Sasha on Shadow, Diplo, Eminem & Minstrelsy

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it's funny someone knew i was thinking abt the clipse (who are not so much more complex than cam'ron - their agonized antihero pose should be familiar to 13-year-old readers of wolverine comics)

vahid (vahid), Saturday, 23 July 2005 00:58 (twenty years ago)

candicissima i think theres a difference between community ppl who condemn rappers for glamorizing crack to poor black kids and rap bloggers condemning other rap bloggers for makin tasteless and dumb crack jokes cuz they dont know shit about what crack means in real life beyond rap punchlines

3, Saturday, 23 July 2005 00:58 (twenty years ago)

For dipset, crack is like a fitted cap or the color purple. Not that, artistically, there is anything wrong with that (morally, up for debate)

The Clipse use crack as means to an end, it is a tool that they use to investigate, i donno, themselves, human nature, blah blah blah. You may not agree with their conclusions (if they ever draw any) but the way they both *use* crack in rap is different.

Vahid - just because you're not convinced by the Clipse's approach does not mean that its the *same* approach we're critiquing dipset for.

deej.., Saturday, 23 July 2005 01:01 (twenty years ago)

For dipset, crack is like a fitted cap or the color purple. Not that, artistically, there is anything wrong with that per se (morally, up for debate)

deej.., Saturday, 23 July 2005 01:02 (twenty years ago)

xposts galore

You told me to put the pipe down in my comments box the other day.

Indeed. But I wasn't saying it to be funny (and didn't necessarily mean crack). I mean, you said R. Kelly was a better performer or whatever than Teddy Pendergrass. You obviously were indulging in some wrong kind of narcotics.

I think crack is disassociated from its actual social connotations because its such a pop culture cliche.

And if that doesn't speak to privilege, than I don't know what does. I'm from East New York. Crack is not a joke nor a cliche to me.

The Clipse use crack as means to an end, it is a tool that they use to investigate, i donno, themselves, human nature, blah blah blah. You may not agree with their conclusions (if they ever draw any) but the way they both *use* crack in rap is different.

And that's OTM. I'm Not You is a fucking brutal ass song, but amusing since they are those rappers now that they were slagging off.

Candicissima (candicissima), Saturday, 23 July 2005 01:04 (twenty years ago)

xpost to deej: well, i have no idea why i started a stupid clipse v cam'ron debate - pusha t has been my current fave rapper for years now and i really like cam'ron too.

also i totally agree w/ the "rap bloggers making tasteless and dumb crack jokes" = fools.

vahid (vahid), Saturday, 23 July 2005 01:04 (twenty years ago)

Again, I wasn't excusing the privilege merely noting WHY a lot of bloggers including myself probably don't realize they should be offended by tales of crack dealing. The only reason I don't get into praising it much is because the stuff bores me. I do like when Fat Joe yells "crack!" out of goddamn nowhere.

miccio (miccio), Saturday, 23 July 2005 01:06 (twenty years ago)

would it be more reasonable to be disturbed by rap bloggers who are into cam'ron not because of crack glorification but because of hustler glorification?

vahid (vahid), Saturday, 23 July 2005 01:06 (twenty years ago)

I think we need to interrogate exactly what "hustler" means before we can answer that vahid!

deej.., Saturday, 23 July 2005 01:07 (twenty years ago)

(and what it means to who and the ramifications of such etc)

deej.., Saturday, 23 July 2005 01:09 (twenty years ago)

People definitely get into the archetype of confident, swaggering, irreverent outlaws. Which crime they perpetrate you find more noxious says more about your personal sensitivities than how reasonable you are.

miccio (miccio), Saturday, 23 July 2005 01:10 (twenty years ago)

I always kinda figured it was becuase of cheap-sounding-mixtape-production glorification more than anything.

Matos-Webster Dictionary (M Matos), Saturday, 23 July 2005 01:10 (twenty years ago)

um, until i see photos of rap bloggers selling crack, i'll stick to finding their attraction to swagger and material flash more obnoxious.

vahid (vahid), Saturday, 23 July 2005 01:15 (twenty years ago)

in case i'm not being clear, anthony, i was talking about rap fans, not rap artists. i am fairly certain most consumers aren't buying cam'rons albums because they're fascinated by crack cocaine (hello, human crack in the flesh?)

vahid (vahid), Saturday, 23 July 2005 01:18 (twenty years ago)

yeah cuz you have to physically sell crack to contribute to the enviroment that perpetuates it

3, Saturday, 23 July 2005 01:19 (twenty years ago)

Again, I wasn't excusing the privilege merely noting WHY a lot of bloggers including myself probably don't realize they should be offended by tales of crack dealing.
Anthony, who's talking about being offended or not offended? Some rapper pretending he still (or ever did) slings rock isn't really offensive, except in the cartoon cutout they have to be in order to have some random feel they are relevant.

