Why does black people never want to rock?

Which, incidentally, describes the other source of fretting over the racial crossover of hip-hop, apart from the top-level issue of mainstream America having to sort out its images of and relationships with black people: note that hip-hop was, up until its big pop crossover, equally horizontal, equally reliant upon a peer to "introduce" you to it. Hip-hop has gradually conquered that and made itself pop, in this reciprocal circle of white kids buying more and more of it. Indie rejects conquering it, and thus can't really make inroads beyond the "peers" of current indie listeners. The only way it will pick up bigger black listenership in the US is as white kids start hanging out more with black kids -- and not just the white kids who are already disposed to pick up on the black musical samizdat, as opposed to the other way around.

I haven't made a post in five days, and that's the best I could come up with for my comeback. Lame....

but I guess I could still be called a Paki, and um:

"whoa whoa whoa there! generalization city!" - agreed. a rather gargantuan generalization, right?

Unless you meant I was generalizing about the ethnic difference part, in which case I'm not so much asserting that as suggesting it. I know it's partly true for me: growing up with this sense of "difference" being hung around you can surely give you a little nudge toward a musical genre that bills itself as the "different" one.

all this begs me to ask, nabisco: what ethnicity are you? not that it's important

I hear Pervez Musharraf's a big fan. He hated "Terror Twilight", but then, didn't everyone?

Ha! I was on the N. Side and heard Straight Outta Compton long before the Pixies or Pavement etc. But somehow I ended, lo these many years down the road, posting about Maurice Chevalier on ILX.

This post is not intended to reinforce anyone's determinism, racial or otherwise.

Why isn't it reciprocal? Why don't black fans pack
Creed shows, for example? Actually, I've never seen a
Creed crowd, but I'm pretty sure that while white
audiences like black music (hip-hop) it's not really
reciprocal. Perhaps I'm wrong tho.

During highschool and Uni my walls were (and still are) plastered with pictures of The Pixies, Jane's Addiction, Sonic Youth, Fugazi, Bad Brains, Pavement, GBV, NWA, Tribe Called Quest and Public Enemy. It's just music!! Enough with the categories! I have friends from all different backgrounds who get down to all different kinds of tunes. What does hearing indie-rock first have to do with being able to appreciate hip-hop later, or vice-versa?

I've been to rock shows where none of the friends I was with were white and I've been to hip-hop shows where they all were. I thought that I'd heard the last of this crap in high school.

If "Indieholic Anonymous" doubts that black people can rock then I should probably invite him to come to the studio sometime when I'm jamming with some friends. We'll blow his stupid ass through the back wall.

A thread with "black people" and "rock" in the title, and absolutely no mention whatsoevah of THE 'BONE!?! Wow.

You do realize that there are not equal numbers of black and non-black people in the U.S., don't you?

Is there some sort of impossible-to-avoid-insult-factor for black-people-what-rock similar to the one for white-people-what-rap?

I don't see how "blowing his stupid ass through the back wall" would convince him of anything. Why don't you just impress him by rocking? Oh, I get it, you're "throwing down"!

Me neither. I guess that is how they solve their problems in the ghetto.

WAIT A MINUTE!...I should have kept reading:

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During highschool and Uni my walls were (and still are) plastered with pictures of The Pixies, Jane's Addiction, Sonic Youth, Fugazi, Bad Brains,
Pavement, GBV, NWA, Tribe Called Quest and Public Enemy. It's just music!! Enough with the categories! I have friends from all different
backgrounds who get down to all different kinds of tunes. What does hearing indie-rock first have to do with being able to appreciate hip-hop later, or
vice-versa?

I've been to rock shows where none of the friends I was with were white and I've been to hip-hop shows where they all were. I thought that I'd heard
the last of this crap in high school.

J-Rock
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So what are you saying? Music genres don't necessarily have racial boundaries? Could this also go for some other issues in life? Oh, no, I have to change the filing system...excuse me...

Its like watching a car wreck. first off you have the moron who started it digging his hole deeper with every word out of his mouth, and then everyone else scrambling to jump in the hole too.

"black people" is not a unit. yet everyone here is talking like you can just say "black people ____________" and not come across as a completely ignorant and uninformed. Do any of you really know anything about the listening patterns and demographics that follow of people outside your immediate area? I really doubt it. I sure don't, so I don't pretend I do.

and matt riedl: I think by "blowing them through the back wall" he meant "rocking."

whatever, I don't even know who here is joking and who here is really just dumb...