How Nicki Minaj Should Be Enjoyed

With cheese. Lots and lots of cheese.

And a sense of fun. Which was lost on the Cocaine Blunts comments section a couple of weeks ago (super-senior year is clearly still affecting my timeliness) when Noz brought the Au bon Pain (no NPR) on Nicki's amazingly awkward BET freestyle. Noz's description of the whole thing and his reaction was hilarious and spot-on and the only real point of contention with the post was his assertion that she's "an awful rapper", which is bullshit. Being "an awful rapper" is really just not being able to rap on beat. At all. That's it.



There's clearly a qualitative difference between "Let Me Take You To The Movies" and Nicki. Nicki can rap. Really fucking well, actually. The issue is the perception of someone's rapping ability is usually couched, like anything else, in the sound of their voice and their mannerisms, two things that she's managed to completely split opinion on due to a post-Wayne dedication to quirk that usually runs anywhere from endearing to awkward. For better or for worse, she's always entertaining. Although she has definitely gone overboard with the performing arts high school graduate thing since I first caught on to "Itty Bitty Piggy". That video and song is a lot more subdued and controlled use of what now just comes off sort of manic, but given how she's changed since that first Lil' Wayne feature two years ago to now there will probably be another version of Nicki by the time the Drake album comes out next year.

(Is it worth anything to state the fact that lyrically Nicki Minaj shits on Drake? What does that even mean?)

The usual centrist comment regarding Nicki Minaj is that her lyrics are good enough, somewhere a couple of notches above "mixtape rapper", but you have to look past her spazziness and, as Noz put it best, her tendency to rap with "...every accent and yet no accent at all", there's a lot more to immediately love than anything featured on Nahright. Beam Me Up Scotty is the most compulsively listenable thing I've listened to lately, and as opposed to all the Gucci mixtapes that felt like work to listen to (always a bad sign), I usually found myself in the stacks during October only listening to that tape.

My cosigning of Nicki Minaj feels defensive, even as she's gotten so much more popular over the summer and fall, mainly because how seriously IRL people take my enthusiasm is equal to how seriously they take her. Its still fruitless trying to explain to people that their clueless assertion about how "pre-2002 Cam'Ron was great", even in 2009. You'd think by now people would have open minds and realize their rote arguments about Cam's rhyme schemes "sounding like Sesame Street" miss the point completely. They're ignoring legitimate, usually (at least pre-2008) quality Cam lyrics because they mistake cleverness and a sense of humor for somehow being too silly to enjoy or take seriously. The same mentality that informs the Nicki Minaj and Cam'Ron debate is what informed people's opinions about The Darkness. The fact that the Darkness weren't that great is besides the point. But, like Cam'Ron and Nicki Minaj, more people are fixated on and prejudiced by their perceptions of each artist's respective silliness that actually stepping back and qualitatively looking at their product never came up in the discussion.

In response to Noz's question about whether "fake quirk was defensible", I said "Isn’t everything fake quirk, though? People become interesting performers by manufacturing tics and mannerisms and etc out of not being able to spew from the sort of dust cloud that made Prince 'Prince'."

And that's really what it comes down to. There are only two real criticisms in regards to Nicki Minaj, and that would be her mania and her lyrics. Her lyrics range from a C+ to a B-, and her mania is enjoyable like a sassy car crash. Her mania/quirk/gimmick isn't any less valid than someone who actually comes off as weird away from the stage, though some might try and derive a qualitative difference between the two. But, it's called "performing" for a reason. And regardless, she's not making any strides to declare premature greatness like Cudi or Wayne or even Jay. She's not declaring much of anything except that, as of right now, she's better than any notable female rapper, which is true. There's no rap purism to her, she's a complete pop-tart, which is why the BAAAAAAAWING of the Cocaine Blunts comments section was both funny and kind of pathetic. There was a woeful lack of perspective that maybe the best way to look at Nicki Minaj is someone rapping and singing for your entertainment. Which is all she's doing.

That and being persnickety about her deli.

NYC Pity Committee

Harris Publications owes me fucking $18.

For some reason I didn’t anticipate that this would be a kind of bullshit night. I left campus sometime Saturday afternoon with absolute unawareness that, after being spoiled since I was 16 by live music experiences that were started on time and didn’t offer mirages of gratuity, I was to finally experience the dreaded “rap show in a club”.

The Internal Affairs 10th Anniversary show story starts in the middle of the week. I go to xxlmag.com virtually every day to read Byron Crawford and Ron Mexico’s respective blog drops. To the immediate left was a blurb about a Harris Publications contest to go see the Pharoahe Monch show in Brooklyn (literally like a 20 minute or so walk from my pre-Bed-Stuy-gentrification brownstone) for free. Because of all the Brooklyn Vegan contests I’ve entered in the last year, I’ve grown pretty used to entering this sort of thing, plus the question was easy enough: “Which artist has Pharoahe Monch never been featured on a song with?” All four of the answers except one were pretty obvious, or at least would be if you dug Phaorahe in the least bit, so I emailed them “MF DOOM” from the choices and got an email the next day or so saying I had won.

