A Penny (or any other Spare Change) For My Thoughts: Memoirs of a Homeless Black Man
Ever since that fateful Keak/Nickatina show in Santa Rosa, I think we've all been aware that the future of rap music is in serious jeopardy. Beats are becoming more and more monotonous, lyrics more and more pointless, and ridiculously unskilled rappers are becoming millionaires. I may have told you guys this a long time ago, but over the summer I turned on 106.1 KMEL for the first time in many, many months (I had boycotted it for awhile), and heard a sickeningly simple beat and incredibly unappealing bassline. The first line I heard went something like this:
"Dis baby girl move her ass like Shakira,
If there was a motor booty contest she would be the winna."
I have many problems with this. First of all, "Shakira" doesn't rhyme with "winner". Second of all, that second line is almost identical to one that Too Short used in "Shake That Monkey" (he used it to much greater effect, I might add). I could go on, but the point is, that experience underlined the bleak future of rap for me. I haven't listened to KMEL or 94.9 since.
Of course, there is still hope. I remember HungryforTacos made a post about how excited he was for the month of December and the various releases that accompanied that sweet, sweet month. Now, I have no idea how those albums panned out, but I decided to take a look in the opposite direction for satisfaction: to the past. As Clive Tyldesley, the play-by-play commentator for FIFA '07 (on the PC, of course) once said, "Sometimes you have to go back to move forward." Well, actually he didn't say that just once, he says it just about every time I play it back to my favorite Middlesbrough defender, David Wheater. But that's not the point.
The point is, I consulted my brother and he showed me some stuff from a group called Above the Law, a bunch of Pomona-based "g-funk" rappers who did most of their stuff throughout the 90's. At last, satisfaction!
Above the Law - "Kalifornia"
Now I'm not sure you guys will like this song, but I sure as hell do. The second guy who raps, Kokane, has the weirdest delivery in the world, but compared to all the Soulja Boy and T-Pain bullshit I've had to listen to lately, I relish every minute of his sing-songy verses. Especially when he says "They call me Mistah Flossy, dolla dolla bill y'all!"
Above the Law - "Call It What U Want"
The heavy beats, the old school rhymes, Pac... This was all so refreshing for me. Now, you could be like Mike Ditka and say that I've become a coward, living in the glorious past of rap music, afraid to face the mindlessness of today's music.
And you'd be right. But fuck it, dis shit's bumpin'!
Out like Afonso Alves from the Dutch League.