Our subconscious desires (mainly survival, and fear) as Freud studied drive our actions.  However these desires can be very irrational or can operate irrationally, and lead us to irrational actions and feelings which can be very dangerous to the self and especially others and if unleashed can cause destructive chaos.  This is the fear that many hip-hop haters (I’m picturing parents and older generation) have.  They fear, perhaps rightfully so, that allowing these locked up inner desired to surface would destroy the status quo, cause chaos, and turn human beings back to their ancestral roots; animals.  All civilized masks would disappear and we would cease to be actors or exercising accepted and appropriate social norms and etiquettes and simply express our raw primal feelings including violence, physical aggression towards enemies, overt verbal and physical sexual advances, and hatred. 

What I like about this is that essentially, if humans were to act on their true inner desires, they would become completely honest with each other, and not repress anything.  The more aristocratic classes in our society are the least overtly barbaric/animalistic, and tend to conform to professional social rules and etiquette which are in place to maintain order and productive business.  The poor, however live in conditions that are closer to the survival of the fittest, and fight or flight environment.  They always feel threatened.

Repression is a necessity for the safety and contentness of the majority.  The government must implement a political philosophy that accounts for the repression of people just enough to keep them comfortable.  People’s individual unique feelings and desires must be repressed in order to maintain control, safety, and a steady or growing economy and repression is necessary for business and the capitalistic/consumer system.  It is the role of businesses to manipulate people’s minds so that people transfer these inner desires to products or other harmless things rather than allow people to express them otherwise.  But “order in the streets, leads to chaos in our minds.”  I believe the more ordered our world becomes, the more we crave the unexpected, the chaotic, and the more we crave and are potentially susceptible to the ideas and values of hip-hop.

NWA, Wu-Tang, Lil-Wayne, Waka Flocka, and numerous other rap artists get us in touch with our subconscious drives and remind us that we have them and what they are.  They rap about killing the enemy, power, fighting the system and pro-creation in a very crude, irrational, raw, barbaric way.  Hip-hop is dangerous.  Hip-hop is political.  Hip-hop is rebellion.  And because the system of consumerism and capitalism and the order they rely on will only get more systematic and fine tuned, I believe, and hope that Hip-hop is here to stay!  We just need to continue finding and popularizing good hip-hop artists.  I think hip-hop will only die when we have given up the hope and accepted that changing our systematic repressive culture is impossible.   Or if it does bring about change, and the idea of systematic repressive environment becomes a thing of the past.

PS. i touched on this topic in this post

Lil wayne concert, and most other concerts

The lil wayne concert in Chicago was truly an epic moment.  To me, it was a pilgrimage.  It was the first concert that I sought out and bought tickets to.  I’ve been to concerts before, and to summerfest, but I usually went to spend time with friends, and or get drunk and be amongst the young, intoxicated, impenetrable nightlife crowd more-so than actually listen to the music.   Although I’ve been to summerfest a few more times than is useful (none this year though), I don’t remember many concerts, and anyways I’m not usually a fan of concerts in general.  (most live concerts I attend I don’t even face the stage, I just talk with friends and watch the illuminated bodies, limbs and heads behind me yell and wave at the band while my back is to the stage.)  And afterwards my friends ask me what I thought of the concert and I just tell them that “I don’t know, I wasn’t listening,” or I say, “it was ok, but it’s no lil wayne.”

So August 13^th, 2011 was a different experience.  I felt I not only witnessed, but participated in history in the making.  Yes, I believe a lil wayne concert is a historic event.  When I’m an old creepy man this is the story I’ll tell to little odd children that sit next to me on my bench.   I’ll become known as the “old guy who tells the same story about a lil wayne concert.”

So here was a guy (Wayne) who actually commanded my attention (and not only my attention) more than any girl in the audience that night.  I mean most concerts, girls attract my attention more than the music, but it really is something when you can attract a straight guy’s attention more than a pretty girl.  (Does this mean I’m not that straight?)

Description of the concert.

