"This is anti autotune, death of the ringtone, this ain’t for itunes, this ain’t for sing alongs" - Jay-Z, D.O.A.

Jay-Z’s first released single from The Blueprint 3 (listen to it here) does so much more than take shots at the rise of the auto-tuned voice in hip hop.  It drops bombs on an entire sector of the music industry that has been producing music that betrays a recession of creativity.  Hopefully, H.O.V.A.’s new album will prove to be the stimulus package that averts a creative Great Depression.

Now, I think auto-tune, like all musical technologies has its place.  Kanye West used it wisely on 808s and Heartbreak, turning his voice into a series of staggering icicles that reflect both the coldness and sharpness of loneliness when a relationship hits an iceberg.  And I enjoyed the first few singles from T-Pain and Lil’ Wayne simply because of the sheer fun of hearing bright and shining auto-tuned harmonies coated like frosting over a hearty beat.  I use auto-tune myself.  As a musician and songwriter who doesn’t have the time or money to spend on perfecting my voice, I enjoy the subversiveness of auto-tune and how it allows me to be creative on my own terms.

But I agree with Jay-Z—the industry has stuffed too much of this sugary stuff down out throats.  His critique could have come from the best writers at Pitchfork or Rolling Stone, although these publications might feel comfortable with challenging the mas

So tatsy, but not very nutritious

culinity of rappers who use auto-tune (“All ya’ll lack aggression put your skirt back down, grow a set man … you boys jeans too tight”).  At the heart of his critique is the idea that the bright melodies that auto-tune are turning rappers away from one of their key duties: to use their voice and words to establish a solid beat.  Sloughing off this important duty, rappers and producers have been able to produce a slew of mediocre songs, which have moved hip hop away from its roots.  So who better to lead us forward (while looking backwards) than the Sinatra of hip hop?

Jay-Z also aligns the rise of auto-tune with the over commercialization of hip hop, using auto-tune as a symbol for the ringtones, itunes, and other “sing a longs” that have made a lot of money by jumping on the coattails of the hip hop that Jay-Z helped reform during the late 90s.  Although making money has always been an important facet of hip hop, these methods of generating income saturate the songs with an irony that all but paints over the gritty street realism that Jay-Z’s work has brought to the table.  So let’s put away the candy, say Grace, and have a moment of silence for autp-tune while we wait for the release of The Blueprint 3.

Lyrics:

“Only rapper to rewrite history without a pen,
No ID on the track let the story begin, begin, begin” (chorus)

This is anti autotune, death of the ringtone, this ain’t for itunes, this ain’t for sing alongs,
this is Sinatra at the opera, bring a blonde, preferably with a fat ass who can sing a song, wrong,
this aint politcally correct, this might offend my political connects,
my raps don’t have melodies, this should make jackers wanna go and commit felonies, ahh
get your chain tooken, I may do it myself - I’m so Brooklyn.
I know we facing a recession, but the music y’all making going make it the great depression.
All y’all lack aggression put your skirt back down, grow a set man.
Yeah this just violent, this is the death of autotune, moment of silence.

(Chorus)

This ain’t a number one record, this is practically assault with a deadly weapon,
I made it just for flex and Mister CEE I want people to feel threatened
stop your bloodclot crying, the kid, the dog everybody dying, no lying,
you boys jeans too tight, you colors too bright, your voice too light
I might wear black for a year straight, I might bring back Versace shades
this ain’t for z100, Ye told me to kill y’all to keep it 1 hundred,
this is for hot 97, for Khalid we the best’n,
yeah this is just violent, this is death of autotune, moment of silence.

(Chorus)

This might need a verse from Jeezy, I might send this to the mixtape weezy,
get somebody from BMF to talk on this, give this to a blood let a crip walk on it,
50 thou to style on this, I just don’t need nobody to smile on this,
you rappers singing too much, get back to rap you t-paining too much.
I’m a multi-millionaire so how is it I’m still the hardest here,
I don’t be in the project hallway talking about how I be in the project all day
that sound stupid to me, if you a gangsta this is how you prove it to me.
Yeah just get violent, this is death of auto-tune moment of silence.

la da da da hey hey hey, goodbye
hold up
the only rapper to re-write history without a pen
no i.d. on the track let the story begin
this is anti auto-tune death of the ring tone
this ain’t for itunes this ain’t for sing a longs
this is sinatra at the opera bring a blonde
preferably with a fat ass who could sing a song
wrong this ain’t politically correct
this might offend my political connect
my raps don’t have melodies

