"Go Shawty, its yo birthday, we gon' party like it's yo birthday/we gon' sip baccardi like it's yo birthday/and we don't even give a fuck it's not your birthday!"
The hit song by 50 Cent, In Da Club, embodies all of the negative stereotypes associated with hip hop culture. The song glamorizes being violent, throwing money around, gangs, collecting hoes like they were gardening supplies---there is nothing poetic about this song, and the lyrics are vacuous. heck, even 50 sounds like he's not into the song at times. It's a terrible excuse for a rap song, yet I play it repeatedly, until the beat drills itself back inside my brain. Kevin Coval, a poet I admire, said that 50 Cent himself is a negative stereotype of rappers, and I agree with that, while still blasting some more of 50's rhymes through my radio. Another rapper I listen to is Self proclaimed "Queen of the South" Trina, a woman who degrades herself in her own songs, and uses the word 'bitch' to punctuate phrases in her raps. That didn't stop me from buying her albums, though. I respect her as an artist more than 50 Cent, as I only like a few of his songs, yet her lyrics, no matter how catchy, are just as vapid.
Bad rappers, no matter how often I declare my hatred for them, will always have a place in my heart, and on my CD shelf. I feel like I'm as shallow as the artist after listening to a hip-pop song, or that I'm a hypocrite when I detest suburban kids for pretending to be rap fans while autotune is dominating the track they leave on repeat. I feel as dirty as a middle aged woman with a secret love for tabloids and gossip, after looking back in disgust at what I just listened to for 10 times straight, but while the song is on, I'm in the moment, nodding my head to the beat, tapping my fingers as the pounding techno beat bursts through the air like cannon fire. I will lose myself in the music, the moment, own it, then snap back to reality and remind myself that I was not listening to 'Lose Yourself', and that 'In Da Club' is still blaring at glass-breaking volume. I tell myself that Soulja Boy can't touch Nas, and Missy is the rightful queen of the south. If hip hop was all about autotune, bland melodies and disney star cameos, it would be pop, and a platinum present would become the Flo-Rida future---right?
We still need those sucker MCs to brighten our dance floors and set the mood for that friday night when the party is wild, and we feel invincible. There's no need to battle---not while that song I heard on the radio, like, a week ago is turned up so loud it's making my body swing in time to the rhythm and now I'm a queen looking down on those fools below me with no taste in music at all----Oh, wait, why was I listening to that song again?
Tuesday, July 28, 2009
Monday, July 20, 2009
Gutter Child
I sleep in the gutter, drowning in an ocean of trash
Gangsters and hoes lulling my aching eyes shut
Lyrics that feel like a breath of fresh air become the dead rats that haunt city subways
Words that deal out death threats and degrading rhymes like decks of cards
Is all my music is to the ears and eyes of my brother
I try reading him a Nikki Giovanni poem about the death of Tupac, and he stops paying attention at the sound of 'pac'
At his age i thought all poems had to rhyme and sound like copies of Silverstein
while today I want Missy Elliott and Eminem to shine through my poems like rays of sun
He thinks up lines that pass me by as I try to write a poem based off a 10% diss from MC Lyte
He writes a poem about bad seeds, yet can't listen to a note that the baddest seeds spit
Never spit seeds, use your words, I'm told----What if the seeds aren't planted or spread, but thrown away or held for a few moments before letting go?
For a moment I'm jealous---he writes better than I did at that age, and I had to be inspired by the music he calls gutter trash
If i play just one line from Nas, he writes it off as something Ludacris, worthless as 50 Cent
When a poet rhymes to a beat and drops lines that contain bad language my brother calls that Gangsta rap
My writing skills are challenged by the boy who doesn't look to rap for inspiration
now can anyone notice why I harbor such frustration as I review my situation?
He doesn't know tagging from grafitti, break dancing from gangster swagga
Lines as effortless as his that can capture mood is what I'm after
I think think up lines that might score a 5 at a slam at best
My brother though a budding rhymer dosen't treat it like a test
He conjures up images, armed with clever lines mixed in with his action-movie filled mind
This morning I tell him He's a good writer
He tells me I draw well as he takes another bite of banana
This stings like a wasp---I want to write well, I hope to sing my own songs and release albums
It's my dream to be recognized for being clever with a pen, writing rhymes like I was painting pictures
Then again, what does he know?
