Hip-Hop-1990-1993
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CrowleyHead
Well-known member
"Hip-Hop's Altamont"
trza
Well-known member
Vanilla Ice has slowly resuscitated his image over the years, he came to my city twice in a year in like 2010 and drew a couple thousand each time. His home renovation shows keep going, he gives good interviews and treats his music career like an embarrassing yearbook photo from twenty years ago. The guy has a deep knowledge and appreciation of light fixtures, they set the tone for the room.
mistersloane
heavy heavy monster sound
That Source Awards is bigger than Altamont. Altamont was the semiotics of music moving from invocation of murder to actual murder, but was still one step removed. The Source Awards was the music of murder completely inhabiting the artists, murder-as-possession.
CrowleyHead
Well-known member
This is so grossly reductive of the drama at that award show, but if you really need me to go in depth, I can do it at a later date.
CrowleyHead
Well-known member
Well for start, you have to look at the obvious regionalism that pervades The Source Awards or Rap in General. In 1995, Hip-Hop Culture was in flux because there was finally an intent to nationalize rap via gangster rap.
Now look at the foundations of rap; in the NYC you have the Bam/Herc/Flash trifecta and it's based out of a collagist approach to DJing. This later manifested itself in the use of sampling but for the average American, their impressions of rap were over 808s and synths, post-electro music. So since rap had to travel over the span of America in a rather grassroots method, y'know, not being a recognizable radio format yet, it was often the more post-electro sound that would manifest in these areas. There are no DJs spinning James Brown with Kraftwerk with Rolling Stones in LA, it's strictly 80's electro/R&B in the post-"Flashlight"/Zapp mold, or in Atlanta and Florida its the more dance/club oriented electro. So by the time NYC rap was finally a thriving scene, records from outside NYC were 'primitive' in contrast because the climate of rapper/production innovations in their zones were sluggish.
As a result, NYC had always had an elitism to outside rap because very few were keeping up. Look at say, NWA. On a technical level, very few of the rappers are at the level where they can compete with NYC rap, except maybe the D.O.C. and even he was a bit of a comparative throwback on his emergence.
Also, you have NYC's climate of the time. The 90-93 period was marked by an advent of post-Native Tongues "Happy Rap" or "Hardcore Rap" (no not the MOP definition). You had your Kwame next to your Brand Nubian next to your Das EFX next to your Fuschnickens or whomever. This was a very 'creative' time, but it would be soon pushed out by Wu-Tang/Nas/Biggie. This was in hip-hop sense, a group of people who all wanted to spiritually reject the Native Tongues sound and go back to the Juice Crew aesthetic (Kool G Rap being god to all three of these people). There was also an overt desire to stop serving as party rap or educative messages as sermonizing (let's not forget, there were a LOT of cults infiltrating rap in this era. Arrested Development were Church Of Christ, Jaz-O was with the Nuwubians, 5%ers were everywhere. Rap was a significant tool in taking young black men and indoctrinating them into so many religious groups back then, and so successful!.) So now, the turn is to post-G Rap Gangster Narrative Storytelling, and the portrayal of oneself as a 'street icon'.
(It's a little known fact, but Native Tongues are actually a spiritual opposition to the Mr. Magic/Marley Marl alliance which was often funded by the drug trade. Marley was of course friends with Eric B. who knew the Paid In Full Posse v. well and most of his projects was often funded by drug money; essentially all of the Juice Crew was an act of vicarious consumption, drug dealers flaunting their success by sponsoring talent. So you have a sort of spiritual NYC War in rap with The Juice Crew & Rakim with the effective LOCKDOWN of WBLS by the Marley/Magic trade on one side and The Native Tongues, who are a sort of Zulu-endorsed anti-dealer alliance (JBz, Tribe, De La, Latifah. Informally the Zulu-endorsed Ultramagnetic, P.E. (who even sniped at The Juice Crew on "Nation of Millions") and the 'redeemed gangster rapper' KRS-One). Eventually, The Juice Crew's benefactors went to jail or died, and the crew was unable to maintain their stranglehold, and The Native Tongues element were often endorsed by major labels who saw them and wanted to promote them as artists. So "Self-Destruction" is less some charity record and more of a Camp David of NYC Rap.)