“London
Quiet down I need to make a sound
New York
Quiet down I need to make a sound
Kingston
Quiet down I need to make a sound
Brazil
Quiet down I need to make sound” – M.I.A., “Bucky Done Gun”

Although I knew that M.I.A.’s creative beats and abrasive yet flowing rhymes would be enthusiastically received by a mainstream audience if she ever got any radio play, a year ago I never would have bet that I would be hearing one of her songs on national radio stations incessantly.  “Paper Planes,” featuring a sample from the Clash’s 1982 song “Straight to Hell,” revolves around a cartoonish chorus filled with gun shots and cash-register rings, wrapped with verses that boast of manufacturing fake visas, selling drugs, and “making that fame.”  Ironically, the one M.I.A. song that has hit the “big-time” is also her first major attempt at mocking mainstream music’s dearth of political discourse. “Paper Planes” reveals just how ridiculous—and

"Paper Planes: Homeland Security Remixes"

ridiculously popular—guns, drugs, and money can be when they are not understood within a specific context, or when these things are used to stereotype immigrants and people of the “third world.”  Unlike “Paper Planes,” most of M.I.A.’s songs derive their political message from her capacity to place apparently “criminal behavior” within a global context, which inevitably belies the idea that the “crimes” that she rhymes about are indeed criminal acts.  But even as “Paper Planes” reached number one on “T.R.L.” and “MuchOnDemand Top Ten” and indie hipsters gleefully mimicked M.I.A.’s satirical dance moves (see her performance on the David Letterman Show), the corporate music giants judged that the song still needed to be “cleansed,” despite repeated objections from the artist herself.  UPDATE: “Paper Planes” has been nominated for both a Grammy and an Oscar.

And this gets to the heart of one of M.I.A.’s grand themes: representation, or who gets to portray who you are and how you can go about exerting influence on portrayals of yourself.  In a small yet telling example of her attitude towards representation, M.I.A.’s second album opens with a song that forcefully reminds her audience that she is not “Maya” (a girl’s name), but rather “M.I.A.”  She is not a name, or a signifier of a stable identity, but rather the absence of a stable identity—an identity that is apparently and continually missing in action.  She knows that she is not literally “missing in action,” but, instead, understands that hip hop artists who represent the “3rd world,” such as herself, are often underrepresented and/or misrepresented in Western cultural, political, and intellectual discourse.  She and many artists like her are often the presence of an absence in today’s hip-hop scene.

Born in the London suburb of Hounslow and raised in Sri Lanka, Mathangi Arulpragasam returned to London as the civil war between the Sri Lankan Army and the Tamil Tigers escalated.  Although images of the Tamil rebellion were pervasive in her early artwork, her early musical and visual compositions also revolved around an inner-conflict: a search for personal identity, which would be both English and Sri Lankan, both colonizer and colonized.

“I was sipping on a Rubicon
Thinking ’bout where I come
It’s all this for revolution
Cuttin’ up the coupon
Savin for a telephone
Can I call home
Please Can I go Home” – M.I.A., “Amazon,” Arular

As her music spread through the globe’s independent music scenes as rapidly as Tandoori chicken, she had to deal with male-dominated major record labels, which would soon profit immensely off of her self-cultivated underground popularity.  They would also attempt to control representations of Arulpragasm.  However, her albums, both of which are named after her parents, not only resisted the image-control of record producers and the music media, but also attempted to shed light on the lives of other women and men who continually find themselves being misrepresented by Western men and women.

In an interview with online-music-journalism giant Pitchfork Media, M.I.A. forced the interviewer to scrap his pre-made questions and proceeded to direct his attention to more pressing matters.  She immediately rejected the oft-touted notion that Diplo, a Philly-based DJ/Producer and self-described “white guy from Florida,” made Arular, her first full-length album.  Indeed, contrary to rumors of Diplo’s involvement in the making of both the music and politics of Arular, M.I.A. constructed the album on her own, in her basement, using relatively inexpensive equipment and—certainly—her own intellect and experiences.

Although she managed to clear up the rumors about Diplo, these rumors were only the tip of a far greater iceberg, which would continually rise to the surface throughout Arulpragasm’s career:

M.I.A.: So the whole time I’ve had immigration problems and not been able to get in the country, what I am or what I do has got a life of its own, and is becoming less and less to do with me. And I just find it a bit upsetting and kind of insulting that I can’t have any ideas on my own because I’m a female or that people from undeveloped countries can’t have ideas of their own unless it’s backed up by someone who’s blond-haired and blue-eyed. After the first time it’s cool, the second time it’s cool, but after like the third, fourth, fifth time, maybe it’s an issue that we need to talk about, maybe that’s something important, you know.