And the hustler imagery is a powerful one. Not a day passes that I don't feel slightly envious of someone else getting paid to basically bullshit while I'm supposedly better off by being "respectable." The minstrel is a hustler, the occupier of the overlapping space that others can not for various reasons and making you buy the idea that they've got it made. I think of Eminem as a minstel. Diplo is just a carpetbagger.

Candicissima (candicissima), Saturday, 23 July 2005 01:19 (twenty years ago)

the inability to separate those 2 things is why krs etc still talk about how the CIA invented it

3, Saturday, 23 July 2005 01:20 (twenty years ago)

yeah cuz you have to physically sell crack to contribute to the enviroment that perpetuates it

That reminds me of this asshole that almost made me break out of my mask and beat his ass. I said where i was from and his response was "oh cool! I've got a connection to that neighborhood! I used to drive with my brother from Jersey to buy drugs there!" Good for him!

Candicissima (candicissima), Saturday, 23 July 2005 01:21 (twenty years ago)

Not a day passes that I don't feel slightly envious of someone else getting paid to basically bullshit

yeah, like those dipset-pushing fuckers at turntablelab.com!! sweater late, wrong size, screwed on shipping charges, no tracking number ... (i mean this in all seriousness!)

vahid (vahid), Saturday, 23 July 2005 01:23 (twenty years ago)

haha it took a couple weeks of me livin next to project buildings before kids realized i wasnt a frat boy there to buy weed

3, Saturday, 23 July 2005 01:23 (twenty years ago)

yeah cuz you have to physically sell crack to contribute to the enviroment that perpetuates it
-- 3 (...), July 23rd, 2005 7:19 PM.

??

vahid (vahid), Saturday, 23 July 2005 01:24 (twenty years ago)

the hustler mystique?

http://gay.ru/wolfy/cinema/prostitute/justso.jpg

Sterling Clover (s_clover), Saturday, 23 July 2005 01:27 (twenty years ago)

"until i see photos of rap bloggers selling crack...", its not enough to endorse it?!

3, Saturday, 23 July 2005 01:28 (twenty years ago)

yeah deej i think whats weird abt dipset, and ive heard only cam, mostly, is that they dont aestheticize crack that much. that this crack as an accesory shit is more some listener fantasy particularly applied, but that theres some new? consensus on the fantasy

xp

006 (thoia), Saturday, 23 July 2005 01:30 (twenty years ago)

this crack as an accesory shit is more some listener fantasy particularly applied

yeah as in "crack : dipset :: tshirts/mixtapes : my website". obv it's a stupid formulation on the part of the listener.

it seems to me there are a million and one things to blame for the proliferation of crack - though haven't crack use / sales / arrests been on the downswing for a long time now? - before the dipset and their fan base.

though if you were to say it was encouraging an unfortunate mentality, i'd agree.

vahid (vahid), Saturday, 23 July 2005 01:36 (twenty years ago)

Sterling, it would've been more fitting to put up a Kevin Federline pic.

Candicissima (candicissima), Saturday, 23 July 2005 01:37 (twenty years ago)

i know 3 finds it deadly dull but i like some of the lyrical trix of some dipset types but hey that doesn't mean that a reaction to the lyrics isn't gonna be part of my emotional response. even kris ex gives what he calls cam'ron's "mesmerizing flow" its props (i think that it's just fairly easy to follow along -- also it's often in three insteada four stresses, which actually made it work real cute with the fourth filled in by e.g. "boys")

and its not about every review being all "this is BAD FOR AMERICA" but just like some sense of reality in the response, you know. which, say, lets ppl. also not get freaked out about the wu promoting samurai swords or something.

Sterling Clover (s_clover), Saturday, 23 July 2005 01:37 (twenty years ago)

thats all i was sayin man! i hate this ilm relativism that pops up whenever you speak on some shit that aint the worst shit ever, its like 'why hate on trent lott? hes not HITLER!'

3, Saturday, 23 July 2005 01:39 (twenty years ago)

i am just still not sure how stupid i came out looking on that wu thread.

vahid (vahid), Saturday, 23 July 2005 01:41 (twenty years ago)

I said where i was from and his response was "oh cool! I've got a connection to that neighborhood! I used to drive with my brother from Jersey to buy drugs there!"

something like this happened to me once this guy was like where are you from and i said such-and-such and he said "oh no shit i used to hustle there"
xp because i haven't got anything meaningful to contribute at this point

nervous (cochere), Saturday, 23 July 2005 01:45 (twenty years ago)

actually i wouldnt even suggest that a cam record contributes directly to a crack problem, altho i think he and we are implicated in smthng larger that does, just saying my suspicion is cam fans of the blogger persuasion are basically getting off on it, and ignoring it publicly

sterling and 3 otm

006 (thoia), Saturday, 23 July 2005 01:47 (twenty years ago)

i mean it seems like the real question is, are cam/dipset/etc glorifying the trade or just referring to is because it is/has been a facet of their lives?

nervous (cochere), Saturday, 23 July 2005 01:49 (twenty years ago)

Who even knows anymore? They might be playing it up since the heads like that shit or actually be nostaglic for slinging rock when they're in the studio or in St. Tropez popping bottles.