On the flipside, you have the domination of LA rap. After years of too many indie labels clogging up the scene, fucking up the business, you had the more savvy West Coast labels who often didn't get picked up by majors too suddenly, and had to learn how to market themselves nationally as the LA Rap scene was so slim compared to the NY scene. NY never thought about marketing themselves nationally, they were so caught up in 'the scene'. So naturally, the industry recognizes that there is a scene of people who have no ego about leaving the confines of their home areas and touring, networking with other artists. Furthermore, whereas sampling and the more aggressive/"avant-garde" artificial sounding stuff of NYC was a lot for radio to tolerate, West Coast rap had evolved to appreciating musicality and was more or less fond of riding R&B record grooves. Which of course, radio could tolerate, as it was recognizably 'musical' and thereby had more versatile natures for programming.
And those rappers lacked any sort of Zulu-Nation movement in LA. Yes, yes, Afrika Islam was Ice-T's DJ/Producer, but this wasn't a homegrown thing. Rap in California began with Ice-T's Schoolly D knock-offs and Too $hort's pimp & cocaine raps (often paid requested verses by drug dealers who could afford to 'rent' him for a freestyle tape). Furthermore, the gang culture in California was now becoming marketable in a way that wasn't so prevalent in NYC (For example, the best indicator of what gangs in the proto-hip-hop NYC was The Warriors. L.A.'s hip-hop era has... Boyz In Da Hood, Colors, Menace, you name it.) It was an industry now to make 'exotic' and mythologize this culture, and would receive relatively big-money compared to the obvious cult movie, 'get into middle-america', 'cross-over' realm of NYC rap.
So now with all of that in mind, flash back to 1995. NYC is finally realizing it needs to become more capitalistic and start thinking about things like competing with a whole generation of rap audience that wants to hear Snoop & Dre-type narrative conceptual gangster rap. It is dealing with the fact that there are Southern and West Coast rappers with massive national hits and platinum albums taking a culture that they always presumed was theirs. It is dealing with the fact that they want to achieve massive record sales without having to do 'pop' music, while still conforming to urban pop and selling out in more subtle ways ("If I Ruled The World" is Nas going from sample-based 'hardcore' rap to old 80s hip-hop played over at a club tempo and Lauryn Hill doing a sung chorus for fans to sing along to. It is most DEFINITELY Nas selling out, even if you don't think it's as vast a compromise for him as say... "Oochie Wally" was.) This is an NYC-based Magazine, in a no longer NYC dominant industry, with an audience comprised of a great deal of people who are desiring a return to coke glamour, 'ghetto fabulous' mentality etc. Being forced to share their celebration with people from California, Atlanta, Florida, Texas, you name it. Their chosen hero is Biggie, who is to them the ultimate of post-G Rap narrative, and Puffy his director, a master of manipulations, club dominations, and someone who is literally the offspring of a NYC Drug Trade Icon.
His nemesis is Suge Knight. A parasite of the highest level, who thrives on bullying and gross abuses of even his own talent he's supposed to defend (Slackk's bigged it up a bunch of times, but read Ronin Ro's "Have Gun Will Travel" on Death Row. The amount of abuse that Warren G has taken over the course of his life from Suge Knight alone is harrowing.) This is a man who sees such a narcissistic delusional city in flux, who sees how badly Puffy is borrowing from the Death Row aesthetics, who is WINNING and knows how much he is hated by New York City for the fact that he's a 'Blood', from "Hollywood", that he clearly has no actual ability or talent but can thrive better than these people who had to take these 'baby steps' to succeed in the music industry.
Also the key difference: Altamont is seen as a death-knell. Nothing ended when The Source Awards commenced or concluded.
Also no actual murders occurring is a big deal.