First up was keri hilson.  She’s good, she’s cool.  Next was Dick Ross featuring 100 extra pounds of fat that creates an illusion of a Mafioso tough guy character, which his skills do not warrant in the rap game.  When he came on I took a seat in my chair, and watched dark masses go wild above me, and laughed internally when I heard the girl next to me recite all the lyrics of his song.  Did she know the lyrics of one of Rick Ross’s obscure songs because she was black? And he was black?  Because I couldn’t think of what would compel someone to learn the lyrics of one of Rick Ross’s obscure songs other than because they sense some kind of illusory relation to this artist (skin color) because the musical quality certainly doesn’t warrant such dedicated fans.  He’s lucky.

Then I emptied my bladder in preparation for lil wayne.  There was a line to the mens.  I asked the guy ahead if he’s been to a lil wayne concert, and he said he has been 4 times.  There was a girl in the bathroom waiting for someone to roll a joint or something, and I’m guessing every 10^th guy commented on her being in the men’s.  Then I bought another beer and went to my seat.  Timely, lil wayne came on and there was a humongous roar from the crowd, and I almost yelled so hard my eyes closed and I barely saw him.  Lil wayne performed a lot of his best songs, including a few from his No Ceilling mixtape.  I was amazed to say the least.  He said some things in between a song or two about jail time.  Then some bridge was lowered and he sang on it.  I think he also did “lollipop.”  Towards the end some others came on stage, including Birdman.  Wayne asked the crowd to cheer for one more song, and they did, and he gave us one more song.

It’s really hard to see something for what it is the first time you look, especially if you are overly excited for it.  Because I almost remember myself singing and cheering more than the actual songs.  If I see him again, I think I’ll be able to overcome my excitement and pay more attention to the music.

Fans and Tragedy/Questions

I couldn’t settle with the amount of people that were there.  I mean it was a testament to what he has created.  He created armies in numerous cities around the world that will bow down to him and follow him, and listen to him.  It started with a small cult, and grew to such unstoppable proportions.  To think: how many people’s ears has he convinced and conquered?   This was a profound, yet tragic moment for me.   I realized again, what a feat he has completed, and how immensely hard it will be for me to do the same with my craft.  The most tragic recurring thought that goes through my head, is that visual art cannot accomplish this feat.  Very few artists, if any have been able to create work that has figured out the issue of art in a system of consumerism, democracy, and mindless masses.  Very few works of art appeal to both acclaimed critics and casual enthusiasts, and very few works function anywhere outside of a white cube space.  And also tragic because how do you move on after witnessing the epitome of what you aspire to be?  What do you do when you come back to the studio the next day? 

These are horrific thoughts and feeling that I have to overcome.  Really, it won’t be easy.  But I must somehow get over this concert, and maybe over lil wayne in general.  I don’t know.  I don’t know.

Best rapper alive

Still, I really feel lucky that I got to be at this concert.  At the point of his career where he could start making nothing but mediocre work from now on.  I wish I got to see him two years ago, when he was in his prime.  Everything from him now might be “post-fact.”

Towards the end of the concert he took the mic and said straightforwardly: my name is Weezy and I am the best rapper alive.  And I loved this.  I love that some people hate this, because it comes across as egotistic.  But is it egotistic if one really is the best rapper alive?  Or is it just truth.  The same way some people proclaim themselves as black belt karate or “professional” photographers.  That’s just his title: Best rapper alive; it’s not much of a boast.

lyrics to above song

When I heard that youtube is filled with garbage, I decided to literally fill it with videos of garbage, so that there is a collection of garbage videos and a channel dedicated specifically to cataloging all kinds of garbage.  Maybe this channel could become a resource for garbage videos in case someone is ever interested in watching garbage. Although I can’t possibly fill this expansive world with garbage, I thought I would try to do my part and I want one of the videos to get popular because it is exactly the opposite of what we strive for to create, and what we consider we want to view.

Furthermore, I decided to videotape garbage around 2008-2009 when I saw that someone tried to create “the worst youtube video.”  That video was a shitty video of some celebrity shot from a cell phone or something, and it got milions of views and became one of the most popular videos on youtube in terms of view numbers and thus was listed under “Top Youtube Videos” back when youtube had that section (I don’t know if youtube still has that section or how it’s judged today).

