Lyrics

Sept’12 I started a post entitled “dear Hip Hop” it was an open letter to the hip hop industry… mainly lamenting at what it has become.

You see for me, nothing displays more lyrical genius, creativity, grit, realness and truth, than hip hop at its best. I’m talking Tupacs “Changes”, DMX “the Convo” and more recently “Dead and Gone” from T.I.

The flip side being there is nothing worse than bad hip hop… and there is a lot of bad hip hop. All I seem to see is bling, rims, bouncing rides & booty popping, to the point where what was a sign of  “success” has to be financed before you’ve made a name for yourself and is now a sign of legitimacy. As if shiny soft porn videos can polish up that junk you refer to as lyrics & make it legit.

Not every song needs to be deep and meaningful, I have nothing against an entertaining fun track, and I get that it’s an industry, a machine pumping out a formulaic cash generating product to the masses…

But hip hop was never about formula, cash, or the masses. It was raw & real, and people listened because they identified with what you were saying, not because they “got-off” on your videos.

And don’t get me started on “christian” hip hop, with a few exceptions (Lecrae, Rapture Ruckus) it’s just mimicking what’s mainstream,  you claim to follow the God of creation, can we please get a little creativity then, not just replacing gang-drug-b!tch-ride references for ones deemed holier…

“preachin’ the word, like a drug dealers, slangin; holy rock on the curb,
eyes blurred off the holy ghost…”

I was about to lose all faith in hip hop when I heard this the other day. Faith restored.