Now look at the foundations of rap; in the NYC you have the Bam/Herc/Flash trifecta and it's based out of a collagist approach to DJing. This later manifested itself in the use of sampling but for the average American, their impressions of rap were over 808s and synths, post-electro music. So since rap had to travel over the span of America in a rather grassroots method, y'know, not being a recognizable radio format yet, it was often the more post-electro sound that would manifest in these areas. There are no DJs spinning James Brown with Kraftwerk with Rolling Stones in LA, it's strictly 80's electro/R&B in the post-"Flashlight"/Zapp mold, or in Atlanta and Florida its the more dance/club oriented electro. So by the time NYC rap was finally a thriving scene, records from outside NYC were 'primitive' in contrast because the climate of rapper/production innovations in their zones were sluggish.
As a result, NYC had always had an elitism to outside rap because very few were keeping up. Look at say, NWA. On a technical level, very few of the rappers are at the level where they can compete with NYC rap, except maybe the D.O.C. and even he was a bit of a comparative throwback on his emergence.
Also, you have NYC's climate of the time. The 90-93 period was marked by an advent of post-Native Tongues "Happy Rap" or "Hardcore Rap" (no not the MOP definition). You had your Kwame next to your Brand Nubian next to your Das EFX next to your Fuschnickens or whomever. This was a very 'creative' time, but it would be soon pushed out by Wu-Tang/Nas/Biggie. This was in hip-hop sense, a group of people who all wanted to spiritually reject the Native Tongues sound and go back to the Juice Crew aesthetic (Kool G Rap being god to all three of these people). There was also an overt desire to stop serving as party rap or educative messages as sermonizing (let's not forget, there were a LOT of cults infiltrating rap in this era. Arrested Development were Church Of Christ, Jaz-O was with the Nuwubians, 5%ers were everywhere. Rap was a significant tool in taking young black men and indoctrinating them into so many religious groups back then, and so successful!.) So now, the turn is to post-G Rap Gangster Narrative Storytelling, and the portrayal of oneself as a 'street icon'.
(It's a little known fact, but Native Tongues are actually a spiritual opposition to the Mr. Magic/Marley Marl alliance which was often funded by the drug trade. Marley was of course friends with Eric B. who knew the Paid In Full Posse v. well and most of his projects was often funded by drug money; essentially all of the Juice Crew was an act of vicarious consumption, drug dealers flaunting their success by sponsoring talent. So you have a sort of spiritual NYC War in rap with The Juice Crew & Rakim with the effective LOCKDOWN of WBLS by the Marley/Magic trade on one side and The Native Tongues, who are a sort of Zulu-endorsed anti-dealer alliance (JBz, Tribe, De La, Latifah. Informally the Zulu-endorsed Ultramagnetic, P.E. (who even sniped at The Juice Crew on "Nation of Millions") and the 'redeemed gangster rapper' KRS-One). Eventually, The Juice Crew's benefactors went to jail or died, and the crew was unable to maintain their stranglehold, and The Native Tongues element were often endorsed by major labels who saw them and wanted to promote them as artists. So "Self-Destruction" is less some charity record and more of a Camp David of NYC Rap.)
On the flipside, you have the domination of LA rap. After years of too many indie labels clogging up the scene, fucking up the business, you had the more savvy West Coast labels who often didn't get picked up by majors too suddenly, and had to learn how to market themselves nationally as the LA Rap scene was so slim compared to the NY scene. NY never thought about marketing themselves nationally, they were so caught up in 'the scene'. So naturally, the industry recognizes that there is a scene of people who have no ego about leaving the confines of their home areas and touring, networking with other artists. Furthermore, whereas sampling and the more aggressive/"avant-garde" artificial sounding stuff of NYC was a lot for radio to tolerate, West Coast rap had evolved to appreciating musicality and was more or less fond of riding R&B record grooves. Which of course, radio could tolerate, as it was recognizably 'musical' and thereby had more versatile natures for programming.