I’d never seen Pharoahe perform before and had to skip the Organized Konfusion reunion shows and this year’s Rock the Bells out of budgetary constraints/sloth so I thought this was fate. I was meant to see Monche destroy a small, intimate Brooklyn club I’d never heard of playing one of my favorite post-Golden Age rap albums for free.

They asked for my email because, not trusting XXLmag of Harris Publications for shit based on the widespread knowledge of the shadiness and bootlegged lack of professionalism from rap mags (i.e. the lingering taint of the Source and the 5 Mic lottery of the Benzino era) so I gave them my AOL when I initially entered the contest as my college email is actually important and I don’t give my government out to the sort of people who’d give vapid chicks from Drake videos a week-long blog column. Probably a mistake since my college email would’ve inherently given them enough info to’ve put me on the RSVP for the show, which was in jeopardy by the weekend as I realized, after a long day in class away from my computer and checking my email for the first time at 5, that they had yet to send me an email back saying they received the last email and that I was good to go.

“What kind of bullshit business doesn’t respond back to emails after Thursday? There’s another work day, right?”

Cut to Thursday. I picked up a few items from my house to take back to college (Halloween mask, PS2 games, etc.) and checked up on my mom who’s having a rough time health wise. At no point during the weekend had I cleared the enthusiastic haze out of mind and thought of printing out my e-correspondence with XXL just in case they were as unprofessional as I’d reckoned and didn’t put me on the RSVP. Nor did I think to borrow my mom’s unlimited metrocard just in case some bullshit happened and I had to come back to the house to sort it out or for any other reason. It’s this kind of lack of foresight that has me coming out of pocket for a second senior year in college.

I take the A to Schermerhorn, hop to the G, get off at Classon and walk through the neighborhood, which is a part of Brooklyn I’ve never been to since, in all honesty, I don’t really fuck with the boroughs like that. I know Manhattan and west Brooklyn better than relatives’ birthdays yet the Bronx, parts of Queens and the other %75 of Brooklyn I never have to visit could be Philly for all I know. A little sketched out to be in the kind of area where the projects have their own embedded police precinct (you’d think that’d help, but if anything it’s the opposite), I made an L to the venue, this odd Bohemian nest in the middle of a semi-gully remnant of pre-Grizzly Bear Brooklyn called Sputnik. Real neo-soul looking inside, calming earth tones, candles, people that look like ?uestlove. Like walking into the jazz club from “What They Do”, actually.

I had Curb Your Enthusiasm and Bill Maher on DVR, but I watched two episodes of Curb and rushed to the venue because the show was supposed to start at 10pm. Once again, lack of foresight. This wasn’t like any of the metal or hardcore shows I’d gone to or even the Ghostface and Roots shows or Rock the Bells. Those shits started on time. It was organized by professionals and had actual money going into it, presenting an opportunity cost if any post-Forever Wu-Tang bullshit scamming or delays happened. When I got there, we were told that the doors for the show would open at 10:30. From the hundreds of shows I’ve gone to, I knew that meant the show would probably go on at 11:15 at the very earliest. I asked the doorman if I was on the RSVP for contest winner to make sure that the sinking paranoia I was starting to feel was just that.

Nope. Not on the list. For his credit the guy seemed genuinely concerned and not pretending to be distant and superior like most NYC doormen. But at this point I had a choice: either pay the fare and go home to print out the emails or stay there and cough up the $18 door charge. Stupidly, I just lingered around there and, after double-checking with the stampstress downstairs and going to get a $10 from the Chinese spot ATM, just said “Fuck it” and paid the money. I was dejected, especially since I was alone, bored, playing text tag on some interpersonal drama shit with a girl from school and quickly realizing that the show was taking so long that I would not be able to catch the last 1’o clock Metro-North to White Plains or the last 2’something free shuttle back to campus. Meaning I’d be stuck in NYC for the night and likely not get back in time the next day to get any meaningful amount of work or anything done.

Anyway, the actual show was great. The intimacy was the entire reason I was doing this, plus the promise that Monch wouldn’t be playing Desire. I might give that record another chance later but from what I remember it wasn’t great, but rode a wave of well-wishing because you’d have to be a complete asshole to not love the guy. That goodwill is how I convinced myself that I didn’t mind XXL’s inefficient fuck-up that was costing me $18.

“Monch deserves the money, goddamit. I mean, he couldn’t sell Internal Affairs for 10 years over sample issues, Desire did Q-Tip numbers and who knows how much of the Diddy ghostwriting money is still around. If I can support the dude enough that he can cop a Popeye’s 5-piece boneless chicken strip meal and take a cab back home after, so be it”

Although Monch's kind of getting back to "Fudge Pudge" status so clearly he's both caking and eating, figuratively and/or literally.