I admire M.I.A.’s patience, and I agree with her when she says that this is “an issue we need to talk about.”  So let’s connect M.I.A.’s experience, as a Sri Lankan/English female hip hop artist, to the larger story of (mis)representations of “3rd world” women.  But let’s do this on Friday.  In the meantime, please, if you haven’t yet, check out M.I.A.’s life story, music, and artwork.

M.I.A.'s album covers reflect her fascination with textiles, the woven products of learning and labor

We all know about Wall Street and Main Street, but what about the Street?

Although many Americans are able to gain a piece—however small—of “the pie,” their ability to do so largely rests on the historical, racial economic exploitation of others, predominantly “minority” populations, who, no matter how hard they try, cannot find solid financial ground beneath their feet.

However, as Melvin L. Oliver and Thomas M. Shapiro point out in “Getting Along,” this solid financial footing that many Americans enjoy does not consist of typical signifiers of economic status, such as one’s salary or wage.  Instead, it consists of “wealth.” Wealth can mean a number of things, including money that has been passed down through generations, which can be used to pay for a home, to start up a business, or to provide a quality education for one’s children. Although middle-class White communities are typically able to pass on some form of this wealth to their children, the accumulation of wealth in Black communities has been impeded by historic barriers, which have been constructed by both centuries of slavery, slavery’s aftermath, and the inherently–and persistently–racist structure of American society.

Of course, simply solving the wealth crisis in African American communities would not automatically catalyze a decline in the racist structure of American society.  Middle/upper class, predominantly white, communities will still attempt to hold on to their monopoly of “high” social status, and lower income white communities might maintain the notion that their whiteness constitutes a “psychological wage.” However, a solid economic footing, complete with access to wealth and assets, would certainly help the African American community confront—both psychologically and materially—the daily challenges of racism and, perhaps, in the long term, weaken America’s racial structure.

The racial wealth gap between Whites and African-Americans exists and persists for many different reasons. Through both subtle and obvious methods of discrimination, American society has provided, and is providing, more opportunities for the accumulation of wealth to Whites than Blacks, and this disparity of opportunities between Whites and Blacks is compounded by each generation, creating a cycle that keeps Blacks far from an ever-growing reservoir of White wealth. Even when whites and blacks are similar with regards to “identifiably important” economic factors, Blacks still confront a “$43,000 net worth handicap” (Oliver and Shapiro 525).

One reason for this disparity is U.S. government policies. During slavery, African Americans could not maintain any property, and even after the Civil War, Jim Crow laws and racist housing policies favored white home-buyers at the cost of severely limiting the possibility of home ownership among the Black population. And the U.S. tax code has continually favored those with assets—predominantly Whites—over those who are lacking in assets— predominantly Blacks. Even if an African-American family is approved for a mortgage, it is usually forced into paying outrageous interest rates due to the “riskiness” of the loan. And even if African Americans are able to pay off an expensive mortgage and keep their home, the value of homes in Black communities tend to decrease over time.  This almost always due to the placement of waste treatment facilities, highways, and garbage dumps near–and through–Black communities, as well as a lack of attention from city services such as police, fire departments, and utility companies.

Jim Crow wasn't just about public segregation

Whereas White parents are sometimes able to leave mortgage-free, high-value homes to their children, Black parents are often forced to pass on expensive mortgages to their children, once again limiting the ability of future generations to accumulate assets. Oliver and Shapiro argue, and I strongly agree, that these racist policies were not simply the consequences of capitalism and the free market, nor were they the mistakes of ignorant policy makers, but, instead, were—and are—the products of a predominantly wealthy White elite political class who were—and are—protecting their own political and economic interests at the cost of further driving down the wedge between Black’s and White’s access to wealth.

The dawn of the information age and the rise of advanced technology only makes this wealth disparity more dangerous to the Black population. While white families are often able to provide their children with the means of building an electronic literacy, or a familiarity with computers and the new media (websites, e-business, digital design, online advertising, computer programming, advanced communication technology, etc.), Black families, without appropriate assets, are often unable to provide their children with necessary learning tools. And this problem goes much extends beyond the family. I’ve recently read a book about electronic literacy by Gail Hawisher, an English professor the University of Illinois, which argues that white neighborhoods are more likely than black neighborhoods to have libraries and schools that not only provide free access to computers and technological resources, but also–and more importantly–provide teachers and tutors who can train young students in the use of new technologies.