And those rappers lacked any sort of Zulu-Nation movement in LA. Yes, yes, Afrika Islam was Ice-T's DJ/Producer, but this wasn't a homegrown thing. Rap in California began with Ice-T's Schoolly D knock-offs and Too $hort's pimp & cocaine raps (often paid requested verses by drug dealers who could afford to 'rent' him for a freestyle tape). Furthermore, the gang culture in California was now becoming marketable in a way that wasn't so prevalent in NYC (For example, the best indicator of what gangs in the proto-hip-hop NYC was The Warriors. L.A.'s hip-hop era has... Boyz In Da Hood, Colors, Menace, you name it.) It was an industry now to make 'exotic' and mythologize this culture, and would receive relatively big-money compared to the obvious cult movie, 'get into middle-america', 'cross-over' realm of NYC rap.
So now with all of that in mind, flash back to 1995. NYC is finally realizing it needs to become more capitalistic and start thinking about things like competing with a whole generation of rap audience that wants to hear Snoop & Dre-type narrative conceptual gangster rap. It is dealing with the fact that there are Southern and West Coast rappers with massive national hits and platinum albums taking a culture that they always presumed was theirs. It is dealing with the fact that they want to achieve massive record sales without having to do 'pop' music, while still conforming to urban pop and selling out in more subtle ways ("If I Ruled The World" is Nas going from sample-based 'hardcore' rap to old 80s hip-hop played over at a club tempo and Lauryn Hill doing a sung chorus for fans to sing along to. It is most DEFINITELY Nas selling out, even if you don't think it's as vast a compromise for him as say... "Oochie Wally" was.) This is an NYC-based Magazine, in a no longer NYC dominant industry, with an audience comprised of a great deal of people who are desiring a return to coke glamour, 'ghetto fabulous' mentality etc. Being forced to share their celebration with people from California, Atlanta, Florida, Texas, you name it. Their chosen hero is Biggie, who is to them the ultimate of post-G Rap narrative, and Puffy his director, a master of manipulations, club dominations, and someone who is literally the offspring of a NYC Drug Trade Icon.
His nemesis is Suge Knight. A parasite of the highest level, who thrives on bullying and gross abuses of even his own talent he's supposed to defend (Slackk's bigged it up a bunch of times, but read Ronin Ro's "Have Gun Will Travel" on Death Row. The amount of abuse that Warren G has taken over the course of his life from Suge Knight alone is harrowing.) This is a man who sees such a narcissistic delusional city in flux, who sees how badly Puffy is borrowing from the Death Row aesthetics, who is WINNING and knows how much he is hated by New York City for the fact that he's a 'Blood', from "Hollywood", that he clearly has no actual ability or talent but can thrive better than these people who had to take these 'baby steps' to succeed in the music industry.
Also the key difference: Altamont is seen as a death-knell. Nothing ended when The Source Awards commenced or concluded.
Also no actual murders occurring is a big deal.
Corpsey
bandz ahoy
I'm confused - why does Craner think The Source Awards 1995 was Hip-Hop's Altamont and why does Crowley think it wasn't? Not being snide, I'm genuinely interested in hearing your arguments. Crowley's done a great job of outlining the historical importance of those awards but I don't think he directly refuted craner's argument, which - to be fair - is difficult to work out.
If the comparison is to do with Mick et al playing the outlaw and then being horrified when genuine outlaws did their outlaw business in front of their gig, the obvious figure to bring in here is 2pac, who in some people's view was a performing arts kid who ended up playing the role of THUG LIFE IMMORTAL after getting his bail paid by Suge Knight, and then of course was shot. I have seen extensive arguments about this online, though, so I don't think it's as cut and dried as that.
On the topic of Death Row/Suge Knight, I really enjoyed reading this article by Byron Crawford (formerly of XXL) about Dr. Dre's rise from hood to billionaire-hood. Very funny and likely to piss some readers off.
If the comparison is to do with Mick et al playing the outlaw and then being horrified when genuine outlaws did their outlaw business in front of their gig, the obvious figure to bring in here is 2pac, who in some people's view was a performing arts kid who ended up playing the role of THUG LIFE IMMORTAL after getting his bail paid by Suge Knight, and then of course was shot. I have seen extensive arguments about this online, though, so I don't think it's as cut and dried as that.
On the topic of Death Row/Suge Knight, I really enjoyed reading this article by Byron Crawford (formerly of XXL) about Dr. Dre's rise from hood to billionaire-hood. Very funny and likely to piss some readers off.