As evidenced by the video, and the entire thing is on that same Youtube account, the shit was nuts. There are maybe 2 or 3 songs off Internal Affairs that I’ve never really liked or felt, so I was bound to enjoy the shit. Plus, he didn’t stick to the script completely. Throughout the evening (or morning because after the warm-up acts, a guy who did a rap where he just pieced together the names of streets in NYC and a member of the X-Ecutioners crew who did a DJ set that felt like a good hour, it was like 12:45) Monch took requests (some tall white dude that looks like he fucks with Jedi Mind Tricks, Kool G Rap and R.A. the Rugged Man heavy shouted out some Soundbombing track after ever song until Monch finally did it.) and did his verses from “Oh No”, “My Life”, “Desire”, and an Organized Konfusion song, I think “Stray Bullets”. He was helped halfway through the set by two singers who, Unitarian Christ bless, were talented but the kind of budget nondescript singers that you get in NYC. A thick-bordering-on-“BBW” chick with ridiculously immaculate cleavage a dude the size of Buckshot that kind of looked a lot like Gandhi from “Clone High”.

The set list is on the youtube channel, but the M.O.P song, maybe my favorite Internal Affairs track, lacked any M.O.P. Monch apologized, but I don’t think anyone, even me at this point, was surprised. The flyer promised tons of guests, basically everyone who guested on the record, but no one showed up. Jean Grae (looking fine and amused at everything), DJ Scratch and Evil D were in the booth, though, though Jean was spectating and didn’t come down to the stage to spit anything.

The night ended with “Simon Says” of course, this was probably my favorite rap concert moment ever and definitely in my top 5 concert experiences in general. I haven’t yelled that loud and spazzed that hard since the last time I saw Converge live, and save for hopefully getting to see M.O.P. do “Ante Up” live in the future. Plus Monch is just as much of a playful virtuoso with a preacher's prescence and a king's tendency to proclaim. I’ve been hearing about S.O.B’s and their rap shows for a minute but I’ve always been hesitant. Seeing Monch live just convinced me to check their listing and check out live hip-hop more than I have been, especially since I unfortunately missed the Boot Camp Clik show and could prolly catch Sean Price there any time.

The second highlight of the Monch weekend? Running into R.A. the Rugged Man at the Fulton Street 4/5/A/C train station. He asked some dude for directions a few feet away but I didn’t geek out and tell him how much I liked Die, Rugged Man, Die just because I’m terrible at talking to people I recognize, like when I ran up on Jay Smooth this summer at a KRS-ONE free show in the Bronx and kind of made him feel uncomfortable as I struggled to verbalize how much I love his work.

Now to get someone to go with me to Vivian Girls.

Because Rosie Perez Was Never All That Cute Above The Neck

How can you not love Nicki Minaj? There's that line in Pulp Fiction about "personality going a long way", and that's always been especially true about rappers. To be real, Kim was never that nice and her best material (Hard Core) just sounds like the majority of it was ghostwritten or directed by Biggie, and all the Michael Jackson drama that came later was just a bad look. Foxy was the same way, except her albums and rhymes rarely measured up to Kim, which left a host of true school femcees like Bahamadia, Jean Grae, and Rah Digga to pick up the slack. But Jean Grae's career never took off (despite being extremely likable and clever), Bahamadia always sounded like Frieza from Dragonball Z, and Rah Digga is best known as the babysitter from "13 Ghosts". Trina was never taken seriously because shed always been too good-looking, and Mia X, Gangsta Boo and a slew of others had to deal with the double curse of being female and Southern, two things that until 2004, were hard obstacles to hurdle. So that just left Queen Latifah and Lauryn Hill, the former pulled a Will Smith and moved on from rap and the latter went fucking batshit. (Remy Ma's in jail and never got past the mixtape stage in her career so her faults go without saying) A lot been written about the dearth of female emcees and the reasons, but Nicki Minaj might be able to overcome that, despite suffering from nearly every flaw listed above.

Jean Grae and Bahamadia could rap, but their voices weren't all that great and weren't sexy enough to arouse interest or push units. Nicki also suffers from this, but after listening to her enough, that grating Rosie Perez, Queens-as-fuck accent becomes somewhat of an asset in being able to tell her apart from legions of other female MC's with "grating New York accents" (to quote Byron Crawford). Another potential chink is her close association to Lil' Wayne, which depending on how Drake does and how well Wayne can actually put out talent (no Tyga) could be good or bad. But judging by the fact that her first mixtape appearance had spot-on Harry Potter references and that she spazzes out on the "Donk" beat for this song is promising. I don't see an issue with a female Lil' Wayne with a better good-to-bad punchline ratio(as of post-Da Drought 3) and ridiculously heaving breasts.

