Rap music came from the Avant Garde of the seventie's, (of which I am one,)
experiments with spoken chant based upon the roots found in the Greek
Chorus. LaMama and Andre Serban, Peter Brook etc. The kids came along
and took the form and "ran with it". More power to them. They've brought
some of the most experimental work in years into the Commercial music
quagmire of derivitive sentimentality. The WSJ should grow up and learn
what they are talking about or go back into retail.
Begin with the three types of Art.
1. Traditional (Heritage works that give us our identity from the great
products of the past)
2.Commercial (Works done for some other reason than the work itself,
ie.entertainment, profit, proscelytizing etc.)
3. Theoretical (Psycho-physical pursuit of the values of a medium for the
purpose of expressing both the truth of a time and place as well as the best
possible product of its kind. i.e. Truth and Beauty. For the purpose
carrying the current indentity into the future.)
Like all formulas the above serves a purely social pedagogical purpose. In
truth they mix constantly with the Theoretical coming out of traditional
explorations and even commercial ventures as well as from pure Fine Arts R &
D. . But it is useful to think this way just as it is useful to believe
that you can seperate the circulatory system from the body for the training
of doctors and the understanding of the general public. Lymph is another
matter all together.
Eminem is Lymph if you use that metaphor. The very rawness (truth) of his
statement gets the artistic mask confused with his personal life. He seems
too immature not to be so confused himself, but that does not mean that the
product is not true. A sophisticated audience will always understand the
mirroring purpose of art and the reality of the artist's life and instrument
serving as the performing instrument that mirrors the world. Such an
audience will refuse to get involved in mixing up the work (product) with
the personal life of the Artist.
The Golden Triad for Art is (Perception, Technique, Intuition PTI) The
enthusiasm of talented youth is to leap over technique directly into
intuition. Such end gaining is immature and self-destructive. The tool
of virtuosity teaches the audience that what is being presented is not an
accident of talent but a result of Mastery. It creates a firewall for
both artist and audience and highlights the truth and quality of the
artistic product. Commercial Art's problem is that its business function
grazes on accidents of talent creating fashion and destroying potential.
Crooked Face Harrell
----- Original Message -----
From: "Christoph Reuss" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
To: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>; <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Sent: Friday, March 30, 2001 3:15 PM
Subject: Re: what's ailing kids
> The Wall Street Journal wrote:
> > This cultural archetype [the "Bad Nigger"] is at the center of rap or
> > hip-hop culture. From "cop killer" Ice T, Tupac Shakur and, today most
> > noticeably, Sean "Puffy" Combs and Eminem (who is white), we get
versions
> > of the BN in all his sneering and inflated masculinity.
> ...
> > But the Puffys of the world cannot market to an indifferent youth. The
> > important question is how the BN archetype -- the slave's projection of
> > lawless power and revenge -- has become the MTV generation's metaphor
for
> > rebellion.
>
> What this article ignores is the **political function** of rappers like
> Eminem: To put juvenile rebellion into "acceptable" forms that are
> harmless to the powers that be, and to *avoid* forms of rebellion
> that oppose/weaken the system -- such as anti-capitalist movements,
> social and global solidarity, civil disobedience, environmental protests.
>
> CounterPunch writes about this in the article "The Politics of Eminem":
> ( http://www.counterpunch.org/eminem.html )
>
> "Eminem's lyrics are a kind of premeditated infantilism, not a
> healthy regression toward the polymorphous perverse, but a summons to
> the thanatic impulse, a call for division, repression, an invocation
> of the very forces that have divided the working class for decades. He
> serves the interests of the State. The idea that Eminem might be
> "censored" is a ruse, and a tired one, and an insult to those who have
> truly been censored. Cross the powerful, question the System and you
> risk censorship, lawsuits, SLAPP suits, beatings, harassment or worse.
> As long as Eminem remains a whore for the corporations, he will
> continue to accumulate wealth and be shielded from the censors of the
> state. And he is a corporate mercenary, whether it's flacking for Nike
> or for the music industry's trade association, the Recording Industry
> Association of America."
>
> That's the political function of the "diversion industry" in general,
> of which the music business is an important part.
>
> Chris
>
>