CrowleyHead
Well-known member
While that is true it's incredibly reductive to the realities of the situation. Wu-Tang Clan was in fact founded on drug money and Ghostface's own personal experiences as a drug dealer in Staten Island (hence why Rza would title him 'treasurer', you can't actually say "Dude with a ton of money from illicit activity") for example, and Suge was definitely connected to gang activity. There were people here involved in this industry on SO MANY levels with actual urban crime so while the artists themselves aren't necessarily the man they portray, that man might always be lurking around the corner around that artist. It's a hallmark of anything in the post '93-era, from J Prince's countless battles with the FBI, rumors of Birdman actually paying his artists in the heron he'd profited on to form Cash Money Records as a laundering process, 50 Cent's prior 'side-career' as local drug dealer.
A lot of people like to play it down like "It can get a bit hyped" and cite for example in modern times, Rick Ross or whomever. But this is a circumstance that plagues the community where a lot of rap in this style generally comes from, where even if the artist's own experiences with illicit activity might be fraudulent, he is generally exposed to a lifestyle that uses rap as a vehicle to escape illicit activity.
So what my point is, is that Altamont was symbolic in the sense that an idealist of 'counter-culture' being made mainstream was deflated by the reality that not all the outcasts of American society are those idealists. This time, 'realism' and 'romanticism' (Death Row vs. Bad Boy) were actively competing against each other, but there wasn't any sense of real idealism present in that tension (maybe Outkast if you want to be really generous, but even then they were focused simply on being recognized legitimately, rather than being symbolic of anything by that point). And also there was no ultimate culmination of violent tragedy until much later, with Biggie getting murdered (if you believe the theory) on contract by Suge.
It's very hard to compare the naivete of The Rolling Stones (and whomever else tried Altamont) to The Source Awards being infected by the sort of malaise that riddles this genre. Because Altamont was not an experience limited to the culture the same way The Source Awards was. Altamont was about the assimilation of 'hippie' ideals. Nobody in The Source Awards was thinking about mainstream America, and vice versa was probably INFINITELY true.
Corpsey
bandz ahoy
I wonder what's going on with Chris Brown and the bloods at the moment
Whether it's just him trying to project a street image or if its a protection racket thing (he was in prison recently, though I'm not sure if the blood thing preceded this). Speaks to Crowley's point about shady characters hanging around Rap/R&B acts, even if the acts themselves aren't gangsters.
Whether it's just him trying to project a street image or if its a protection racket thing (he was in prison recently, though I'm not sure if the blood thing preceded this). Speaks to Crowley's point about shady characters hanging around Rap/R&B acts, even if the acts themselves aren't gangsters.
CrowleyHead
Well-known member
The Tupac thing is also note-worthy because Tupac is not there. He'd already made a fiasco of one Source Awards show where he bum-rushed a ATCQ show just to curse off the audience, and Zulu Nation forced him to apologize. Yet this was '93, I believe, when Zulu still had currency and authority in the culture. By '95, corporate music industry interest had moved in and worked against 'cults' to mainstream rap further (you can see that as everyone in the mainstream of rap becomes this sort of generic "Christian" figure; nowadays any rapper who doesn't go out of his way to play that up becomes a conspirator in a Satanic Illuminati Cult because rap was encouraged to homogenize itself spiritually so intensely. Even something like Jay-Z wearing a 5% medallion recently is now met with shock and confusion, because that element is so divorced from the genre these days) and so if you weren't a 'power-player', if you weren't in the labels, the management teams, the production teams, or the artists and their entourages (now becoming again, signs of the net worth of the rapper. Its like Feudalism meets Veblen; I'm the most successful, so I am able to dress all of my childhood friends, and keep them fed and with great jewelry, and in return they're going to break your skeletal structure if you fuck with me. And now that crew has to be appealed to because they're attached to the artist.)