Not that that's all she is but, really, those titties are reckless.

Luckily she seems to have been blessed with a good amount of self-awareness for a rapper in general, not just a femcee, which is good to see. Several interviews from this year have shown that she's trying to distance herself from being interpreted as a Lil' Kim clone (minus the pre-mortem Michael Jackson self-esteem kit) or merely a dime-a-dozen NY rapper with a marketable body. For most women, especially in hip-hop, there's an internal debate about just simply riding the wave of interest produced by your looks and displaying your talents without foregoing that very same aspect of your womanhood, and there is a fine balance there (to rhyme about riding dick or to not rhyme about riding dick), which Nicki Minaj not only seems extremely aware of, but she's trying to shift the conversation about her to something other than the fact that people want to see her naked (and would probably rather see her naked than hear her ape Lil' Wayne's cadences and inflections)

And with a voice like that, she should be trying to display depth. One hacked Sidekick might be all it would take to derail further interest in Nicki Minaj, Cassie-style, so establishing a more complex identity and becoming a better rapper is definitely a must. Although probably not as every instance showing that she's moving away from tat lane has two where she's using it for promotion. Her wackiness is her main asset right now, and it might be shallow to cosign a rapper for that reason alone, the field is kind of barren for female rappers (and Crime Mob sort of fell apart) and I can do without Lil'Mama/Bow Wow.

Tonight's Da Night

Photo Courtesy of/hijacked from Brooklyn Vegan

It's been a long time. I shouldn't of left, but shit, its summer, music is boring right now and a motherfucker got hisself a JOB. So rather than opining about Rick Ross's succulent yet deceptive man-titties or Soulja Boy v. Ice-T during what was admittedly an inspiration drought, I sat back, wondering if I'd avoid the blog death that happens to most people doing this self-important e-typing bullshit. Luckily, yesterday was the NYC date of Rock The Bells, which was pretty much the one of the best lineups of anything in the history of ever. And this counts Woodstock that, honestly, had a lot of shitty filler that didn't age well.

After seeing my tax dependent Christian for a rare opportunity to actually hang out with one of my friends and downing some choice Colombian food for breakfast/lunch in Queens, I made my virgin voyage to Long Island. I was unable to find out where the Queens-to-LI bus was since it was Sunday, and being an hour late because of the lunch (I should've left around 12:30 to catch Dead Prez at 2:30, who were the first act I gave a shit about missing) I had to call upon all of the colors of the wind to navigate myself to Jones Beach. If transit wasn't so easy to deal with in NYC, I would've been fucked, but luckily I was able to read the map and ask the right questions, though I still felt terribly lost and embarrassed that I'm pushing 21 and never had never rode the LIRR or been to Long Island.

Unsurprisingly, the trains at Jamaica were filled with people coming to Rock The Bells who also didn't give a shit about missing about 6 Paid Dues acts. There was a nice mix of genuinely hot women and only a tiny smattering of the DudeManBrah's that gave Rock The Bell's its reputation last year of the pre-eminent wigger haven.

Rage Against The Machine seems to really bring out the retards.

After getting there and a bit of uncertainty with about what bus to take, all 123 of us made it on the convoy and were at the beach from Freeport, LI in about 20 minutes.

Following the signs posted and reverberations of Dead Prez's final three songs, I got to my ridiculous nosebleed seat and avoided the overpriced food and interesting but kind of futile distractions (I'd love to spit a 16 for a Burger King king mask, but, nah.) I figured, when I bought the tickets in late May on Ticketmassa that the seats wouldn't be that bad, but I got to experience the kind of immaculate view that comes with not spending a third of my paycheck on concert tickets. But luckily, save for Immortal Technique who tends to suffer from a weak flow and the same stale, cliched undie rap beats that helped kill NY rap, the whole lineup was energetic and awesome. I missed "Hip Hop" because I opted to piss before going up the endless cascade of stairs to section 24 seat V19, but I don't really like more than four Dead Prez songs anyway. I always thought it was ridiculous that they didn't blow up in the hood with their incendiary and kind of hood-ignorant politics and embracing the sort of shit I used to run into in Bed-Stuy (wheatgrass-promoting militant natty dreads with far left agendas and light-skinnededed girlfriends), but that doesn't mean I'd care to see them work through "Mind Sex" on a hot Sunday afternoon.

