Last night at the battle of the bands at the Thatcher School, I was the only Black man to preform. As it was my first time doing a show as a Nerdcore hip-hop artist, I was anxious. One of the things that stood out to me was that I was receiving dirty looks regularly from white nerds who were judging me based on my brown skin and fabulously curly hair. It was truly hurtful to see guys, with skinny arms and bottle lens glasses who looked like they’d never been laid, treating me, a true believer who should be their friend, as a threat for such petty reasons. Nerds shouldn’t be racist. That’s just stupid.
Recently I’ve been thinking about what it means to be hip-hop and I’ve concluded that hip-hop is a soul that the music has. Flying Lotus and Dub FX are often hip-hop even with out rapping. I feel hip-hop is the most versatile musical genre because it takes from all others. In my song “Just a Gigolo” on the last album, I had Keith sample the 1929 Italian opera song, “Just a Gigolo”. Hip-hop can take on any form melodically and it adds the unending possibilities of the spoken word. Too many rappers are not writers and that is where pop music and singles that spout ideals detrimental to the health of people and cultures derive from: crap rappers don’t read and can hardly write.
So, because it can take on any form musically, I’ve always thought that people who do not like hip-hop must feel negatively about it because of the subject matter they regularly hear. They hear misogyny, infidelity, drunkenness, and ignorance and after hearing those associated with “hip-hop”, for so long, come to think thats what hip-hop actually is. These non-writer rappers are why there exist a genre called “rap” aside from hip-hop. It’s “total chaos; no - mass confusion.”
But, truly, it seems I was wrong; there ARE people that dislike music simply for the fact that vocal percussion is incorporated. Take yesterday for example.
I performed “Spiderman” my song about a child who grows up reading comics and aspiring to vigilanteism and later as an adult meets human beings who experienced dramatic events in their childhoods, who were in need of a hero at the time when he was leisurely reading Marvel Team Up on his race-car bed. The boy, a man by the end of the third verse, comes to the conclusion that he, as a man, shares the same responsibility as Peter Parker even with out having been given the same power. He realizes that it is every human being’s duty to help and protect other sentient beings whenever they have the opportunity.
Of the four judges I got two eights and a nine. The last judge who, through-out the night had been making offensive comments about Chinese, simply said, ” While I appreciate the change of pace, I can’t give you more than a six”. In his next Chinese joke, he managed to incorporate the Buddha. So he insulted a sixteenth of my blood, my religion, and my love, hip-hop. Another interesting fact is that I was the only Black man to preform that night and this judge and I were the darkest skinned humans on stage… all night.
It seems even when a vocal percussionist (rapper) is positive, there will be people who shy away from hearing his words simply because they are rapped. This hurts me but I want peace. I make music to tell stories, to share love, and to ease my soul. I feel sorry for those who are phobic of drum rolls. May the force be with you, ever and always.
- Darth [MC] Maasai Warrior the Fanboii Prime the Pooh
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