He's quick to label artists as if they were cans of soup---SHE's showing too much cleavage, HER skirt's too tight, HE wants to shoot his foes point-blank, why did he use the f word 4 times in that line?
He rejects the poetry that he himself can learn from, yet knows how to weave together words without the help of two turntables and a microphone
I'm just the girl that lies in the gutter while my favorite MCs corrupt my mind
Gangsters and hoes lulling my aching eyes shut
Lyrics that feel like a breath of fresh air become the dead rats that haunt city subways
Words that deal out death threats and degrading rhymes like decks of cards
Is all my music is to the ears and eyes of my brother
I try reading him a Nikki Giovanni poem about the death of Tupac, and he stops paying attention at the sound of 'pac'
At his age i thought all poems had to rhyme and sound like copies of Silverstein
while today I want Missy Elliott and Eminem to shine through my poems like rays of sun
He thinks up lines that pass me by as I try to write a poem based off a 10% diss from MC Lyte
He writes a poem about bad seeds, yet can't listen to a note that the baddest seeds spit
Never spit seeds, use your words, I'm told----What if the seeds aren't planted or spread, but thrown away or held for a few moments before letting go?
For a moment I'm jealous---he writes better than I did at that age, and I had to be inspired by the music he calls gutter trash
If i play just one line from Nas, he writes it off as something Ludacris, worthless as 50 Cent
When a poet rhymes to a beat and drops lines that contain bad language my brother calls that Gangsta rap
My writing skills are challenged by the boy who doesn't look to rap for inspiration
now can anyone notice why I harbor such frustration as I review my situation?
He doesn't know tagging from grafitti, break dancing from gangster swagga
Lines as effortless as his that can capture mood is what I'm after
I think think up lines that might score a 5 at a slam at best
My brother though a budding rhymer dosen't treat it like a test
He conjures up images, armed with clever lines mixed in with his action-movie filled mind
This morning I tell him He's a good writer
He tells me I draw well as he takes another bite of banana
This stings like a wasp---I want to write well, I hope to sing my own songs and release albums
It's my dream to be recognized for being clever with a pen, writing rhymes like I was painting pictures
Then again, what does he know?
He's quick to label artists as if they were cans of soup---SHE's showing too much cleavage, HER skirt's too tight, HE wants to shoot his foes point-blank, why did he use the f word 4 times in that line?
He rejects the poetry that he himself can learn from, yet knows how to weave together words without the help of two turntables and a microphone
I'm just the girl that lies in the gutter while my favorite MCs corrupt my mind
Friday, July 3, 2009
Slacker Girl (Dirty south, Two Outsiders, and Sleepless Nights)
Get them teeth fixed, spray some sheen on those dreads/get them bags out your eyes, get some rest and go to bed
The line, meant to pierce an up and coming female rapper like a blade, that contained the patronizing, fake-sisterly advice kept playing in the back of my own tired head
up late, school tomorrow, drawing needs to be complete so I can wake to something more pleasing to the eye
This test will boost your grade/Study well and pass the class/Think of how freshened you should feel, once you've slept sound at last
I miss my friend, who lives in another suburb far from me and who is surrounded by boxes in the white-brick home with the odd-looking ceiling---I wrote a poem about him earlier, trying to guess at what his reaction were to be if by chance he read through---Would he laugh, or shrug it off like a playful insult?
