Rap and hip-hop are arguably another set of musical expressions and culture created, pushed, and developed by Blacks and Latinos in the United States. It took over 20 years for many in the music industry to even acknowledge rap’s and hip-hop’s impact on music, let alone to make some positive declaration about the people and cultures that created it. It wasn’t until rap acts like LL Cool J and Young MC were able to package the music to a larger audience, that chattel rap became labeled into the narrow stricture of commercial music that we know today. It’s taken ‘hood moguls like Sean Combs and Russell Simmons to diversify rap music into a product that can transcend culture and creativity, and spill into the aisles of Nordstrom, boutiques, and the beaches of St. Tropez. Is that a good thing? Well, we’re finding out now…

I’ve become one of those old, rickety –nee, crotchety– adults who looks back nostalgically, and thinks, “I remember when…” I’ve all but resigned myself to listening to nothing but LPs, and dumping my CDs (and digital files), for the sake of “old school.” However, I’m realizing that I’m not alone, and it’s not just nostalgia for “the way it used to be.”

There was a certain level of regulation that rap music and hip-hop culture retained. That was to keep it pure; less of an old school, than a pure school. The gramophone was invented in 1887, and we started scratching the hell out of it ninety years later…coincidentally in a year

ending in seven. (Oooh, that’s deep, but for another posting.) In between those years, Blacks in particular, had learned some pretty nasty lessons about the music industry, publishing rights, and “artistic license.” The djs had more power to regulate than b-girls and b-boys, and more pull than rappers. Producers were barely imagined when rap started. It was pure school theater: dj, emcees, dancers and artists.The true and pure school of rap was about the machine of movement and funk. Your crew provided the cogs, and oil and the dj was the wheel. Everyone in your crew was true to you and your sound: that was the only reason they were there. They believed in the vision and talent, and everyone was headed in the same direction.All of that reminiscing also made me long for the power of the dj. The mechanic, the ghost in the machine and the mover and shaker. The one who made the crew pop.There’s such a disrespect, reinterpreting, and dissecting of the rap machine, that now were just left with a hoopty running on recycled parts, rusty engines and recalled wheels.

[picappgallerysingle id="4125434"]There’s no soul, no spark of life left in the rap machine. It’s overrun by groupies, instant cash, and mogul dreams –all at the expense of the vision.I’m all for the art of the dj, and demanding that the emcee follow the lead of the dj. I don’t want my emcee to take a music class at an exclusive music school in upstate New York. The divine big bang of “the party” is being lost on a lazy producers, lackluster djs, and whack assed emcees. I’ve been on a tirade about this for a while, but it’s been building for the past couple of years, and now the public is catching up. Blacks and Latinos should expect more out of their musical forms, and we shouldn’t be forming our vision around “getting paid” and “20″ rims.” Consumerism has done rap and hip-hop a huge injustice. I love that folks can get paid for their artistic contributions and expressions, but who determines the purity of that expression? Who demands that the soul be kept in rap? Truly not the recording industry.

It’s up to the communities that create and develop it. Most cultures are so true to their cultural expressions that they refuse to let it die in corporate hands. They create institutions to preserve it. They make their expressions a family event, and pass it on –in it’s true form– to their children. They enliven the spirit of the expression in rites so that no one forgets it. They write, sing, play and document the purpose and players in their cultural expression. They create myths, legends and books to make sure that they are never forgotten.We can’t get to this point until the soul is returned to rap and hip-hop. Change happens, but surgical enhancements are deliberate. For the past couple of weeks I’ve been pulling out my LPs, and listening to the mistresses and masters of dj-ing: the turntablists. I’ve also downloaded some old reliables like the late dj J Dilla’s Donuts album, the musical magician Danger Mouse’s album The Mouse and the Mask, and throwing in some obscure folk songs like Nick Drake’s “Fly” and “Pink Moon,” the Runaway’s salacious “Cherry Bomb,” Donny Hathaways gut wrenching but optimistic “Love, Love, Love,” and a little De la Soul, KRS-ONE’s “My 9 MM Goes Bang,” Rita Marley’s “One Draw”, and Johnny Cash’s “Folsom Prison Blues” just for the heck of it.

That’s the spirit of the dj –the draw of music to move the body and soul, and mashed-up to make it pleasing to the ear’s of the primal woman and man. You just can’t do that with mush-mouthed rapping of some crap that’s coming out nowadays.

It’s going to take a belly busting exorcism to filter the whack out of hip-hop. So ya’ll, let’s purify ourselves in the waters of Lake Minnetonka and exorcise the “suck” out of hip-hop, and bring back the soul! To quote Chef’s mother Nelly while she performed her own version of an exorcism, “Lord, Thomas…don’t let it get on the curtains!”

Resources (I’ll be adding more, so stay tuned!):

DJS
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• Grandmaster Flash
• J Dilla

EMCEES
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• Human Beatboxing

GRAFFITI ARTISTS + ART
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• B-Girl Be – Intermedia Arts
• B-Girl Manifesto

PRESERVING HIP-HOP CULTURE
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• True Skool
• B-Girl Manifesto
• The Zulu Nation
• The Electric Boogaloos

KINDRED SPIRITS
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• “Return return of the DJ”, Billy Jam, SF Bay Guardian, February 13, 2008

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