After Immortal Technique got done being angry and Peruvian, De La Soul got onstage and I realized that from then on out, I would be bombarded with 7 main stage acts I really fucking enjoy and would probably thoroughly embarrass myself with my quiet yet energetic rapping to shit I know. But for the sake of clarity, here is the rest of the show by act:

De La Soul- Unsurprisingly, they opted to not do "Me Myself and I". Which is cool, because due to my newfound appreciation of their non-"Oooh" songs (Fuck it, their first two records are classics), but I sort of wanted them to just do "Jenifa Taught Me" and like all of De La Soul Is Dead. They fell into a common trap of playing shit from albums people didn't like that much (for good reason) or new shit. Which, from death metal to Cappadonna, is always a terrible idea. Unless that shit is Thriller, I'll pass on trying to engage and decipher through crappy sound your latest 2rd rate J Dilla homage (Looking at you, Q-Tip). But they definitely could rock a crowd and kept things lean, just the three of them onstage and then briefly Q-Tip when he ran on stage for his "Buddy (Remix)" verse, which I thoroughly spazzed out for. Its enough to like some shit yourself, but to have this cavernous beach side theater full of heads reciting obscure lyrics to shit no one under 25 listens to is beautiful.

The Pharcyde- Aww. See, here is the thing. De La Soul, with their the Hives-aping "Freezing during a song for effect" thing got away with playing three post Buhloone Mind State songs no one knew or cared about (Doing "Oooh" with Redman would've been awesome). But though the theater was only half full this early into the main stage acts the crowd didn't get into any of the songs until "Passing Me By", which makes me wonder if its because The Pharcyde are this Cali rap group whose talent has been overshadowed by being the go-to reference made by white people who don't like rap to prove that they "do like rap". But to be honest I only recognized 5 songs, the aforementioned classic as well as "Oh Shit", "Ya Mama", "Drop", "Runnin'", and "I'm That Type of Nigga". Despite the noticeable flatness of the crowd, the dudes were entertaining and pretty much, like those Young Scooby Doo cartoons from the 90's, did their own signature dances throughout the whole set. Kind of felt bad for them, considering they were the first reunited act to play a set and didn't get the rapturous "welcome back" they might've deserved.

Raekwon & Ghostface- Holy shit. Okay, here's the thing. Everyone who played tonight made at least one album that I consider to be one of my favorites ever and unadulterated classics. Except Dead Prez and Immortal Technique, but that goes without saying. But having seen Ghost before last year at Nokia, I had a good idea what to expect, which was the throwback Wu/90's rap stage set-up, with about 30 hangers-on, family members, and weed carriers on stage while Cappadonna, Ghost and Rae did a bunch of the very best songs off Only Built For Cuban Linx and Ghost did "We Celebrate" and "Be Easy", which are neither his best or worst tracks. And as usual, there was the honoring of ODB's memory, constantly doing only their verses from other people's songs, doing only one verse and a hook at a time of their own, and Cappa or Rae doing the verses of other people, including Deck's still-titanic "Triumph" verse, which I know by heart and usually dumb out on whenever the song plays, and Nas' "Verbal Intercourse" verse, which was odd because dunny was in the building but didn't pull a Q-Tip and join his mans and them. Regardless, there were like 14 songs played (or thirds of songs, really) and I couldn't have been happier as the only song played I didn't dig was "We Celebrate" which, real talk, is unpleasantly "old guy rap" and uncool despite how on point the lyrics are. Plus, they did "Glaciers of Ice" and "Incarcerated Scarfaces" with maximum vigor so everybody got their hardbody anthems for the day. At this point, I took a break to go see what the hipsters were doing at the Paid Dues stage since, despite only like 10 minutes between each act, I somehow though missing ten minutes of Red&Meth wouldn't be a big deal.

Spank Rock w/Amanda Black and some of those DJ's they're always with or some shit- Here's the thing. I checked out Spank rock based on a cosign from drew Barrymore on her iTunes celebrity playlist, which I check out a few times a year to see if any of the featured actors and musicians had somewhat decent or atypical music taste. So far, Drew was the closest to being interesting, and the track she chose was "Bump" which is an awesome track and led to the even more hipstertastic and awesome "Bump (Switch Remix)". Half of YOYOYOYOYOYOYO is good, so I got mired into that whole Plastic Little/Amanda Blank/Spank rock thing for a minute last year, until the boringness of Spank's verses and the shittyness of all the music they've released since that album became clear and it just became annoying. There's something sad about watching hipsters and scene kids taken out of dark slutty clubs where they thrive and people enable their failings and put on a small stage in front of 30 people as infinitely more talented musicians' sets are blaring about 30 feet away. They, for all of their efforts, look like pets right before you put them to sleep, in a weird environment and over-doing it for you approval. Still, lots of good-looking people. And they tried hard for what's its worth, but it probably fared better outside of New York as evidenced here.