You can't stop by the market for giant soda bottles with an imaginary friend, or wander through town, mocking the countless McMansions with an invisible teen---We're both Greasers--outsiders looking to belong, yet trying to appear as if all we wanna do is take your money like M.I.A.---But I was drawing, not thinking about paper planes---Trina was spitting through my headphones instead
We are learning about planet Earth---an area where I have a lot of faults in a subject I manage to coast through each class like someone who just doesn't give a damn about the future---the words 'career' 'reality' and 'study' sound foreign to her
that rebel, rap junkie, antisocial and awkward teenage girl who can waste a night instead of brushing up on plate tectonics---She'd rather stroke that brush across a canvas she got from her uncle who paints strip malls and naked women
Dirty south rap newcomers lacked the country-fried zest the 21st century claimed they captured---When i think rap, I think of the wild west coast that brought Tupac and Dre---the east streets, gritty new york city and its not-so-innocent little sister, my own Chi-town stuck in the middle of both sides like a diplomat
The new south rappers were like mosquitoes to my ears, while my favorite female MCs weren't gonna have music riding the radio waves anytime soon---Remy Ma was rotting in prison and Southern queen Missy's album seemed too far away from my stereo
Then came the Diamond Princess---She raps about sex, money, getting glamorously drunk---What every decent fellow hates rap for spreading around like Swine flu
Her voice and lyrics are filthy---yet they're dirty in a way that repped the south, and showed she was Still Da Baddest---southern belle gone gangster, yet Trina never mentions a bullet---she doesn't wish to see tear-stained caskets or funerals
I listen to her song while I work on art of my own, but hers is the kind of art that I could listen to, feel higher than a paper plane, above my own art supplies and paper and pencil, then remember who I am and float like a leaf back down to Earth---a planet I know a C grade's worth of information about, where I loose sleep while my papa will preach to me on how I need to care about this class
A headphone falls out of my left ear as I scribble madly to the beat of the song, my masterpiece looking like a piece I hadn't quite mastered--Just one more stroke, fix her cheek, shade in her dress, capture the mood, make her look to impress---You'd think I was six again, playing with a dress up doll to fit my standards
Then again, I should have been studying, sleeping, sweaty from the heat, dreaming of a failing grade and that tag-along girl that won't stop asking if I'm awake as soon as I drag myself up out of the steaming covers
Get them bags out your eyes, get some rest and go to bed
The line, meant to pierce an up and coming female rapper like a blade, that contained the patronizing, fake-sisterly advice kept playing in the back of my own tired head
up late, school tomorrow, drawing needs to be complete so I can wake to something more pleasing to the eye
This test will boost your grade/Study well and pass the class/Think of how freshened you should feel, once you've slept sound at last
I miss my friend, who lives in another suburb far from me and who is surrounded by boxes in the white-brick home with the odd-looking ceiling---I wrote a poem about him earlier, trying to guess at what his reaction were to be if by chance he read through---Would he laugh, or shrug it off like a playful insult?
You can't stop by the market for giant soda bottles with an imaginary friend, or wander through town, mocking the countless McMansions with an invisible teen---We're both Greasers--outsiders looking to belong, yet trying to appear as if all we wanna do is take your money like M.I.A.---But I was drawing, not thinking about paper planes---Trina was spitting through my headphones instead
We are learning about planet Earth---an area where I have a lot of faults in a subject I manage to coast through each class like someone who just doesn't give a damn about the future---the words 'career' 'reality' and 'study' sound foreign to her
that rebel, rap junkie, antisocial and awkward teenage girl who can waste a night instead of brushing up on plate tectonics---She'd rather stroke that brush across a canvas she got from her uncle who paints strip malls and naked women
Dirty south rap newcomers lacked the country-fried zest the 21st century claimed they captured---When i think rap, I think of the wild west coast that brought Tupac and Dre---the east streets, gritty new york city and its not-so-innocent little sister, my own Chi-town stuck in the middle of both sides like a diplomat
The new south rappers were like mosquitoes to my ears, while my favorite female MCs weren't gonna have music riding the radio waves anytime soon---Remy Ma was rotting in prison and Southern queen Missy's album seemed too far away from my stereo
Then came the Diamond Princess---She raps about sex, money, getting glamorously drunk---What every decent fellow hates rap for spreading around like Swine flu
Her voice and lyrics are filthy---yet they're dirty in a way that repped the south, and showed she was Still Da Baddest---southern belle gone gangster, yet Trina never mentions a bullet---she doesn't wish to see tear-stained caskets or funerals
I listen to her song while I work on art of my own, but hers is the kind of art that I could listen to, feel higher than a paper plane, above my own art supplies and paper and pencil, then remember who I am and float like a leaf back down to Earth---a planet I know a C grade's worth of information about, where I loose sleep while my papa will preach to me on how I need to care about this class
A headphone falls out of my left ear as I scribble madly to the beat of the song, my masterpiece looking like a piece I hadn't quite mastered--Just one more stroke, fix her cheek, shade in her dress, capture the mood, make her look to impress---You'd think I was six again, playing with a dress up doll to fit my standards
Then again, I should have been studying, sleeping, sweaty from the heat, dreaming of a failing grade and that tag-along girl that won't stop asking if I'm awake as soon as I drag myself up out of the steaming covers
Get them bags out your eyes, get some rest and go to bed
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