Money Maker

Growing up in a nation that will rely more and more on an electronically literate workforce, young Black students who do not have access to training opportunities will be significantly at a loss when they attempt to obtain new technology-based jobs, which can provide access to new sources of wealth. Of course, this is just one sector of the economy that bolsters the argument that current welfare, housing, and minimum wage policies are not significantly improving Blacks’ present or future access to wealth.

The historical limitations placed on Blacks’ ability to gain wealth represent challenges that Black leaders and sympathetic, knowledgeable White leaders will need to address as soon as possible. Both Blacks and Whites need to work at not only helping black business men and women establish thriving businesses amidst the jungle of white-controlled American/global corporations, but also providing young African Americans with the tools that they will need to succeed in the future.

I might be a bit optimistic, but I believe that the new media, and the new technologies that produce the new media, can be excellent avenues of success for the next generations of African Americans–but this hinges on whether or not appropriate training and resources are provided.

This seems to be the crux of the issue: more resources—and a large variety of resources—need to be allocated to lower class and Black communities in order to confront the structural exclusion of the poor and Blacks from the mainstream economy. Although the rhetoric of reparations might be too discomforting for some White Americans to swallow, I tend to believe that once White Americans are convinced that the economic well-being of the nation is reliant on the inclusion of everyone, including those who have been historically exploited, in the new economy, they will be more willing to support initiatives that allow the lower classes and the Black community—as well as other minority communities—to accumulate wealth. Indeed, the consequences of the historical exclusion of Blacks from wealth will continue to affect the majority of Americans (i.e., the current financial crisis), except, perhaps, those elites who have enough wealth to support the next five generations of their families (and obtain golden lifeboats in the event of a collapse of the stockmarket).

In order to avoid the devastating consequences of a “Swiss cheese” economy, in which growing pockets of poverty exist alongside the growing wealth of the dominant class, Blacks of all economic and social classes will need to work together to present their struggles to a white community that will be, hopefully, ready not only to listen to the concerns of the Black community, but also willing to enact radical solutions.

Cheese is better without the holes

Works Cited

Oliver, M.L., Shapiro, T.M. “Getting Along: Renewing America’s Commitment to Racial Justic”

Bun B

In 2007, a group of fiscally wise hip hop artists, including Slim Thug and Bun B, toured the nation.  Rather than performing their latest hit songs, they spit some financial advice to young African-American and Hispanic fans.  Tales of personal economic woe, illustrated by anecdotes concerning unwise purchases and the pain of debt, brought a much needed sense of humanity to their lessons on financial responsibility.  While these artists encouraged their audience to develop a critical financial literacy, they also turned their critical eyes upon themselves, discussing how some hip hop artists–at least on the surface–seem to endorse a fiscally irresponsible lifestyle.

Previously, in 2005, rapper Eminem and hip hop mogul Russell Simmons launched the first “Hip Hop Summit on Financial Empowerment National Tour,” which featured financial expert Suze Orman and the Vice President of Crystler Financial, William F. Jones, Jr.  Like the 2007 tour, its precursor featured politically conscious hip hop artists like Reverend Run of Run DMC, Common, and MC Serch.

Simmons, financial philanthropist?

However, the history of the convergence of hip hop and finance is not solely made up of green and glowing moments.

Simmons made his first foray into the world of global finances in 2003, joining CIncinnati-based debt-and-loan-buyer Unifund Corporation in order to launch a debit/credit-card operation.  This new card would be

Note the Haliburton-esque font

offered to people who could not obtain credit-cards and/or loans from most money-lending institutions because of their poor credit scores.  Hoping to give the debit-cards to over 48 million consumers, of whom were mostly disadvantaged Hispanics and African-Americans, Simmons and Unifund launched the “Visa Rush Card,” which would cost $19.95, plus $1.00 per transaction.

I guess debt is gendered. Click on a card.

“Everything that we do comes from hip-hop culture, which is the expression of people who are struggling,” he said in an interview, speaking with the distinctive cadence of a man who sees poetry woven into daily life. “I’m doing something the banks should have done. The banks looked at the people in the face and did not see enough money in their eyes to pay attention to them.”