For the record, the Paid Dues line-up:

Spank Rock with Amanda Blank 6:40
Devlin & Darko 5:55
Akrika Bambaataa 4:45
The Cool Kids 4:05
Tyga 3:25
Ninjasonik 2:45
B.O.B. 2:05
MURS 1:25
Jay Electronica 12:55
Wale 12:25
Kidz In The Hall 11:55
DJ Blaqstarr 11:15

I feel bad for everyone who played before Tyga (Really? Tyga?), since people mostly filed in for Ghost and Rae and I can't imagine more than 8 people watched Wale or Murs. Though I was tempted to say "fuck Immortal Technique" and go check out The Cool Kids. But I was timid and lazy and it was a bitch getting up to my mosquito and dragonfly-ridden seats. On the way back, I noted a commotion and stop to check out exactly what was going on, and one of the many chill people there last night told me some fuckery with someone getting carried out on a stretcher happened, and that no one had gone on yet. 15 minutes later when things got back to normal, Mos Def came on rather than Red&Meth, which was a relief when i found out that Red and Meth hadn't gone on yet.

Mos Def- Dude is probably one of the best live MC's ever considering he does a bit of everything, from geeking out to crooning and invoking 30 years of rap history and etc. Plus, he only played one song from Tru3 Magic, "Undeniable", which was one of the three good songs on there and flipped the same sample that Rza and Nas did this year. He played the original versions of the songs that are sampled on his albums to intro those same songs, but it got to be a bit much when he just played some reggae for 6 minutes straight until the melody from KRS-ONE's "Stop The Violence" and Black Star's "Definition" played and segued into Talib coming out them doing the song, to crowd eruption. Which is cool, but I always through that not only was Mos better than Talib, but Black Star's record wasn't amazing enough to backup people's fervor to see them together all the time. Mos was the only exception to the "don't play new songs" rule, since the new tracks he did sounded pretty fucking great and might be further proof that Tru3 Magic was just a dud to get out his Geffen contract, and the set was topped off by "Get By", which is the best thing Talib will ever do and is still a gorgeous, legitimately uplifting track, and then bringing Pharoahe Monche, who had been around earlier for Immortal Technique, out to do "Simon Says", which was the first full-blown ridiculous moment of the day as everyone went retarded and that fucking legendarily monstrous beat boomed loud enough to be heard by ever middle class Italian family on the isle.

Only downer was "Ms. Fat Booty" getting cut off halfway through and abandoned because of an error caused by miscommunication between Mos and the DJ. Fucked up my recital.

Red&Meth- From the announcement of the lineup, I thought about the weirdness of having Cuban Linx and Red&Meth both doing duo sets and the difference between the old Wu way of doing stage shows and Red&Meth's way, which is just as cocky, energetic, ridiculous and awesome as it seemed when I saw it discussed on MTV 10 years ago. Shit, besides Method Man being hyper and frequently dancing wildly and seeming to be floating 6 inches off the ground while doing it, its probably the same shit from that old Def Jam tour from Backstage.

Fuck, that's a great movie.

But moreso than anyone else so far, they knew the drill and it was all hits and singles, every song people expected and wanted they got, plus some surprises like "Def Squad Delite" with Keith Murray and fucking "Tonight's Da Night", which made me the happiest girl in Long Island not getting DP'd on her parents bed on a Stickcam show. Now, every show I've ever been to had weed, so that's nothing new, but the shit was omnipresent during their set, as was the "Really?" feeling when Redman asked if the crowd saw How High, wanted to see a sequel, and then revealed that they were making the sequel.

Oh and +1000 rap points for bringing out Slick rick to do like 8 bars of "La Di Da Di" and then leave the stage. That's fucking ballsy.

Nas- And then Nas. Nas is maybe one of the more difficult rappers ever, more than Pac because Pac never made a decent album so fuck him. But I've never seen the guy live so I didn't know whether or not to expect the same lax quality control as his post It Was Written album output or what. Tenser, to the point the guys down the row from me booed and inspired half the theater to do the same, was the nearly half an hour wait to sound check Nas' live band, which didn't really get much use anyway and his attempt to put these weird studio musicians, save for the sonic heft added by the drummer, over his tracks didn't fare well and got cut out three songs in after the awkward riffing and keyboard patch over "NY State of Mind". Speaking of which, he played, truncated Ghostface style, about half of Illmatic, which was the fulfillment of a dream I've had since hearing the record, as well as a few surprising singles, like "Hate Me Now". I was really disappointed he didn't do "Oochie Wally", but I guess its a dream deferred until I get to see dude perform as an event with a less "Yaaay rap" vibe and more of a "Pussy poppin in a handstand" feel. Oh, and he brought Jay out for those two songs they did together. "Success" is meh, but "Black Republican" is a fucking behemoth with that kind of bass-heavy volume in that kind of venue. All was forgiven, although dude has terrible breath control, though he was forced into stopping enough that it just seemed like he was being "deep". You know...in that high school 2Pac fan way. Weird to be privy to one of those "event" moments, even though every guest except Pharoahe and Biz Markie (during De La's set) was obvious.

Oh and "N.I.G.G.E.R." is achingly beautiful. All is forgiven, Nasir.

