The Crack-Rap Conundrum.
I received this e-mail earlier today and my response got a little long. I thought the initial e-mail and my response might be interesting enough to post here. Plus, I haven’t posted yet this week, so anything is better than nothing…right?
“hey man, cool blog you got goin’. i’ve commented on at least one (a couple?) of your posts so far, and since i noticed a link to what you thought of Jeezy’s Inspiration album recently i figured i’d see what you thought on somethin’ that’s been buggin’ me ’bout dude’s music lately.
like you, i find a lot to like ’bout The Inspiration in terms of beats, hooks, the way Jeezy carries himself — i’d go as far to say it’s one of my favorite recent albums. however, there’s this kinda white-boy guilt that keeps naggin’ at me when i listen to it. i know Jeezy ain’t the first cat to rap ’bout drugs, but whereas other rappers — take Jay and Biggie just for the sake of example — have shades of complexity that can be pointed out, the way Jeezy does things strikes me as borderline (if not outright) glorification of the lifestyle, which irks me. if he did more excellent tracks like “Dreamin’” i wouldn’t feel uncomfortable ’bout it, but the fact that a _lot_ of his album has him mentioning selling coke and material gain in the same breath, and in easy-to-understand terms, is troubling.
i know the standard defense is that it’s just music, but when these guys go on ’bout how “real” they are and are bein’ listened to by kids who can’t grasp music in the same way we do, i can’t help but wonder if kids in poor urban communities are gettin’ bad signals from this stuff. i would like to think that everyone’s just takin’ it as music that’s fun and purpose-driven, but i’m not so sure that’s the case. and Jeezy’s easily way more popular than any cat who’s ever rapped ’bout drugs as explicitly.
kinda outta the blue, but might make an interesting blog post. just seein’ your thoughts on this.
-(name witheld until I get permission)”
Hey!
Thanks for the comments and interest. I appreciate the personal email as well, that’s real.
It seems that we like Jeezy for many of the same reasons. Many of them almost seem to be in spite of him or out some kind of begrudging respect. He WORKS on his albums which is more than I can say about many of my favorite rappers. He has a sonic consistency and something like a vision for his album and persona and that’s really cool.
The contrasts between Jeezy and Jay and Biggie are apt because they work so well. Certainly, on the surface level they are unfair because Jeezy barely even raps and Biggie and Jay are two greats but it works. See if this makes sense…
Pardon me, if I’m being too pretentious or appear pedantic, I’m not trying to, but as my blog mentions, I’ve begun a ‘Film Studies’ program and we read an essay by ‘Taxi Driver’ screenwriter, Paul Schrader in which he discusses the importance, art, greatness and everything else of Film Noir. Film Noir being, American crime movies of the 40s and 50s noted by dark lighting and even darker, cynical stories and blah, blah, blah.
Well, Schrader contrasts the sophistication of Film Noir with other “genres”. He calls Westerns moral[ly] primitive[]” and adds that the Gangster movies of the 1930s, which preceded Film Noir, contained “Horatio Alger” values. Horatio Alger, was a late 19th century writer for young teens, his big book was ‘Ragged Dick’ about a raggedy orphan living on the streets, who through his own might and gusto comes to be wealthy. Hmm..sound familiar? What Schrader was getting at with old Gangster movies and what I’m getting at (and you too) with Jeezy which is, an intellectual problem. He presents the story too simplistically, too melodramatically, he skips over the rotten details. Jay-Z and Biggie are Film Noir; Jeezy is the 1930s Gangster movie. Of course, it says something about the current rap climate that the change is a devolution not an evolution as it was in “filmmaking”.
In terms of sophistication, there’s a change but in terms of influence I don’t know how much that really matters. The easily-influenced are easily-influenced by everything, not just super-obvious crack-rap, but more complicated crack-rap as well. Young Jeezy gives you a super-clear melodramatic version of the life that is therefore easier to grasp. Sort of.
I say “sort of” because I think his music contains some complexities and in a way, those complexities are even more subtle than Jay or Biggie’s. They can be found in his vocal inflection, and his dark and disturbing beats. This of course, flies over the heads of the people listening to the music. This, I find exciting but it is also disturbing because this subtlety is in-line with or right next to Jeezy’s super obvious coke-referencing. While Biggie and Jay-Z rapped about coke, it was often hard for a typical listener to grasp or pull-out the “sell crack, get rich” message that both of them, in their own ways, also espouse(d). Jeezy’s message is clearer because he just chants it at you for an hour straight.
At the same time, I’m not sure how much more obvious Jeezy’s rapping about coke is to that of Jay or Biggie’s. Jeezy’s rapping is more obvious and therefore the subject matter more apparent but I would say his production is more bizarre and strange; It blows my mind that these songs are on the radio. Jay-Z and Biggie rapped more subtle, more nuanced crack-talk but over very catchy and digestable production. Whose the true or truer “pusher”? I don’t know.
