Letters From FreakLoud: Bullets, Band-Aids and Other Things That I've Learned by Reading

Columns

It’s a crazy rappity rap rap world.

Urban music information whizzes around like gnats on coke. Life-long homies are beefing, multi-platinum artists are smacking youngsters around at shows, and all the black Baby Boomers in the world have decided that gangsta rap is a bigger problem than bad parenting.

God bless the elegant chaos.

The old guard is fading, the new class is eating itself, and I’m waiting, just waiting for one of the Dip-Unit jokers to declare himself openly… republican.

Common and Russell are getting bashed on Oprah. Not because they are purveyors of the ubiquitous filth in the world, but because neither one of them is able to come up with a way to defend the filth to anyone who is actually listening to the words.

Meanwhile, beneath all of our soggy noses, the movement called nerdcore is selling out venues around the country on the backs of MCs named Frontalot and Lars. One is a brilliant lyricist and niche creator, the other is a pop culture vulture with cute raps, a bad band and a slideshow. I recommend that you see one of the shows. There’s never been a whiter group of people at a rap show ever. Not for Eminem, or Anticon… not even for Sage Francis. No wiggers or coffee shop hipsters. Just regular old white people hollering that Lil’ Jon is killing hip-hop.

Then you have Fiddy Cent (Thank you Jim Lampley) escorting a sombrero’d Floyd Mayweather to the ring in a red, white and green bulletproof vest. Nevermind that the entire country is all ass-over-shoulders about Imus, let’s go out there and piss off all the Mexicans before I spend twelve rounds punching one of their heroes in the face. Classy, very classy. Somewhere, Pat Buchanan is bent over a whiskey bar laughing his pasty ass off.

Don’t forget that GQ Fiddy is still beefing (veal-ing is more appropriate) with Cam’ron. And the new news is that Cam and Jim Jones haven’t spoken in a year. This revelation underscores Jones’ absence in the word-war between Cam and Fif. It also brings light to the notion that the dogs atop the NY rap scene aren’t making enough money to leave each other be. If they all had top-ten records then they wouldn’t be so bitter and sensitive toward each other. It also seems as if the bitterest one of the bunch is the one that hasn’t had his pink-framed mug on anyone’s countdown in a while.

In the midst of this madness, Lil Wayne is fast becoming everybody’s favorite rapper. While the NY cats bicker and the LA folks grope around for a platform to yell from, Weezy, Jeezy, and T.I. are winning the hearts of rap fans from Peachtree to Bed-Stuy to Crenshaw. You won’t catch me running to Coconuts to cop their newest mixtapes but I agree that at least two of them are leagues ahead of their peers lyrically. The only sad thing is that it sometimes seems as if swagger is the only thing that matters anymore.

But don’t tell that to the few hungry vagrants that huddle around the occasional garbage fire that pops up in the underground. Yes, the underground is still where the most talented people are, but the scene is becoming so self-indulgent that even the fans are starting to see the egomaniacs that are pulling the strings behind the curtains. It’s a shame, too. Stuff like Brother Ali or J-Zone is buried under piles and piles of demos burned by disaffected suburban youths that rap because it’s easier to learn ProTools than it is to play the drums.

I’m guilty, too, though. When I first had my underground-is-dead revelation, I concentrated on making music that combined progressive lyrics with beats and hooks that the average rap fan could vibe to. Yup, I tried it for all of two weeks. Even got a couple of decent songs out of it, but slowly but surely, my experimental nature asserted itself and I was back to sampling King Missile for the 14th or 15th time. I can’t help it I guess. I make what I wanna hear. This means two things. One, I’m on the slow, slow, slow road to fame and riches. Two, for the time being, I’ll be performing for and pandering towards the boom bap refugees.

I’ll be trolling the boards of okayplayer.com, allhiphop.com, projectblowed.com, and undergroundhiphop.com. I’ll be posting flyers for shows that you either won’t go to or won’t miss. I’ll be posting trivial opinions on random subjects from time to time so I don’t blow my cover and expose myself as a Thirsty Fish and/or Open Mike Eagle shill. I’ll (continue to) shower your arse with MySpace bulletins and comments until other people are doing it for me. I promise that I’ll never use a ‘bot, though. Mostly because I’m afraid that they’ll delete my account.

And I’ll be doing shows in discos that are filled with my friends and family. Handing out burned CDs with the rest of the wretches.