But now, you have no authority figure like the Hell's Angels were proposed as. Instead it's criminals or 'quasi-criminal figures' policing themselves. There is no Zulu Nation, Native Tongues. Most of those individuals have now sold-out to corporate interests or are now left out of the equation. If they were there, they'd have protection like The Violators or maybe Latifah's team who 'protected' Flavor Unit; redeemed criminal figures who have been religiously/culturally 're-educated'. So you have a purposefully amoral and negative vibe being successful and essentially praised. At least Altamont pretended to the audience being "Brothers & Sisters" expressing "Peace & Love".
But back to Tupac; he's in jail at this time. I can only imagine how badly he would've stoked the flames of that shit. But watching Snoop who at the time, you can tell was emotionally overwhelmed, so infuriated and hurt, KILLS ME man. Snoop's always been a kind of straight-forward guy, a really earnest sort of spirit even when he's young and gotta be snotty to Eazy for the sake of loyalty to his new adoptive benefactors in Dre and Suge. That's how useless any form of strong character was in that environment, that simply being recognized for success results in getting SHITTED on by NYC. And Snoop at that time loved New York! Yes he was from Long Beach and repped for NWA, but he always paid tribute to Slick Rick and Big Daddy Kane. And now he's got the city that gave him a music he loves just treating him like dirt. For a young man, that's got to wound you. Tell me one character in the Altamont saga who truly conveys that much hurt. Not Jagger, who's more or less "Oh dear, what did I do?".
But now, you have no authority figure like the Hell's Angels were proposed as. Instead it's criminals or 'quasi-criminal figures' policing themselves. There is no Zulu Nation, Native Tongues. Most of those individuals have now sold-out to corporate interests or are now left out of the equation. If they were there, they'd have protection like The Violators or maybe Latifah's team who 'protected' Flavor Unit; redeemed criminal figures who have been religiously/culturally 're-educated'. So you have a purposefully amoral and negative vibe being successful and essentially praised. At least Altamont pretended to the audience being "Brothers & Sisters" expressing "Peace & Love".
But back to Tupac; he's in jail at this time. I can only imagine how badly he would've stoked the flames of that shit. But watching Snoop who at the time, you can tell was emotionally overwhelmed, so infuriated and hurt, KILLS ME man. Snoop's always been a kind of straight-forward guy, a really earnest sort of spirit even when he's young and gotta be snotty to Eazy for the sake of loyalty to his new adoptive benefactors in Dre and Suge. That's how useless any form of strong character was in that environment, that simply being recognized for success results in getting SHITTED on by NYC. And Snoop at that time loved New York! Yes he was from Long Beach and repped for NWA, but he always paid tribute to Slick Rick and Big Daddy Kane. And now he's got the city that gave him a music he loves just treating him like dirt. For a young man, that's got to wound you. Tell me one character in the Altamont saga who truly conveys that much hurt. Not Jagger, who's more or less "Oh dear, what did I do?".
CrowleyHead
Well-known member
From what's understood, this is a jail thing, though I doubt he's... 'IN IN'?
What's interesting though is several people, Frank Ocean specifically, have been physically harassed by Brown's relatives. So I wonder if there's like, an element of that in his family. Nowadays though, he's certainly getting more than his share of violence happening around him that his life is so chaotic. I can't think of anyone with his level of talent and ability to crossover (tarnished or not) in such a really tumultuous sort of existence.
craner
Beast of Burden
I felt the same about Snoop. You usually hear about Suge kickstarting the trouble with his amusing dig at Puffy but it's ugly right off the bat, with that grotesque Bad Boy montage which is totally shit-stirring and greeted with ugly partisan braying by the NYC home crowd who remain out of order for the rest of the evening. At some point during the proceedings the people handing out awards start to look pretty fucking scared.
I suppose the Altamont thing was only 1) that it's rare to watch as a showbiz situation spills over into the ugly reality of ultraviolence, and tangibly sense an atmosphere switch from fantasy and glamour to physical fear and near-chaos 2) the film as a document when culture changes and the atmosphere definitively darkens. It was a wafer-thin comparison.
I remember reading some guy from the Roots saying this, talking about fights breaking out around the hall and sitting behind Nas who sank deeper and deeper into his chair as the night progressed.
