Hip-hop Essays – Page 3

Why Aloe Blacc getting ripped off is no big surprise

Former Stones Throw artist and chart-topper Aloe Blacc recently announced that he has only earned $4,000 from Pandora streams of his monster hit Wake Me Up (with Avicii), despite clocking up an incredible 168 million plays in the US.

A shocking revelation, but is anyone really that surprised? The game changed beyond all recognition years ago, and the plates have shifted again several times since, each time leaving the artist with little to show for their efforts.

Gone are the days when a musician could sell millions of CDs and make big bucks. Save for the occasional exception, like Taylor Swift, who recently shipped well over a million copies of her latest album 1989, sales ain’t what they used to be.

What’s interesting in relation to hip-hop is how all that big talk about sales figures that dominated headlines a few years ago has all but disappeared.

As a music built upon bragging rites and proving you are the best, there was a time when commercial artists like 50 Cent were obsessed with sales numbers, making them as much of a badge of honor as the amount of times he’d been shot.

If a big release didn’t ship more than a good few hundred thousand right away you were done, and your rivals would tell you so. Nowadays though, no one is moving units, not even Em, Pimp Juice or Rocafella, as Jay-Z once famously said (sort of).

Everyone knows the big money is now to be made from touring, where eye-watering prices can be charged for a show that, lets be honest, usually sucks.

But it would be hard for a rapper to deny that still being able to make big money from sales would be nice, especially when facing the necessary tough grind that comes with traveling around the world on tour.

New ways of getting music to us are appearing all the time, and as always hip-hop is at the cutting edge. From the biggest albums to the humblest of indy material, most work is now available for stream before release. Run the Jewels even gave away RTJ2 for free, following in the footsteps of U2 and others.

It remains to be seen if the industry will ever find a way to get those sales revenues back up, but whats certain is that a rapper will need to be pretty damn successful to get anywhere even close to that Taylor Swift money.

Why we miss the classic hip-hop breakdown

Hip-hop production has changed and evolved many times since the late 80s, swaying back and forth between old styles and futuristic ones.

The basics don’t change much though, with most tracks roughly sticking to the classic structure of the first two golden eras: Short into with ad-libs, or cuts and scratches. Verse 1, hook. Verse 2, hook. Verse 3, hook. More hook, shout outs, extended cuts and scratches. Fade out.

We are know it well, not just from hip-hop but also most other popular music genres. Classic rap tracks sometimes had an extra special treat though, between the second hook and the start of verse 3. It was known as a breakdown, and we miss them like crazy.

A breakdown tended to include extra cutting and scratches, variations on the beat, extended use of the main samples, and various other types of niceness.

They provided a chance for the listener to pause for reflection, to take in the meaning of the first two verses, and get ready for the third, which was often the most powerful. They also gave the producer time to showcase their abilities, and flex their cutting skills if they also happened to be a deejay.

We’re not necessarily saying we need them back, and in fact producers like DJ Premier and Pete Rock still tend to produce beats in this way. Other modern hip-hop tracks still have them too.

Lest we forget how fucking dope they were though, so here’s a few of our personal favorites. The breakdowns all appear after the first couple of verses.

Nas, The World Is Yours. Produced by Pete Rock.

Lords of the Underground, What I’m After. Produced by K-Def.

LL Cool J, Mama Said Knock You Out. Produced by Marley Marl.

Album Review: Blasphemy – a record of two halves from Ras Kass & Apollo Brown

Ah, Ras Kass. He started off so well with his first solo records, the Golden State Warriors projects and all those other great features. Then came all the legal drama, and those promising albums that never saw the light of day.

All that seems to be in the past now though, with Rassy back making good music. Blasphemy sees his team up with Apollo Brown, a talented producer who’s released a steady run of quality material over the last few years, collaborating with Guilty Simpson, OC and others.

Unfortunately, Blasphemy is an album of two different halves: one good, the other a bit boring. The first half is the good one, with impressive beats from Brown, and some sharp observations from Ras, plus features from always reliable artists like Pharoahe Monch, Rakaa and Xzibit.

Then we get to the second half. The way most people listen to music these days means albums don’t tend to flow in a sequence like they used to. But some thought still needs to go into how tracks are ordered. With Blasphemy, all the good stuff has been put up front, with the lesser tracks dumped in the back.

There isn’t anything badly wrong with those lesser tracks, they just lack the same punch and urgency of the first few. Apollo’s beats also tend to sound the same after more than a handful of tracks, and the cross-over attempt Too Much of a Good Thing doesnt suit Ras’ style one bit.

Not a bad project overall then, but unlikely to be bothering the top spot come album of the year retrospectives in a couple of months time.

Blasphemy it out now on Mello Music Group.

Album Review: Why RTJ2 is the Godfather Part II of hip-hop

That old line about how movie sequels rarely live up to the original has always applied to music too. The so-called sophomore jinx has ruined the career of many an artist, never quite hitting the same heights as a classic debut.

With Run the Jewels 2, El-P and Killer Mike have gone and pulled a Godfather Part II. If last year’s debut album was a modern classic, then Run the Jewels 2 is even better. It’s darker, dirtier and way more fucked-up than the original, and all the better for it.

