Stunts, Blunts, Blingin' and...

Yes this is the current state of Hip Hop, rap - whatever you want to call it. Everyone is up in a tizzy about the copious amounts of sex, violence, and blatant nothingness etc in the "art form" these last days. All the fuss, all the talk over what I consider to be nothing! Key word folks is the word "artform" Art is the concept of what any particular individual deems it to be. Art can be as beautiful as the Mona Lisa, African sculptures, the Mayan pyramids or Salvador Dali's strange abstract paintings. They were all different in their own ways, none of them duplicating the next. Mondrian just painted colored squares, DaVinci did portraits. Same goes for Hip Hop the music in my opinion can be an expression of whatever the artist wants it to be. From Ms. New Boody, Lean and Pop, Shoulder leans, big boodies shaking, dancefloor quaking - whatever. You've a whole school of thought that says that the recent Hip Hop releases are senseless. Ok and so what, is all art supposed to be master pieces. Sometimes they make as much sense as one of Dali's odd paintings, and so what, I'm sure more than a few folks have said a thing or 2 about Dali and his brand of art. Some say that the guys disrespect the women, the violence is too much. Yah ok, I don't hear these folks complaining about the abundance of violent movies, that they themselves enjoy watching. I'm sure they all love Denzel, but he won the Oscar for "Training Day" - the ultra violent movie. Yeah we sat there and cheered for his win. Lets not forget what Hip Hop is all about, its music, art, not reality, sometimes more like commentary. Why all the need for it to be positive or meaningful. Why can't it be nonsense, violent, sensible, deep, cultural, silly - whatever. Afterall, at the end of the day, its art and I've seen a million paintings and none of them are the same, and sometimes they don't always mean something to me.

And as for all the New York moaners, just lay off the rest of the country. When it was all about NY they ignored the rest of the country, now the spotlight has shifted they're moaning and hating on everyone else. Time for Atlanta, Texas, Louisiana, Florida, and all the other underdogs to rise. Sick and tired of all the tired "anthems" coming out of the city anyway that don't sound like shit anyway. The only thing playing on the local radio are the out of town hits and of course they're still holding on to when things were great, so, ample "throwbacks" Yeah keep dreaming, get to the studios and make something that sounds good. And as for all the elitists, just remember, art can be anything and just because we're black doesn't mean that everything that our artists put out should be socially responsible, they don't owe anything to society, these guys are not role models, they are singers/rappers or whatever. If they feel like reciting how big their rims are or how many chains, hey so be it. I am not looking to them for anything redeeming anyway and neither should society. So to everyone frustrating themselves with the "current state of Hip Hop" I say, get a life, bop ya head to the beat pop ya collar and just zone out lean and pop and have a ball; its just music, after all as I said before, it ain't that deep.