All of these dudes glorify the lifestyle and all of them, in one way or another, show you the downside. Jeezy works more in the super-obvious and in generalities, that is to say, his rapping is not detail-oriented and is more like a Hollywood version of the crack game. However, as I go back, do Jay or Biggie really give you any more detail? Do they glorify it less? Compare their crack rap to that of Raekwon and Ghostface and Jay and Biggie end up in the Jeezy spot.
When discussing the topic of crack-rap, there are two arguments/ideas, running next to one another that barely ever intersect. The first is, for lack of a better word, the rap fan’s perspective, and that primarily relates to an appreciation of lyrics and beats in all of their complexity. The second, is some kind of sociological or cultural studies perspective relating to the impact of crack-rap on poor “urban” kids. I’m sorry if I appear facetious but we all know what one means when they talk about crack and its effect on urban communities so I think it would be better, although less politically correct, to just say black kids. If country singers sang about selling crystal-meth, we’d be concerned with its effect on poor whites or even “rednecks” not poor “rural communities”…
Either way, the real issue you raised is the artist’s responsibility. I find the “it’s just music” argument weak and disingenuous, and I think all who use it know it is. However, they use it because if they don’t, they’ll just be shutup because this is some really complicated shit! Jeezy or whoever can’t jump on television and drop some kind of hyper-complex thesis on crack-rap and its positive and negative and in-between-ative aspects so they just blow it off with “it’s just me expressin’ myself” because it shuts people up and the shit sells so it isn’t going anywhere.
From a rap fan’s perspective, I like Jeezy; I don’t love him but his album is pretty damn good and for me, as a thinking person, like yourself (NAME), can reconcile these good qualities with the apparent bad qualities and (I don’t know if you’d agree here) I think Jeezy’s music does hint at and emote some of the negative aspects of hustling even if it doesn’t do it through subtle or conventionally artistic means. ‘Bury Me a G’ is an amazing, amazing, song, powerful, cinematic, emotional, everything. I said this in my little review, but I think if Jeezy’s album ended with ‘Bury Me…’ and ‘Dreamin’ it would have been lauded as a complicated address of the crack world.
From a sociological perspective, I totally differ from you and that is okay. I understand my opinion here is flawed and maybe even dismissive, but I’ve yet to find a “better” opinion I can feel comfortable having. We differ in that I do not believe in the transformative qualities of art. That is to say, I don’t think the art or even popular culture of the world truly does affect people for good or bad. There have been plenty of wars since Picasso painted Guernica. ‘White Lines (Don’t Do It)’ didn’t end cocaine problems. People will sell and deal crack way after Jeezy’s albums are relegated to discount bins. Does that make it right to perpetuate it? No. But if it does perpetuate it, as you and others suggest and I totally see why you would say that, I do not think better-wrought or more complex raps about crack perpetuate it any less. So in that way, Jay and Biggie are equally guilty.
As a cultural trend or oddity however, the thinly-veiled coke stuff is weird. Weird the way popular songs that are really about blowjobs or other “subversive” stuff is weird. I think this is seen as stranger and more problematic because it is crack-dealing and not only dealing, but a perpetuation of the worst cliche being pushed in the ghetto (next to stop snitching): sell crack, make money. While I want to believe in tiers of suffering, that is to say, Jeezy is worse than Paris Hilton because Jeezy is affecting impoverished, mind-bogglingly fucked-over black youth, I have a hard time lying down with that idea. Primarily, because I find it simple-minded and in favor of victimization which I generally have a problem with… but more so than that, I find the “this negatively affects poor blacks” argument condescending towards the black youth. A black youth that myself and so many others claim to be concerned about. To suggest these kids and teens don’t understand the moralistic issues of crack-dealing is a bit condescending. This is the problem with D.A.R.E and other stuff like that, it assumes that these kids dealing are stupid which they are not. They know what they are doing is not a good idea but they do it anyway. That is unfortunate. That is sad, even tragic but people do things they know are wrong everyday. Most murders are thought-out to some extent, and just like a murderer who in some way, accepted or embraced his fate, those selling drugs have accepted the fate that may fall upon them for dealing. Now, many do not see the full implication of this choice and misinterpret the positives and that is unfortunate, particularly because so many choose crack-dealing out of decision that it is the best of the worst choices they have access to, but still- the issue remains more complex and morally ambiguous than Officer Friendly wants to admit or consider.
More complicated because I don’t know if dealing drugs really is that bad. It’s bad because it is criminal. It is bad because you’re leading to the destruction of others. It’s bad because it will get your ass thrown in jail, especially if you’re dealing crack and not cocaine and especially if you’re black and not white and all that good stuff we already know…
Sorry about the length. haha. I guess that’s a blog entry??
brandon
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