What we have here is two artists high as a kite on confidence from just how well their music is being received. For lesser acts, this can lead to complacency. For others, it brings out the best in them. Jamie and Mike know how good they are, and they know we know how good they are.

That’s why RTJ2 is almost the perfect album, with virtually every track the kind you want to listen to again and again. Standouts include Jeopardy, Oh My Darling Don’t Cry, and Close Your Eyes with Zack de la Rocha, who reminds us all that while he may not make rap music, he can rap with the best of them. El-P’s production work is impeccable; weird enough to be his own signature sound, but accessible and head-nodding enough to keep it grounded. As for the lyrics, both rappers are angry as hell, and it works like a charm.

The true genius of Run the Jewels, still one of the most unlikely collaborations in hip-hop, is that both artists have approached it as blank canvas, despite each one having a huge backlog of music to their name. It doesnt matter if you know everything that has come before (the classic Company Flow and Def Jux material from El-P, the Outkast features from Mike), or if this is the first time you’ve come across them. We are all on the the same page at this point, and by discarding any preconceptions of the music we expect them to release, Run the Jewels are making exactly the type of music they want to.

On those rare occasions where a movie sequel does live up to the original, the one after that is usually garbage. Watch Godfather Part III if you don’t believe us. Run the Jewels is a saga we want to see rolling on forever, and judging by the new album, things are only going to keep getting better.

Don’t forget that RTJ2 being out means we are also one step closer to getting Meow the Jewels, potentially the most incredible album in the history of music ever. Or maybe not. Only time will tell. Until then, enjoy what’s probably the best work that either of these two guys have ever produced. And when you do consider the music they have been involved in before now, that’s some accolade.

RTJ2 is out now on Mass Appeal.

Time is Illmatic: Documenting Hip-hop the correct way

For those of us 30 and over, the first thing that hits you when you realize Illmatic came out 20 years ago is how it makes you feel old as shit. There are millions of rap fans around the world who weren’t even born in 1994, and they almost definitely wont be familiar with the Wild Style clips that start the album off.

The second thing that hits you is just how much hip-hop has changed in those 20 years, mostly for the good. It’s a genre still much maligned and misunderstood by the masses, but its also finally now at a point where it is legitimately recognized for its cultural impact and long history. And where there is history, there are always people ready to capture and preserve it. That’s why, in the years since Illmatic dropped, a small but incredible collection of documentary films have been made about hip-hop.

To be clear on our definitions, when we say hip-hop documentary, we aren’t talking about promotional tie-in DVDs like Backstage, or extended video/live flicks like Streets is Watching or Up in Smoke.

We mean well-crafted cinematic productions that get the attention of respected critics and film festival judges. Films like Scratch (Doug Pray, 2002), Michael Rapaport’s Beats, Rhymes & Life: The Travels of A Tribe Called Quest (2012), My Vinyl Weighs a Ton: This is Stones Throw Records (Jeff Broadway, 2014), and The Wonder Year and The Hip-Hop Fellow (Kenneth Price, 2011, 2014), both of which document the work of 9th Wonder. Each tells the story of hip-hop culture in a way that not only appeals to the true fan, but also makes the stories accessible to those from outside of the movement.

The latest documentary in this category to hit screens is Time is Illmatic, released to coincide with the album’s 20th anniversary. For those in the know, 1994 was slap-bang in the middle of the 2nd golden era of hip-hop, a time when quality material was being released by a huge selection of artists. But it was also a time when New York was in crisis, at the tail-end of the crack epidemic, and with murder rates among young black males way too high.

Time is Illmatic is less then about the music, and more about the social, economic and political climate of Queensbridge and every other ghetto at the time. It covers at length the break-up of Nas’ parents, and the effect it had on both Nas and his brother (Bravehearts rapper Jungle).

The tragic death of Ill Will is also a main theme. Anyone familiar with Nas’ music since Illmatic knows how frequently Will’s name appears, but here the true impact of his death is finally made clear. There are points where Nas struggles to re-live the pain of the story, and a poignant moment where Jungle questions his mother for not having moved them away from Queensbridge the moment one of her sons best friends was shot dead.

From a cinematic perspective, its a well-written and directed piece of film making, respectful of the culture, while never shying away from it’s many contradictions and problems.

For historians of the music itself, there are some interesting snippets of detail about how the album came together, with interviews from MC Serch, Large Professor, Pete Rock, DJ Premier and Q-Tip. There’s even a section on the infamous Bridge Wars, highlighting how significant the battle was for those who came from Queens and the Bronx.

It makes for a worthy addition to the cannon of other impressive hip-hop documentary films, and does well to capture a moment in history that effected the lives of so many people around the world.

Time is Illmatic is out now. Check the website for screenings.

Why life is hard for good female rappers

Producer 9th Wonder recently tweeted about how today’s rap fans are uninterested in female rappers with proper skills, and how an artist like his own Rapsody can struggle to break into the mainstream. As one of the most respected voices in hip-hop, pretty much everything that 9th Wonder says is spot on, and, somewhat sadly this time, he’s dead right once again.