A Tribe Called Quest- this started out weird because it was basically 13 or so songs, and the first 6 was a Q-Tip solo set wherein he did his singles, the new track he's putting out, and his verse from "Excursions", all with Mos Def, geeking out next to him. Which is another thing, there's a pointed difference, I noticed, between Method Man's cocky hyperactivity, and Q-Tip geeking out. Its hard not to like the guy. There was a really cool usage of the video screen attached to the towering DJ booth on stage that wasn't really used at all until Q-Tip's set, and then become a whole experience when Ali, Phife, and that weird Morehouse professor looking guy who never does verses came out and basically performed the Tribe's Anthology album live. And of course, not going against the grain of the genre or tour, brought out Busta Rhymes and Consequence, the former who did his "Scenario" verse much better than at Fiascogate last year.

All in all it was a beautiful night oddly devoid of the transport issues or drama I've become accustomed to going to shows and I even got to force an upgrade of my seats by moving down to the middle section since, though sold out on Ticketmaster, there were about 40 empty seats scattered about the area. My progress lower to the floor and closer to the stage was a huge step for my people, and not since Lenny Kravitz nutted in Lisa Bonet and several other pale women or Barack Obama became the first blacasian presidential candidate since Andre Jackson has such a momentous moment momented to the descendents of mulatta.

Now if only the crowd had acquiesced to Redman and Pharoahe Monche's peaceable suggestions to show their titties.

Titties are always nice.

Mobb Deep is CVLT

There's a shitty joke thats pretty old by now regarding the Megadeth/Melodic death influenced metalcore band God Forbid. Basically, every single generic mainstream metal fan (which is, unfortunately, the majority; dumb, awkward Metalocalypse watching Children of Bodom/Lamb of God fans and the like) has done this joke, and if you're even vaguely into metal, you've encountered it. Its along the lines of:

Socially awkward white kid 1:"What's your favorite black metal band?"
Musical leper number 2: "Oh, you mean God Forbid? HAHAHAHAOMFGLMAOZEPICWIN!!"

This is supposed to be funny because 4 of the 5 members of the band are black. Never mind that God Forbid only have two good songs and are awful overall, like most mainstream metal, but its this odd rite of passage where if I run into anyone who still finds it funny to make ye olde "black metal" joke in reference to God Forbid, I make a mental note to avoid them forever. Its both a mark of stunted musical and mental growth and I know nothing good can come with associating with that kind of person (ie: Cannibal Corpse fans). Despite a minority of non-white metal musicians, they are there, especially in Latin America, because as everyone knows, Hispanics love metal. Suffocation are great and crazy influential and two of their core members are black. From Loudness to Boris, there are a large amount of great Asian metal musicians, also, which explains why former Megadeth and Cacophony guitarist Marty Friedman hosts a Japanenglish rock/metal show in Japan. Just like the discovery of DH Peligro, Suicidal Tendencies, and the Bad Brains in punk, the ethnic makeup of music gets a lot more varied the deeper you get into it and things like that stop being funny. Also, you become 17 or older.

But what about black metal? The general consensus is that its the complete opposite of everything Afro. Shit, its the opposite of everything industrial and modern, in some instances. So as the heralded music form of Nazi's, white separatists, awkward nerds and just all around interesting crackers, it usually inspires a few raised eyebrows and a couple of sighs when the issue of black people doing black metal comes up. How would you deal with the overwhelming racism? How would you make it relate to the diaspora or life as a pan-African? Would you write songs about Anansie? Would you wear corpsepaint? Would you still call it "black metal", or would you ignore the cliche humor inherent to the name regarding the situation of the musicians ethnicity? And how many black people would have to start black metal bands until there was a decent band? (Probably the same ratio I use with women in rock and rap, since there's only a large amount of good white male rock bands because the people who play the music are overwhelming white and male and with such large numbers, there's gotta be some diamonds in there somewhere)

Well, really, despite a large number of asian and Hispanic black metal musicians already extant to ease the process and possibly inspire some Lilith fair-esque tour, its unnecessary. There's already an avenue to be black and do black metal.

Hip-hop.




This relates slightly to something I've been wanting to discuss and have never seen anyone else talk about, generally because I might be one of few non-hipsters who fucks with a lot of both hip-hop and black metal and it is the basic truth that the two genres are incredibly similar.