– An Ad for the Rush Card, quoting Russell Simmons

Although the “prepaid” card’s advertisements highlight how the card can be used to limit spending, the card not only comes with a variety of service fees, but also pulls users’ into greater debt by hiding its high overdraft and late fees. For a relatively small sample of the complaints of unhappy customers, just take a look at this Rush Card message board.

“RUSH CARD IS FULL OF (BULL s***). RUSSELL SIMMONS OLD WRINKLE UP a** NEED TO BE A SHAME OF HIS SELF. TALKIN ABOUT HE IS TRYING TO HELP OUT. ALL THEY DOING IS TAKING AN DOLLAR EVERY TRANSACTION, THAT IS MADE FROM THAT ACCT AND $1.95 FOR WITHDRAWL FEE ON TOP OF THE BANK FEE’S. IT IS AN BIG SCAM. IN THE OPERATOR DON’T KNOW WHAT THE f*** THEY ARE TAKING ABOUT. THEY DON’T SPEAK ENGLISH AND HAVE THE NERVE TO HANG UP YOU, BECAUSE YOU CAN’T UNDERSTAND WHAT THEY ARE TAKING ABOUT.”

– Lynett, from Florida, on August 20, 2008

“IF U VALUE YOUR MONEY “DON’T” f*** WITH THE RUSHCARD..AUGUST 1, THE WHOLE NETWORK WENT DOWN AND EVERY TIME I USED MY RUSHCARD IT DECLINED ME….BUT IT STILL TOOK THE CASH OUT OF MY BALANCE…AND EVERYTIME…I TRYED TO CALL CUSTOMER SERVICE “ALL CIRCUITS ARE BUSY NOW” FROM FRIDAY MORNING UP UNTIL 10 PM……THEY R REALLY TERRIBLE…………RUSSELL SIMMONS SHOULD NOT MAKE US PAY HIS ALAMONY AND CHILD SUPPORT 2 THAT ASAIN BROAD…………”

– Scottie, from Georgia, on August 2, 2008

While the many credit card users who could not make good on their spending played a role in generating the current financial crisis, corporations and moguls like Unifund and Simmons also set the stage for the fallout by offering a “safe” means of spending money and—to make matters worse—dragging their most disadvantaged customers down the abyss of debt with them. Simmons’s intentions might have been good, but his credit card—and the institutions that offered, bought, and sold sub-prime loans, opted to put profit over people, and short-term earnings over long-term success. Although Simmons might have wanted to help out fellow African-Americans–and fellow African-Americans and Hispanics might have wanted to help out Simmons, Simmons, however inadvertently, assumed the role of the oppressor, not the redeemer.  He did not consider how institutions like Unifund, which exploit economically disadvantaged folk by offering them loans with excessive interest rates, bolster the structurally racist economy of the U.S. and, perhaps, the globe.

Structurally racist economy?  Yes. If Simmons and Unifund truly wanted to help people, they could have gone to the root of the problem: the barriers that prevent–and continue to prevent–disadvantaged folk from gaining assets, wealth, and a home (that is, a home that increases in value rather than decreases).  Instead, they exacerbated and reproduced the problem.

So what’s the radical solution?  Well, many people have come up with some ideas, and we’ll talk about those on Friday.

Please share any experiences that you might have had with the “Rush Card” or similar operations.  And if anyone has been to one of these hip hop financial summits, please discuss the affect that they have had on your financial decisions.

I know that people wouldn’t usually rap this
But I got the facts to back this
Just last year, Chicago had over 600 caskets
Man, killin’s some wack shit Oh, I forgot, ‘cept for when niggas is rappin’

Do you know what it feel like when people is passin’?
He got changed over his chains, a block off Ashland
I need to talk to somebody, pastor

-Kanye West, “Everything I Am”

Defining himself by what he is not rather than by what he is, Kanye West challenges some general assumptions about hip hop and identity.  Although music critics and listeners would quickly agree that West exemplifies contemporary hip hop music, perhaps going so far as to say that he is the best producer/performer of hip hop in today’s scene, they tend to miss how West’s music is constituting a politically conscious counter-beat within mainstream hip hop.  Indeed, West’s sociopolitical syncopation often gets lost beneath a loud yet thin facade of big-label glam.  In “Everything I Am,” West attempts to set the record straight, revealing how stereotypes of hip hop are truly twisted, not to mention America’s discourse on violence.

