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Parent Category: Onstage

by Khari Gzifa

A frequent topic lately, at least in hip hop circles, has been the idea of "culture vulture-ism" and the overt revamping of the popular hip hop image into a less melanin dominated one. While I definitely have an opinion that I have shared in some impromptu roundtables, I think the greater issue is being missed. To illustrate my argument please allow me to divert this conversation into a brief socio-economic lesson. I promise, I will return to my point.

In the 1970s a critical threshold in American business was passed with barely a word mentioned or notice taken. In that decade, GMAC (the financing arm of manufacturing giant General Motors, and basically a bank) for the first time surpassed GM itself in profit-making. When big business saw that it was more profitable to loan money to buy cars than to make and sell those cars, there was a seismic shift in our business models. In the interest of keeping it brief, things like NAFTA, the birth of the world’s most ridiculous CEO-to-Employee pay ratio and most importantly CONSOLIDATION are all direct results of that change. Consolidation is what has been happening all over American business for the last 4 decades; from the Ma Bell and public utilities breakups (which were supposedly done to INCREASE competition, lol), to the wipeout of neighborhood hardware and mom and pop general stores by the likes of Home Depot and Walmart. The new model is very few choices in all of your goods and services. No place is this rule more obvious than in public or terrestrial radio. As a result of that same consolidation trend, behemoths like Clear Channel are now able to completely dominate the marketplace. They are able to present their viewpoint everywhere at once, and only their viewpoint. By establishing that role in media they were able to change radio from its previous role of conduit or a highway through which ideas and art were transmitted between creator and consumer, into a new role as tastemaker and grand arbiter of what is appealing/popular and what ain’t!  Now songs had to "cater to radio", images had to fit into a known value and the public needed to be TOLD what to like. See, that’s the only way the banksters, the bean counting counterfeiters that are the real force behind the huge multinational corporations and the crime enabling legislation that created this situation, know how to do business. It’s their ONLY model!

So all this brings me back to where we are now. The reason hip hop is lightening up is because it needs to accomplish two tasks for this group; a) it needs to sell to as wide a base as possible and that includes not just the majority culture but the originators too, and it needs to include the lions share within both those groups and, b) they need to sell other images, lifestyles, products, etc. to you through the music and to do this they need the least threatening/most broadly accepted images out there; the majority culture (read, white people). Remember, these labels are doing 360 deals exclusively for a reason. The money ain't there in music like it used to be and those same reverberations go through radio as well.

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Parent Category: Onstage

by Khari Gzifa
I thought today I would give a few tips. Consider this an advice column of sorts for unsolicited (nonetheless, very needed) career guidance. This particularly goes out to the artists that don’t have the marquee names and the big budgets, indeed the ones who YouTube intends to evict from their space. As I see it, most of the "underground" artists of today are essentially carbon copies of the "mainstream" rappers. I mean they rap about the same things. So much so, that based on hearing many of their songs I wonder why any of them would ever want a major label deal at all, seeing as how they already have the identical lifestyle AND no 360 deal draining away profits that they could keep for themselves. Unless of course, the lyrics are not "keeping it real," but instead are "keeping it fraudulent". A lesson that many artists seem to have missed is that NOBODY likes to be lied to. Whether it’s in business, personal life, or even in the art they purchase, respect, trade, etc. The underlying statement in any lie after all is, "...and you're too dumb to know any better". Not exactly a great message to send to someone you are courting as a potential fan or investor. I’m going to just take a few minutes to offer my 3 tips on how an artist can avoid being one amongst a million, and instead be one of a kind, which is what they were always meant to be.

First tip, you (Mr. and Ms. underground artist, from here on referred to as simply you) can’t say what they say. They, being the anointed few who seem to have unfettered access to the airwaves, TV coverage, award show nominations, etc. You know the usual suspects, your Kanye’s, Jays, Ross', Wayne’s, Drakes, etc. Their lives are not yours. It comes off as dishonest and insulting to the audience when you keep presenting a fantasy as if its reality.  I mean beyond that, some of it is just ridiculous anyway. Come on son, bragging about all this dealing and shooting people, and on and on. If you were ever even slightly involved in any of that, you would be an absolute idiot to be recording and releasing those potentially incriminating statements on CD. Everyone knows this, and it prevents you from being taken seriously. I know many, emcees especially, will say that "they are not speaking about themselves personally and these are stories from the artist’s experience". I don’t deny that, but that is not the way they market and promote themselves. They are truly selling an image that is in direct opposition to the lives they actually live and the very real lessons they have learned in that life. I believe that is a big reason many artists are not able to amass a following. You need to have trust from both sides of the equation, both the artist and the audience, and when you blatantly lie and exaggerate in your "conversations" with your listeners, then that trust just isn’t there.

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Parent Category: Onstage

by J. Francis Black

In the past, I had the tendency to fixate on aspects of my life until they’d snowball into full-blown obsessions.  I found myself preoccupied with mini dramas that related to my relationships, or lack thereof, with a significant other; familial relationships; and my jobs as they related to me doing, or not doing, meaningful and compelling work.   These things – love, family, and work - are known to me as ‘My Personal Trifecta’.  Many phone conversations, lunch dates, and happy hours were filled with endless conversations about one or all of the not so positive aspects of this trifecta – discussing who did what, where, and with who.   This was in addition to the persistent thoughts, internal monologues, and arguments I constantly had with myself about these parts of my life.  I'd ask myself endless questions like, did I do the right things, should I have said what I said, what's wrong with them, what's wrong with me. 

After a while, I felt so… tired.  At first I attributed my fatigue to the idea that these elements of my life that I obsessed over were draining my battery.  I was repeatedly having the same circular conversations with people dealing with their own trifectas, snowballs, and full-blown obsessions.  Then I’d come home to quietly deal with my own negative thoughts, attitudes, and fixations about my life and the lives of others. I felt these things were stealing my time and internal resources away.

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Parent Category: Onstage

Love and I will Love 

“I love you because you get it.

I’ve been so underappreciated for so long in my life for having such a true love.

You receive it and multiply.

“Thank you.” 

I will love you like high school seniors love july

like teachers love being right

like little boys love pizza.

I will love you like tourists love directions.

like bead bracelets.

I’ll place galaxies on your wrist hoping they match your eyes.

like performers love acknowledgement

like grace before every meal.

Love me like a hug heals wounds.

like prayer mends souls.

like midnight loves the past and future.

like sentence loves subject. 

Love me like there is no comparison.

Just love me

like sundresses love spring mimosas

Love me like you’ve read my flaws and want to read the sequel.