A portion of this has to do with the sociology of scenes. Though hip-hop's rigid alienation of outsiders with the endless sermonizing and proselytizing about the supposed canon and best MC's and what is real hip-hop and etc is more akin to the clandestine denseness of electronica and its subgenres, the archival nature and continually active and disparate fanbase of rap is exactly like that of metal. One trip to metal-archives.com or checking out a few mainstream documentaries and its clear that, though the history and sound are clearly different (the latter to a degree, more later), the behavior is the same. The same generational squabbles, same pro-genre festivals, same zines and small publications, same elaborate message board sites (smnnews vs. allhiphop), same elitism, same outdated canon (2Pac/Common and Ozzy/Pantera all kind of suck), same self-lionizing, same feeling of anti-outsider exclusivity, ever-evolving dress code, both are recognized for having one ethnicity be the majority consumers and participants, etc, etc. And besides, ignorant motherfuckers like Brand Nubian and a good half of anyone who has ever rapped have more in common with the homophobia and ethnocentrist politics of black metal musicians and fans than they know.

Beyond just metal as an umbrella genre, you can break it down further, making the comparison sharper and more unique. Really, as hip-hop's best period is 1986-1996, that is the same era "extreme" metal started to emerge, or rather death and black metal. Now, the death metal connection is extremely easy to make. Besides the Gravediggaz, there's a heap of rappers, mostly horrorcore, who not only acknowledge death metal aesthetics and use the same lyrical style in their rhymes, but there are also those who are informed about the genre and even played in or have side-project death metal bands like Jedi Mind Tricks, Ill Bill, and Necro. There have also been a lot of rappers like Big L or Prodigy who were inclined to drop something grisly or blasphemous from time to time in between their raps.

Death metal, however, is the indie rock of the metal scene. Everyone thinks they're cool and edgy and obscure for listening to it, but in reality its mainstream and poppy as fuck. If you like Deicide or Death, that's like saying you think The Shins are "hella rad". And it tends to breed the same alpha-male lunkhead mentality that helped spawn black metal as a reactionary genre split from the same 80's influences (Bathory, Celtic Frost, Sarcofago, etc). There's an interesting series of interviews with Varg Vikernes on the official Burzum website, all informative, and this quote in particular touches on that issue: "Black Metal was a revolt against the modern world, and in particular against the commercialized (Americanized) Death Metal scene."

Black metal's nascent rise and fall (well, its decline in Scandinavia) and etc is over-documented and mythologized, so in the end, what's most important is the music, despite the ideologies it spewed forth during its first wave. Within that, as unfortunately hipsters have caught on to, is a genre containing essentially four sounds and approaches to it; showing a rock sound or influence (Darkthrone, later Satyricon, a bunch of "black n roll bands"), overt "extreme" or death metal influences (Immortal, 1349, Gorgoroth, Behemoth, most mainstream black metal), grandiose and symphonic rather than striving to sound ugly (Emperor), and the overall best, the approach seen as "avant-garde" or, at the very least, in keeping with the ideologies of black metal (Burzum, Wolves in the Throne Room, Deathspell Omega, etc). Essentially, black metal has two shades, ugly and beautiful, and the avant-garde bands, have, for good reason, drawn comparisons to shoegaze and My Bloody Valentine with all of their lush pendulum strummed beauty. This sound, though great and strangely overlooked when beacons of being out-to-lunch like Vice do whole vbs.tv episodes about motherfucking Gaahl from Gorgoroth (Really? Way to be generic and uninformed, indie rock fans.), doesn't relate.

However, with its utterly discordant nature, the rawer, more basic black metal sound is akin to the more ugly, harsh New York rap productions of the last 20 years. Besides tons of ugly sounding dissonant productions that on a music geek level, sound JUST LIKE black metal riffs (full of weird half steps, chord glisses out of key, out of tune piano and guitars, etc)



there's also the overall vibe of hardcore NY rap from the 90's. RZA and Havoc, for example managed to capture unique vibes, at once unsettling and claustrophobic but still cool. Also, a lot of 90's hip-hop, like a lot of black metal, requires a decent attention span, since its not exactly AC/DC in terms of easy to digest riffyness. There's tons of sonic layers and musically wrong thing happening, which would make Deathspell Omega and their peers the Three 6 Mafia of black metal I think. Which would probably make Kanye West the Immortal of rap or something.

Considering that the basics of black metal, musically is rapidly strummed minor chords shifting tonal degrees that they shouldn't shift(i-vi and i-ii-vi-vii, etc), it wouldn't necessarily be that hard to bridge that gap and make an awesome hybrid of the two. Really, all that prevented a decent rap rock hybrid was that the ego of rock musicians prevented them from understanding that since the rhythmic forms are too different that most people would never actually sit down and figure a way to splice them, it makes more sense to place metal music/riffs/samples over hip-hop drum pattern and rap over that, than the reverse, which has failed horribly whenever done.

I'd hope to see this done eventually. Since I'm way too lazy and unlearned about samplers and drum machines to do it myself, I think Three 6 Mafia, Dre (if you can shake the cobwebs off him), Lil' Jon or RZA would be great at this sort of thing, and I'd love to hear "Dunkelheit" over some 808's.

For real. Or if that shit doesn't work, just continue taking over hardcore and metalcore, as MOP are doing: