Is rap tomorrow's jazz?

[Jazz Kat]

Yo dog! What does intellectualize mean?

[John L]

"To intellectualize jazz:" to think long and hard about what you are going to play before playing

"To overintellectualize jazz:" to think so long and hard about what you are going to play that you don't play shit.

"To underintellectualize jazz:" to blow and blow and then say, "oh fuck."

Edited August 26, 2005 by John L

[ghost of miles]

A little Public Enemy (late period) stuck in my head this a.m.:

He Got Game

It's from 1998, well past their peak, but I remember quite clearly the visceral excitement of their first three records. Can't wait for the new 33 1/3 book about It Takes a Nation of Millions to Hold Us Back.

[clifford_thornton]

Oh yeah, early PE were excellent.

KRS-1

MC Lyte

Tribe

...

Hell, Ice Cube's 1st solo l/p is pretty great.

[AllenLowe]

hey, look, I did rap before it was trendy to do rap. But when I did rap, you could understand the woids.****

****see: Sunshine Boys

[ghost of miles]

Oh yeah, early PE were excellent.

KRS-1

MC Lyte

Tribe

...

Hell, Ice Cube's 1st solo l/p is pretty great.

That the one with "Once Upon a Time in the Projects"? I had it on cassette...that dates me, doesn't it?

[aparxa]

The Sound Providers!

J5

Tribe

Ugly Duckling

MC Solaar

P.U.T.S.

Rock

[brownie]

Guru featuring Donald Byrd

[clifford_thornton]

Oh yeah, early PE were excellent.

KRS-1

MC Lyte

Tribe

...

Hell, Ice Cube's 1st solo l/p is pretty great.

That the one with "Once Upon a Time in the Projects"? I had it on cassette...that dates me, doesn't it?

Yes - me too. I saw a Priority/Ruthless vinyl of it recently but it was too battered to buy.

[Ken Dryden]

I don't remember too many jazz artists killing each other in violent feuds, though more than a few went to jail for repeated drug offenses (usually possession, not selling).

As for rap being compared to jazz, forget it. Rappers are not musicians in my book, just lousy poets who generally scream their drivel. The turntablists are just as useless to me.

[AllenLowe]

you sound like Armstrong talking about the beboppers-

and let's not forget that Ben Webster beat up women. Dizzy and Max did his, too. Jazz was full of degenerate junkies, guys who cheated on their wives and ran around with hookers. Not to mention the boozers and the guys who ran out on their kids. Or who did hard time.

boy, things HAVE changed -

Edited March 17, 2010 by AllenLowe

[Dan Gould]

I don't remember too many jazz artists killing each other in violent feuds, though more than a few went to jail for repeated drug offenses (usually possession, not selling).

As for rap being compared to jazz, forget it. Rappers are not musicians in my book, just lousy poets who generally scream their drivel. The turntablists are just as useless to me.

:tup :tup :tup :tup

[clifford_thornton]

I am pretty sure that most of the people commenting here haven't really given a listen to rap or hip-hop. I'm no expert, but I'm not going to denigrate a genre just because of its public image and what's been encouraged by a few dumbshits in the music.

[JSngry]

personally I'm careful about bringing my "baggage" to listening to music. What works for me is to just let that crap go. Just listen. Shhhh. Listen. Quiet your mind. Don't expect or anticipate. Just be there. Let yourself be surprised. It's fun.

[Dan Gould]

I am pretty sure that most of the people commenting here haven't really given a listen to rap or hip-hop. I'm no expert, but I'm not going to denigrate a genre just because of its public image and what's been encouraged by a few dumbshits in the music.

Or, alternatively, one taste of horseshit will make you stop eating it, now and forever.

[JSngry]

The problem with so much of this discussion thus far is that it projects all kinds of things that are part of the inner psyche of the posters onto the music the musicians are playing. How much of what people are claiming is "about" the music of any era IS actually objectively about the music - rather than being about their own biases and prejudices and hindsight?

[DrJ]

Is rap tomorrow's jazz?

Probably not, but it may be yesterday's country.

[ghost of miles]

Guru of "Jazz Thing" fame passed away yesterday at the age of 43.

[Dave James]

I know I'm swimming against the tide, but I kind of like some of this stuff. There's no doubt the majority of rap music is a waste of time, or in the case of the violent, misogynistic stuff, much worse, but every now and then you stumble onto something that's a little more, shall we say, refined. A good example is the piece David just posted. Here's another one I found on a YouTube cruise the other day by a band called Stetsasonic that's a little bit better than most. One thing for sure, you can't ignore the beat.

[Rosco]

Guru of "Jazz Thing" fame passed away yesterday at the age of 43.

If rap is the new jazz, Guru was its Hank Mobley.

[Stefan Wood]

Back to PE, I was really pleased by their last cd, "How Do You Sell Soul to a Soulless People Who Sold Their Soul?" A fine effort. Also, Q-Tip's "The Renaissance," and Tanya Morgan's "Brooklynati." There's a lot of vigor still left in the genre, and it's not going away.

[John L]

I know I'm swimming against the tide, but I kind of like some of this stuff. There's no doubt the majority of rap music is a waste of time, or in the case of the violent, misogynistic stuff, much worse, but every now and then you stumble onto something that's a little more, shall we say, refined. A good example is the piece David just posted. Here's another one I found on a YouTube cruise the other day by a band called Stetsasonic that's a little bit better than most. One thing for sure, you can't ignore the beat.

The thing is - violence and misogyny - which are often present in the pop gansta stuff made for teenagers - have virtually nothing to do with Hip Hop in the sense of music.

[Christiern]

I have heard good rappers, but most of them are stuck in an unimaginative groove. I don't think rap is/was the new jazz, but it does remind me of that period in the Sixties when mediocre musicians came out of the woodwork to jump over the jazz fence at its lowest point. That so-called avant garde movement. It was the perfect jazz phase for wannabes who had neither the technical knowhow nor the musical talent. I heard so much awful stuff during that time, performed by people who assumed that their fumbling noises would be interpreted as something profound. In fact, some so-called jazz writers, not having much of a clue themselves, thought their ears were being fed intellectual manna. Then, as with rap today, there was genuinely good stuff floating in the pot of crap.

The same thing happened in the art world, people throw things together and call it art, aided and abetted by "experts". Fortunately—whether it's jazz, visual art or pedestrian poetry—in the end, the real stuff always survives the dross.

[Big Beat Steve]

I have heard good rappers, but most of them are stuck in an unimaginative groove. I don't think rap is/was the new jazz, but it does remind me of that period in the Sixties when mediocre musicians came out of the woodwork to jump over the jazz fence at its lowest point. That so-called avant garde movement. It was the perfect jazz phase for wannabes who had neither the technical knowhow nor the musical talent. I heard so much awful stuff during that time, performed by people who assumed that their fumbling noises would be interpreted as something profound. In fact, some so-called jazz writers, not having much of a clue themselves, thought their ears were being fed intellectual manna. Then, as with rap today, there was genuinely good stuff floating in the pot of crap.

The same thing happened in the art world, people throw things together and call it art, aided and abetted by "experts". Fortunately—whether it's jazz, visual art or pedestrian poetry—in the end, the real stuff always survives the dross.

Very good point (and a point much too seldom made).

That said, except for a few minutes' worth of novelty value each time I've never really liked any of that rap that I've heard in likely and unlikely places, and I cannot see it as any form of real jazz either, but as a grassroots music movement reflecting its times, social conditions and background I am quite willing to say it very likely is today's R&B. And quite legitimately so. If you look closely (leaving the actual musical "craft" and styles aside but they are a matter of taste anyway), there are parallels indeed.

And as for that violence, misoginy (and what not) accusations, come on ... don't you remember all your blues lyrics of waaaay back? How many blues songs have there been with the line of "I'm gonna kill that woman" (and didn't they sound pretty serious?), how often have vulgarity, booze, drugs and adultery been featured VERY prominently in these lyrics? What would have been the percentage of vocal R&B of the 40s and early 50s that would be blacklisted as being "unsuitable for airplay" in today's cleaned-up, whitewashed, sterilized-to-death, oh so politically correct media world? So please don't confuse the artificial outrage dictated by the overly sanitized "do's and don'ts" of a (re-)puritan(ized) society with any alleged "lewdness" that would make those lyrics that much worse than what has been around before. IMHO these gangsta lyrics often are just an immature put-on by kids mentally stuck halfway in childhood (a bit different to someone in his late 30s singing about doing his woman in ).

Edited April 21, 2010 by Big Beat Steve

[Dave James]

And as for that violence, misoginy (and what not) accusations, come on ... don't you remember all your blues lyrics of waaaay back? How many blues songs have there been with the line of "I'm gonna kill that woman" (and didn't they sound pretty serious?), how often have vulgarity, booze, drugs and adultery been featured VERY prominently in these lyrics? What would have been the percentage of vocal R&B of the 40s and early 50s that would be blacklisted as being "unsuitable for airplay" in today's cleaned-up, whitewashed, sterilized-to-death, oh so politically correct media world? So please don't confuse the artificial outrage dictated by the overly sanitized "do's and don'ts" of a (re-)puritan(ized) society with any alleged "lewdness" that would make those lyrics that much worse than what has been around before. IMHO these gangsta lyrics often are just an immature put-on by kids mentally stuck halfway in childhood (a bit different to someone in his late 30s singing about doing his woman in ).

I don't know, do you think some of these guys who openly talk about killing cops and smacking women around are just cases of arrested development? I wouldn't be so sure. IMO, comparing the lyrics of old R&B tunes to those of gansta rap is an apples to oranges argument. Times change and so does intent.