First, he informs the listener that hip hop doesn’t and has never relied solely on fashion statements or “gun-talk.”  Lamb(l)asting the idea that rappers need to wear baggy clothes, rock expensive corporate brands, or glorify violence in order to identify with hip hop, Kanye cooly tosses off the words of critics who racistly complain that he is not “ghetto” enough.  Even as he coolly and confidently does so, he trashes the idea that hip hop artists need to maintain a calm, collected, tough-guy demeanor.  Anyone who saw West’s performance a couple of years ago at Lollapalooza will remember how he “spazzed out” after the sound crew

India.Arie

could not get the mix right for his hometown audience.  You might have recently seen him smash a paparazzo’s camera.  Indeed, as Kanye proclaims in the song, he can say “goodbye to the NAACP award / goodbye to the India.Arie award.”  In other words, West’s political messages may not always come out wrapped in the composure of Arie (recall his post-Katrina comments) or gain the backing of the NAACP (even though he won the institutions “Best New Artist” award).  But that’s not what’s important.  He’s say’n that although hip hop may be connected to African American musical and social revolutions of the past, it is also a relatively new movement, which has the potential to “act out” as it establishes itself under the watchful eyes of its forerunners.  And although some hip hop artists, under the watchful eye of big-label executives, endorse a corporate masculinity, West knows that hip hop has always been about undermining controlled images.

Him and his message, despite–or maybe because of–their anxious, kinetic appearance, remain prescient.  In the third verse, he joins artists like Talib Kweli and Common in their attempts to focus people’s attention on the real violence–as opposed to the fabricated violence that some hip hoppers and big-label CEOs like to profit off of–that is ripping through communities that lack the resouces to stem its tide.  While the U.S. spends billions of dollars in equipment and personnel to criminally occupy a country halfway around the world, West reminds us that “Just last year, Chicago had over 600 caskets.”  Although he correctly doesn’t argue that hip hop is the cause of this violence, he does ask both hip hop and the public to reevaluate their conceptions of violence and its source.  He feels an absence in America’s discourse on violence, and he hopes to remind his listeners of the people who are suffering from the violence of, in Jonathan Kozol’s poetic phrase, “savage inequalities,” which often go unnoticed here in the U.S.

Bud Billiken Parade, High School Anti-Violence Acrobats

The absence of any widespread discourse on these savage inequalities plays a crucial role in the formation of America’s national identity, in much the same way that West’s challenges of hip hop stereotypes constitute his own identity.  Perhaps West’s work, alongside that of other hip hop artists, will help change the way we all think about violence.

My 15 seconds up, but I got more to say
That’s enough Mr. West, please no more today

-Kanye West, “Everything I Am”

I’ve been absent from this blog for too long!  Luckily, my absence has got me thinking about the idea of absence and how one hip hop artist in particular has also thought about the idea of absence.  Enjoy.

The following types of people might have objections to this post:

1.) If you do not believe that hip hop artists are creators, consumers, and connoisseurs of contemporary critical theory and philosophy.

2.)  If you believe that anyone bellow the age of 25–especially one without an M.A. or PhD–should not discuss critical theory and philosophy.

Although you might fall into one of these categories, I hope that you will read on and, more importantly, make your presence felt by adding a comment or two to this post.  As for myself, I will try, as I write, to think not only about those people who will read and possibly enjoy this post, but also about those who will read it and find it out of touch, lacking focus, or simply untenable.

After all, this blog is not only constituted by those who read it and write it, but also by those who do not read it and do not write it.  It is as much about the presence of certain readers and writers as it is about the absence of other readers and writers.  Although this blog is dedicated to a discussion of hip hop, it is always already dedicated to a discussion of everything that is not hip hop.  Why?  Because it is impossible to define hip hop without thinking of everything that is not hip hop.

Therefore, everything that is not hip hop is actually here in this blog, pushed away into the background, seemingly absent but actually imperturbably present.  For example, we can’t identify someone as a hip hopper without ignoring or covering up the idea that that person is also a student, an American, a Chicagoan, a man, or an entrepreneur.  Stuart Hall, an eminent cultural studies scholar, provides us with an even more eloquent example.  Discussing British identity in a (post)colonial world, Hall argues that one

"Everything I'm not made me everything I am"

cannot be British without being Indian, Chinese, and Carribbean.  He uses a cup of tea to illustrate his point.  Although we might think that having a cup of tea is a marker of British identity, we also need to remember that the tea leaves are probably from India, and the cup is probably made out of porcelain from China, and the sugar at the bottom of the cup of tea was probably harvested by a worker in one of the cane fields of the West Indies.  We might identify the person enjoying the cup of tea in London as being British, and thus push all other identities into the background, but that British identity would not be perceivable if we didn’t believe that all those other identities were absent.  Of course, the Indian, Chinese, and Caribbean elements are present however much we tend to ignore them.  They may seem absent, but they are in fact critically present.