I suppose the Altamont thing was only 1) that it's rare to watch as a showbiz situation spills over into the ugly reality of ultraviolence, and tangibly sense an atmosphere switch from fantasy and glamour to physical fear and near-chaos 2) the film as a document when culture changes and the atmosphere definitively darkens. It was a wafer-thin comparison.
I remember reading some guy from the Roots saying this, talking about fights breaking out around the hall and sitting behind Nas who sank deeper and deeper into his chair as the night progressed.
CrowleyHead
Well-known member
The people of the '93-'03 NYC industry are some really truly lawless characters. Puffy trying to nearly kill Steve Stoute, Jay-Z stabbing Lance Rivera. Even straight-laced characters like say, Lyor Cohen. I watched him fucking throwing bows with pleasure at the Hip-Hop Honors ceremony when DMX, his Diamond Selling Golden Child, was onstage. Even then, in the late 00's, he was being smug, sending shots at Puffy.
I've also mentioned before on this forum years ago, but The Roots were always part of the problem. There's an ancient Murder Dog where someone in the group (presumably Questlove's afro) is disparaging of West Coast rappers. Then when the Puffy era is unchallenged, they're insulting to other East Coast rappers. The whole 2nd generation of the Natives who don't have direct connections to the Zulus such as De La and The Roots SORTA/KINDA just come off as toxic to me. You can tell once they get into the "Stakes Is High"-era that these guys were so scornful and bitter; and while it came from a noble position it always slid into such into such petty "I'm better than them because I DIDN'T conform to expectations." (Because those limp jam band songs were SO MUCH BETTER for the culture) It's also funny because to me, California-based groups like Alkoholiks and Digital Underground conveyed the spirit of the Jungle Brothers FAR better than Tribe or De La did. (Neither of those two had their progenitors irreverence IMO)
So you see, there's no RIGHTEOUS party in this community. Everyone has negative and positive qualities that mold the genre in certain ways.
I also didn't cover this when discussing it earlier, but it's fascinating to watch such a tightly knit organization like Death Row fall apart like they did. Quik now talks openly with contempt for Tupac's behavior and falsity, Suge traumatized half that team (there's even weird rumors he is the reason Devante Swing of Jodeci fell out of the public light). Even Dogg Pound was broken up for a long time because Kurupt went back to Suge post-jail, while Daz sued him for owed royalties. Kind of a weird experience to watch such an intensely clannish bunch truly fall apart.
I've also mentioned before on this forum years ago, but The Roots were always part of the problem. There's an ancient Murder Dog where someone in the group (presumably Questlove's afro) is disparaging of West Coast rappers. Then when the Puffy era is unchallenged, they're insulting to other East Coast rappers. The whole 2nd generation of the Natives who don't have direct connections to the Zulus such as De La and The Roots SORTA/KINDA just come off as toxic to me. You can tell once they get into the "Stakes Is High"-era that these guys were so scornful and bitter; and while it came from a noble position it always slid into such into such petty "I'm better than them because I DIDN'T conform to expectations." (Because those limp jam band songs were SO MUCH BETTER for the culture) It's also funny because to me, California-based groups like Alkoholiks and Digital Underground conveyed the spirit of the Jungle Brothers FAR better than Tribe or De La did. (Neither of those two had their progenitors irreverence IMO)
So you see, there's no RIGHTEOUS party in this community. Everyone has negative and positive qualities that mold the genre in certain ways.
I also didn't cover this when discussing it earlier, but it's fascinating to watch such a tightly knit organization like Death Row fall apart like they did. Quik now talks openly with contempt for Tupac's behavior and falsity, Suge traumatized half that team (there's even weird rumors he is the reason Devante Swing of Jodeci fell out of the public light). Even Dogg Pound was broken up for a long time because Kurupt went back to Suge post-jail, while Daz sued him for owed royalties. Kind of a weird experience to watch such an intensely clannish bunch truly fall apart.
CrowleyHead
Well-known member
Mobb Deep never had the impact of Big, Wu-Tang or Nas. In fact they remodeled themselves AFTER those three; remember the debut.