, chords, real instruments, and singing.
It is vulgar and made by people who have no musical aptitude whatsoever. It's audience is the same. No musical inclination of any kind, would never have the ability to play a real instrument and are tone deaf. You can't really call a rapper a "musician" can you?
And it's not kids anymore, it's into a second generation. Take a look at the cars that boom this as they are driving and it's not a kid at the wheel. They are in their 30s and older.
And I believe like the girl says in the rant that a good portion of listeners to this stuff are being influenced by what is being said in the lyrics and it's not how to live good and be a good person.
How did it ever come to this?
Well there's my rant(again as I have ranted in the past about the same subject).
And the girl in the video makes me realize that young people her age can see this for what it really is and denounce what this is all about. Good for her.
[Post edited by Moderator]
Mark, I respectfully disagree.
There will always be good music and bad music. Good art and bad art.
Rap at its worst certainly fits into your description. At its best, it is found in the play Hamilton, which has had unprecedented critical and box office success.
Music that is different is always met with criticism. Mozart’s Marriage of Figaro, when first performed, was not well liked. “Too noisy”, “Too many notes”, etc. Now, it’s recognized for the masterpiece that it is.
I think we need to keep open minds about every artistic endeavour- otherwise, you never know what you might miss.
Question of Rap
The intelligent opinion so well voiced by Stell Bell and Mark's specific point of view have not completely changed my own position on the subject of rap, but have helped me understand why it is so disliked.
I think we are talking about three different things with a tendency to lump them all together.
Rap music is very much about words and language, and if there's a sharp edge to a lot of it that certainly comes from the words.
Next comes the question of whether rap actually qualifies as music. I kind of liken it to a form of drum music, and the military also uses drum music as have many civilizations and cultures. Probably the drum was the first music instrument. Symphony orchestras have huge drum sections. I like drum music.
Finally, rap is attributed to black people, and no doubt they invented the genre, but now there are many white rap artists as well, so no real point is necessarily made by mentioning it unless the artists employ rap as an expression of mistreatment they've experienced, a sort of protest that can also be done through poetry or plain verse and is protected free speech. Rap could be used just as easily to deliver any message, even a station announcement or advertisement.
KDX will probably block rap music that has an axe to grind because that would make it more of a program in itself and not simply an interlude, which is what we seek in between programs. It'll be difficult to separate the subject content of rap because the words are not always easily understood; it would help to have a lyric sheet.
Getting to know the individual artists will probably be the best way to become familiar with what's being conveyed by particular samples.
I saw the part of my rant that got moderated but I was just making a comparison and if it was seen you would know what I was saying. Nothing derogatory was intended.
By the way Carl, you can get the lyrics of anything just by searching any song and lyrics.
Useful Information
Mark shared: "By the way Carl, you can get the lyrics of anything just by searching any song and lyrics."
That is useful to know and thank you for telling me. I will start searching for lyrics and discover what is being said by all the fast talkers.
Mark said: "Rap is not music. There’s no tune, chords, real instruments, and singing."
"HOLD MY BEER..." (John Cage, Edgard Varese, Steve Reich, Nam June Paik)
I also know that there are other genera non rap songs that have a bad message although far and few between....."Mack the Knife" by Bobby Darin, "Under my Thumb" and "Brown Sugar" by the Stones, "Itchicoo Park" by the Small Faces and some of the Lou Reed songs with the Velvet Underground and even the Beatles "Run for your Life" and Rappers would point to that in their defense. Those songs wouldn't get played on my station.
Neither would "hey Joe" or Neil Young's "Down by the River"
99% of the other stuff those artists did wasn't like that. Like I said it's isolated cases.
But a whole Genera based on life in bad neighborhoods and the majority of it being a cool way to live is a different story besides the non musical part and it sounding so vulgar and I hear it all the time from all the cars and I've looked at lyrics to have an educated opinion and the girl doing the rant has it right on.