With the caveat that I do not wield an extensive knowledge of philosophy or critical theory, I think that it is safe to say that Jacques Derrida, one of the “founders” of Deconstruction, was the loudest and perhaps first scholar to voice the idea that absences are always present.  And who is the only artist in the music industry, as far as I know, that has been able to creatively build on this concept and apply it to his own career and music?  Kanye West.  (Please post comments about other artists who also feel the presence of absences!)

Contrary to the title of West’s track “Everything I Am,” Kanye actually uses the song to define himself by discussing everything that he is not.  He explains that he’ll never have the sex appeal of singers like Beyonce or be as stylish as mink-wearing artists like Killa Cam and Will.Iam.  Directly speaking to his audience, West wisely and humbly asks his listeners to define who he is: “Let me know if you feel it man / cause everything I’m not made me everything I am.”  Kanye knows that he cannot control his own identity and that, in fact, the public’s perception of him plays a crucial role in the constitution of his identity.  This idea that we do not control who we are goes against the grain of conventional American wisdom and, on a more local level, the idea that hip hop artists are self-made men and women who rise to the top because of their individual talent and work ethic.  Like his mentor Jay-Z, Kanye West knows that many things that are not under his control and seemingly absent from his performances–from the circumstances surrounding his upbringing to the hip hop artists that came before him and shaped his style–affect who he is today and what he has been able to accomplish.  Although some artists may be either unconscious of these absences or unwilling to discuss them, West forces them out of the shadows, pushing these absences into the spotlight for all to see.

Tomorrow we’ll discuss “Everything I Am” in more detail, analyzing the specific absences that West decides to rap about.  We will also need to ask ourselves both why he chooses these specific absences and what other absences lurk beneath the surface of the song.  In the meantime, feel free to make your absence felt by commenting with questions, concerns, and thoughts.

Listen to the song.

In the previous post, I discussed how Jay Z’s “My 1st Song” expresses his own conceptions of the American work ethic, individualism, and merit.  Although Jay takes pride in his own accomplishments, he also gives props to the luck he’s been handed and the talent he’s been given.

In other words, we could say that Jay doesn’t glorify the individual and the individual’s efforts.  He doesn’t make the claim, as many Americans do, that every individual has the opportunity to succeed in our capitalist society as long as he or she works harder than others.  At the same time, he doesn’t downplay the importance of having a strong work ethic, or of “staying hungry.”  Indeed, the chorus of “My 1st Song” emphasizes this point, using a brilliant chiasmic line to encourage the listener to approach every project, whatever it entails, with determination and dedication: “Treat my first like my last and my last like my first /. And my thirst is the same as when I came.”

He also places his rise to fame and fortune within a communal framework, drawing our attention to the friends and associates that played a role in his success.  Metaphorically calling himself a schoolboy, Jay describes his rise—or “education” in pedagogical terms, and notes that he had “to lay way in the cut, till I finally got my turn.”  In other words, his time to shine was preceded by an era of other gifted students, who not only taught him, but also established a foundation upon which he could write his own success story.

This system of communal education, labor, and success appears in other areas of hip hop culture and, as many scholars point out, in the guilds of the Middle Ages.  Like the apprenticeships that medieval master artisans offered to young protégés, “internships” are often offered by master graffiti artists, major MCs, and prominent b-boys to promising, yet callow, candidates.  Although these candidates must develop their own talents by serving their superiors, they are also given the opportunity to observe their “masters” at work, thereby gaining valuable insights into the “trade” as well as motivation and future connections—not to mention the right to eventually take on their own apprentices.

This cycle of education, which combines individual talent and labor with a communal scaffolding, belies the myth of self-determination and meritocracy.  Suggesting that individuals’ success stories are often authored on a solid slate comprised of a community of teachers, shared knowledge, and fellow students, Jay Z and hip hop attempt to redefine American conceptions of the individual, accomplishment, and labor.