And thanks to someone's nice ping, I was reminded that I did say crack pipe in Anthony's comment box. So shoot me.

Candicissima (candicissima), Saturday, 23 July 2005 01:55 (twenty years ago)

i just posted what i was talkin bout up there go see http://gelandweave.blogspot.com/

3, Saturday, 23 July 2005 01:58 (twenty years ago)

and yeah i know dayton fam speak about crack as much as cam but i tried to put down how its different

3, Saturday, 23 July 2005 02:02 (twenty years ago)

ill read that in a sec so this may be irrelevant. i liked the leroi shit. but i mean, i 1ce, drunk bought crack, and ppl ive told that story to seemed so dynamite receptive and so already laughing, like if you were telling a story abt some dumb mutual acquaintance who always does dumb shit, that i cant see crack as some ageold hustler glistening business independent of color

006 (thoia), Saturday, 23 July 2005 02:09 (twenty years ago)

oh i meant to append that that post itself acts like a boast

006 (thoia), Saturday, 23 July 2005 02:10 (twenty years ago)

This went a strange direction.
The Dips HARDLY have a stranglehold on the crack scene, as Micc notes Fat Joe likes to CALL himself Cooked Coke and Joey Crack and how could ya'll forget the 123456789... it's tha ten crack commandments from Frank White?

Also, more to the point, IT'S AN OBV. METAPHOR; as in: my rhymes and my style and my swagger and ME is as addictive as crack.

Of course, ILMers frontin' like they slang rock is nonsensical and cooked cocaine is a helluva drug and so forth but I don't recall anybody being this snooty and shameshame when it comes to Lou Reed/Kurt Cobain heroin-chic.

Forksclovetofu (Forksclovetofu), Saturday, 23 July 2005 04:06 (twenty years ago)

That's because ILX didn't start til like 2001! Plus it's my wife and its my life.

miccio (miccio), Saturday, 23 July 2005 04:16 (twenty years ago)

She's a fickle miccstress.

Forksclovetofu (Forksclovetofu), Saturday, 23 July 2005 04:19 (twenty years ago)

yeah i ws only talking abt crack in a real shielded way, abt crack to ppl who unfortunately might not have all fat joes records, i thot here it cld just be some vu bullshit of course, it did occur to me. still i think this, crack, its only a metaphor, shit that you, if you will, are pushin, is troubling. as if when a motherfucker hears cam equate himself w crack, if he does, its the same as cam equating himself w i dunno don juan, this allcap metaphor shit doesnt work, maybe, when the rapper and listener are different and have different agendas?

006 (thoia), Saturday, 23 July 2005 04:42 (twenty years ago)

That's likely true of ALL lyrics tho', no? And the glorification of bad behaviour is hardly new in pop music, right?
Still, point made.

Forksclovetofu (Forksclovetofu), Saturday, 23 July 2005 04:53 (twenty years ago)

id be the 1st to admit say an affinity for glorification its just i dont think ppl cn straight or strait equate cam love w say loving jason pierce, wo making some unexamined assertions. im sure we cld agree that some things are true of all lyrics but my point, based on an impression, ws that dips appreciation, when its articulated, seems to be abt ignoring certain of their lyrics while isolating others, calling em bricolage

006 (thoia), Saturday, 23 July 2005 05:11 (twenty years ago)

haha that cld be true of all lyrical analysis then! just i find it selective in a curious way

006 (thoia), Saturday, 23 July 2005 05:14 (twenty years ago)

People are still missing the point that we're not getting worked up because dipset rap about crack. Its HOW they rap about it that intrigues/bothers/whatever us. And that doesn't mean that I dislike dipset's music. I don't. But I do have issues with elements of it.

And vahid, wtf is your problem with people liking music about swaggering?

deej.., Saturday, 23 July 2005 19:38 (twenty years ago)

could someone link the Kris Exo piece on Purple Haze? Google doesn't turn anything up.

milozauckerman (miloaukerman), Saturday, 23 July 2005 19:58 (twenty years ago)

And vahid, wtf is your problem with people liking music about swaggering?

what the fuck, asshole, what the fuck

vahid (vahid), Saturday, 23 July 2005 19:59 (twenty years ago)

Huh? That wasn't intended to be hostile!

deej.., Saturday, 23 July 2005 20:04 (twenty years ago)

yeah, i know. my point = swagger can be sort of lame if you're not in the mood!

vahid (vahid), Saturday, 23 July 2005 20:10 (twenty years ago)

dj if you hate crack then you hate fun!

Sterling Clover (s_clover), Sunday, 24 July 2005 00:15 (twenty years ago)


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