Still Interested in this Subject
Like turning on a light bulb I suddenly realized that for short bridges in between programs I would not want vocal music. It is best to use instrumental music.
That raises the question, is there any instrumental rap?
Those thumping car loudspeakers that roll around are just plain rude like people with dogs barking all day.
Well Carl, if you take away the vocal and have it in karaoke style you now have instrumental Rap. I'm sure it's there. You'll get something like electronic dance music with the same thump thump thump.
Deep Music Studies
Still learning, I have discovered that the form of rap music that stirs the most disapproval is called "gangsta rap", and by reading the details we learn that several common assumptions about the music are wrong.
Rather than being an unleashed outpouring of profanity and crime, it is actually a story told from a very blunt point-of-view about conditions and dangers living in certain parts of town.
Gangsta rap does not "promote bad neighborhoods", as has been mistakenly said, but complains about conditions in bad neighborhoods owing in part to poor city administration.
And because gangsta rap is only one type of rap it is unfair to lump all rap into the same category.
The True Story About Gangsta Rap
Carl, using my "open' mind I read the Wikipedia article you referred to and whatever take you want to put on it, it is still about criminal life in bad parts of any city....things I don't want to hear about or ever be around, and the "music" part of it is personal opinion and my opinion and what I compare it to, is, that it's not music. As for these "bad" areas, these are no good people who choose to live like this and sing about it in their songs which I don't want to hear and the other versions of this genera are watered down to make it more mainstream but still has it's roots in this. The countless "African American"(to be politically correct) groups, singers, etc that graced Motown, everyone from the Spinners to Nat King Cole....from Chuck Berry to Muddy Waters, Jazz people from Oscar Peterson to Ella Fitzgerold and on and on and on.......to Aretha Franklin....if you read their biography you will find they(many of them) grew up in not good areas and were poor but didn't choose a life of gangs and crime and made real music and didn't sing about criminal life in bad areas and became "good" people. They sang about romance, boy and girl, innocence, love, school days, dances like the Locomotion, the twist, and countless more. Wilson Pickett, James Brown, etc etc etc...... sang about girls and boys, dancing and romance.
So, what happened? How come singers like Al Green aren't around now?
Mark, I heartily suggest you Google the lyrics to "I Need Love" by LL Cool J. There is not one single sung note anywhere in the recording. It is all recitation. But it is as heartfelt a love song as anything from anyone you mentioned.
Remedial Reading
I love these threads where we learn by sharing what we think and know about things.
Later today I will try to link everyone to a tremendous radio conversation I found between a top journalist and a famous rap artist. It is very intelligent and informative and might help shatter some of the attitudes about rap artists being gangstas.
Meanwhile a new question: is there any rap parody? I mean, some funny rap songs?
I don't like rap. Much as I don't like most country music (although I like Patsy Cline & other classic country artists that also made the pop charts in the 40s, 50s & 60s).
But it's not the only genre to sing about crime and drug use. Google vintage jazz & drugs & you'll find many well known artists, including Ella Fitzgerald (admittedly early in her career, before she tried to market herself as the girl next door). Billie Holiday's career was cut short & certainly greatly affected by her drug addictions. And there are many, many more.
That doesn't even cover alcohol abuse.
Far be it from me to sweep rap under the rug just because I don't personally like it.
Theodore Sturgeon, the great science fiction writer, once postulated that 90% of everything is crap. For non current music, we tend to remember only that 10% that rose to the top and was good. In the here and now, the 90% tends to overshadow the good 10%.
Carl asked if there are any funny rap songs. Hell yeah:
"Baby Got Back" - Sir Mix a Lot
"The Honeymooners Rap" - Joe Piscopo
"Ya Mama" - The Phaarcyde
...and no less than 10 songs from Weird Al Yankovic:
(www.hotnewhiphop.com/10-hip-hop-songs-parodied-by-weird-al-news.11564.html)