“I’m just, tryin to stay above water y’know
Just stay busy, stay workin
Puff told me like, the key to this joint
The key to staying, on top of things
is treat everything like it’s your first project, knahmsayin?
Like it’s your first day like back when you was an intern
Like, that’s how you try to treat things like, just stay hungry”

–Notorious B.I.G., interview

“It’s my life - it’s my pain and my struggle
The song that I sing to you it’s my ev-ery-thing
Treat my first like my last, and my last like my first
And my thirst is the same as - when I came
It’s my joy and my tears and the laughter it brings to me
It’s my ev-ery-thing”

–Jay Z, “My 1st Song,” chorus

I hope everyone enjoyed their labor day weekend. As the American summer comes to a close (it’s a strangely Fall-like 62 degrees out here in Chicago) and students of all sorts return to school, perhaps it’s a good time to reflect on what labor means to hip hop, and how hip hop’s work ethic is different and/or similar to the “American” work ethic.

Recently, I’ve been spending a lot of my time studying for the Graduate Records Examination. Although my efforts to get a solid score on this challenging test certainly pale in comparison to the daily grind of those people who are working more than one job, raising a family, and waking up every morning to do the same thing, every once in while I need want something to help keep me go’n. And whenever I feel like one of my textbooks is enervating me (“enervating” is one of these fancy GRE words that I now feel the need to use in order to remember them), I’ll usually turn to hip hop music. One particular song has been getting a lot of play recently: Jay Z’s “My 1st Song”

"When I was born, it was sworn, I was never gon' be shit"

In “My 1^st Song,” which appropriately concludes Jay Z’s “retirement” album (The Black Album), Jay articulately describes his own work ethic. Over a waltzing bluesy beat, Jay first offers a rhetorical question, “Ya’ll wanna know why he don’t stop / Ya’ll wanna know why he don’t flop / Let me tell you people why / Came from the bottom of the block I.” What follows is a story about battling adversity, setting goals, pushing personal limits, and ultimately arriving a triumphant moment.

But Jay’s story isn’t a simple tale of individualism, self-determination, and pulling one’s self up by his own bootstraps. Although he joyfully proclaims that he is now “on top in the spot that I earned,” he also lets the listener know that he had to “take advantage of the luck you handed / or the talent you been given.” This is aspect of personal accomplishments that many Americans have a hard time accepting. In American society, the myth of the individual tends to allow no room for the “luck you handed” or the “talent you been given.”

Instead of thinking about the circumstances that have allowed powerful individuals to rise in American society, we sometimes give in to the appealing idea that these individuals did everything on their own, with no one’s help—we remove them from their societal context. What Jay is say’n is that he might have managed to pull himself up by his bootstraps, but, at the same time, he’s also say’n that he didn’t do it on his own.

He also argues that his own rise to stardom and power, like many other people’s rise, was not without its flaws. In the first verse of the song, he discusses how drug deal’n played a role in the development of his character. Although many critics of hip hop might vehemently declare that Jay is just another example of a rapper glorifying the drug trade, these critics are missing the subtext here, probably because they can’t hear the heart of the song over their own blow-hard voices. Jay is not glorify’n the drug trade; he’s speaking his mind about it in order to illustrate the fact that many youths get caught up in it, and, tragically, many cannot get out of it.

He is say’n that he is one of the lucky ones, calling on people to recognize the fact that many youths aren’t handed any luck or given the opportunity to develop their talent. Jay’s swagger certainly reflects some aspects of the American myth of individualism, but his rhymes also shatter some of those reflections. He paints himself as someone in the middle—pulling himself up by his own bootstraps, but also acknowledging where those boot straps came from.

Jay’s perception of his own work ethic shapes, and is shaped by, the work ethic that other hip hop artists have striven to develop. Tomorrow, I’ll dig a little deeper and try to discuss the bigger picture of hip hop’s work ethic. Tonight, there’s study’n to be done.

My 1st Song Video

Lyrics

“Hip-hop both produces and is produced by a cultural context that often thinks differently about questions of language, writing, identity and ownership from the mainstream discourses of the academy. … Hip-hoppers may have very different ideas about what it means for something to be real, how they relate to communities, how language operates. To the extent that this broad cultural movement influences youth in different ways across the world–always appropriated, always locally inflected–it is important that educators take this into account. Inclusion in the curicculum from this point of view, therefore, is not so much a question of using lyrics or discussing issues in popular culture as it is about engaging much more broadly with a cultural movement that has many different inflections across the globe.”

Alastair Pennycook, in Global Englishes and Transcultural Flows (p.150) (2007)

W.E.B. DuBois

February 23, 1986 - August 27, 1963

(check out Vibe’s tribute)