When LL Cool J released the video for his 1996 hit Doin’ It, something wasn’t right. The usual over-cooked hallmarks of a Hype Williams visual were all there, but there was something funny about the appearance of LeShaun, who sings the hook. It didn’t look like her at all, and that was because it wasn’t.

It later transpired that she was pregnant when the video was shot, but rumors at the time had it that LeShaun had been replaced by a bunch of models because she wasn’t deemed hot enough to get busy with Uncle L in a Hype Williams joint.

Whether true or not, it’s this type of misogynistic bullshit that keeps truly talented female rappers out of the mainstream, and it always has. It seems as though at some point in the career of all female artists, a cruel decision hast to get made: Let their writing and rhyme skills be what gets them noticed, or use their femininity and sex appeal as the gimmick. Unfortunately there seems little scope to do both, and we all know which artists have chosen which path. Remember those early videos of Nicki Minaj spitting absolute fire in freestyle sessions on the streets of NYC? Didn’t think so. Not many people do.

https://twitter.com/9thWonderMusic/status/524222036429000704

For those that don’t take the route we’ll traveled by Nicki, Lil Kim and the others, there’s little in the way of longevity to be had. And that’s a damn shame. The true hip-hop fan doesn’t care if a good artist is a man, woman, straight, gay or anything else. As KRS-ONE once said, a dope emcee is a dope emcee. If they do happen to be a woman, it also makes no difference what they look like.

Sex sells in the real world though, and that’s why pretty much every skilful female rapper of the past twenty years has all but disappeared. If they are still around, their chances of new success seem to be fading fast. Bahamadia, Jean Grae, Apani B Fly, Lady of Rage. All of them chose to stay true to the art instead of selling their body, but have little to show for it today. For what its worth by the way, if we are going to be forced to judge them on looks too, every one of the women on the list in the sentence above are talented emcees AND beautiful.

It’s a depressing truth to face, but the artistry of women artists will never be judged as important as T&A by millions of teenage fans. It’s a problem not just in hip-hop of course, but it’s probably the one specific form of entertainment where it’s at its worst. In the meantime, quality artists like Rapsody and the next generation will continue to find it hard to breakthrough.

Beauty and the Beast by Rapsody is out now, with beats from the maestro 9th Wonder, and others from his Jamla squad.

Why Meow the Jewels is more than just a gimmick

Writing about an album made from cat sounds probably isn’t the best way to start a new hip-hop blog, but fuck it. Cats and hip-hop go way back anyway. Just ask Naughty by Nature. And even today, Tyler, the Creator can’t get enough of Photoshopped felines.

Now though, with the Meow the Jewels Kickstarter hitting its funding goal with days to spare, that rap and cat relationship is about to be taken to a whole new level. What started out as a joke is happening for real, and it looks set to go down in rap history as either the dumbest album ever conceived, or one of the most brilliant.

It began a few months back, when Run the Jewels (aka El-P and Killer Mike) announced there would be a special ‘remix’ edition of their new album RTJ2, recorded using the sounds of cats. With a price tag of a modest $40K, it was taken as nothing more than joke, and a nice little pop-shot at the drama surrounding that not-so secret one-off Wu-Tang Clan album.

One fan took it to heart though, and set about making sure the remix album came out for real. The Kickstarter appeal to raise the $40K soon got the backing of Run the Jewels itself, with El-P stating that his slice of the crowd-funded cash would get donated to the families of Eric Garner and Michael Brown.

Before long the campaign had caught the attention of the hip-hop world and beyond, with some of the biggest names in the game pledging to work on the album, including Dan the Automator, Prince Paul, Just Blaze and Alchemist.

Who knows what the project will actually sound like, but the end result is less important than the journey towards it. Musically, hip-hop has never been shy to blur reality with fiction, from the mostly made-up violence of classic gangster raps, to the stories told by the alter egos of artists like Ghostface Killah, MF Doom and Quasimoto. It’s also a genre well-versed in crossing over to the weird side, even something as weird as making beats from cat noises.

But Meow The Jewels could also end up having a deeper meaning beyond the music. A project as crazy as this will always cross-over into mainstream news media, helping introduce Run the Jewels to a wider audience, which in turn is good for independent hip-hop as a whole.

It’s the charitable donation and connection with the situation in Ferguson that is key though. Hip-hop has always had a serious image problem to the outsiders that don’t understand it. Many of those same people have also likely struggled to keep track of the full extent of the aftermath and fallout from the deaths of Garner and Brown. But with rappers having been reporting from the front line, especially artists like Talib Kweli and Run the Jewels’ own Killer Mike, the true scale of the issue has been getting through loud and clear not just to their fans, but further afield thanks to news outlets and social media.

El-P’s Meow the Jewels donations will only help to further raise the profile of hip-hop as a creative movement with enough power to make a difference, which puts the whole project way above the status of cheesy gimmick. If we end up getting some decent music out of it too, that’s merely a bonus.

It’s unclear when Meow the Jewels will drop, but peep the trailer below in the meantime. RTJ2 is released later this month.