At some point I noticed there was a video where someone videotaped paint drying.  They did this because someone claimed that youtube videos are as interesting as watching paint dry.

Later, I was very interested in doing things that have anti-art, have a punk-aesthetic, and most importantly encompass Warholian ideas of triviality and the mundane.  Devoting time to make something very banal and useless on purpose, in an almost apathetic way, without dramatizing the subject or beautifying it.  Now there are several such videos: one two.

My goal was to get a video of garbage to accumulate millions of views.  In a community like youtube, the most important thing is popularity.  Videos that are popular surface in the forefront of this community, and videos that are not popular, yet possibly really good, are forgotten and hidden.  Having a video of garbage surface to prominence would exploit the judging system of youtube, by revealing the faults of glorifying popular things rather than tasteful creative endeavors. Anyways, in a context where everyone is trying to create a creative video, a fascinating video, a wild video, or a funny one, a video of trash stands out.  It’s something unusual in this context.

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Some notes on garbage:

These videos are exactly what we don’t want or care to see.  But people are interested in what nobody wants to see, or they could stumble upon it by accident due to the way things are linked on the internet.  People are curious to know what something worthless or terrible looks like.

When I think of garbage I think of objects that nobody need.  Extended it’s not just objects but anything.  Anything can be garbage in the wrong context or time: noise, music, art, love, old technology.  People think of garbage as useless.  One man’s trash it another’s treasure.

Garbage piles are something that is in the way of people; it is kept hidden in black bags in opaque trashcans.  It is in transit to some other place which nobody knows about and which is not a place of interest.  To a dump.  A morgue for useless materials.  It’s used material, or sometimes it’s new material that is in excess, or at the wrong place at the wrong time, and thus not in current need.  It looks gross because it is often the remains of objects that are not desirable.  The bottoms of lettuce, the bones and cartilage of a chicken breast that nobody can eat, empty bottles of drunk drinks, wrapping paper.

Garbage is ubiquitous as useful things.  We make useful things out of garbage.  Artists make visually intriguing things out of useless things.

The Internet, like our world, is full of garbage.  Spam is garbage.  Irrelevant home videos popular on youtube are considered garbage.  Everyone makes them, but nobody besides the creator and their close ones care about it.

I thought I would video record something that nobody claims they want to see, something that is traditionally unpleasant to look at.  Yet visually it forms descent compositions that are not much different than a lot of sculptures or paintings I’ve seen.  I’m not talking about the materials, but the way the shapes and colors are arranged and relate to each other.  Garbage piles happen naturally.

We, a first world “civilized” society, create more garbage than any other country.  It’s what we create.  When I think about this, I think that it is not a conscious decision that we do this, but more like an inevitable consequence, but nevertheless, it’s not something that most are proud of.  But still, we really do create garbage.  That’s undeniable.  Yet we don’t think of it as something we create and it doesn’t really have a purpose, so we don’t glorify this creation.  The garbage we create could be acknowledged.

What many people don’t like about New York City, is that there are too many people.  It takes focus to walk down a street and maneuver past all kinds of bodies going right, left, stopping, slowing down or speeding up.  But this is precisely what I like!  I love being in a crowd.  My favorite is the subway at rush hour.  I enjoy the idea of being compressed amongst the hundreds of bodies on the subway train with the blank or tired sagging faces turned in different directions trying not to slip and fall.  I like to stand my ground while other bodies push me about.  Everyone is fighting for their body’s room, and one has to be assertive about claiming space at peak times.  This arouses in me a love for the city because I see, and literally feel life gushing and pulsating around me.  Sometimes you can feel the heat of the person next to you and realize how close you are to a stranger: closer than you can get anywhere else without it being socially unacceptable.  I smile when the conductor yells to not hold doors for the last few people that squish into the subway train instead of waiting for the next train because this shows that, yes, there really is an overwhelming amount of people, of life.  And I am more interested in the idea of confinement in the subway, reminding me that I am alive, over the confinement of a coffin, alone and dead.

Carelessness

I really like how careless people are in public.  New Yorkers have seen and heard so many odd things about so many people that odd things don’t capture their interest as easily as the rest of America.  People dress more unusually or wear crappy old clothes and others don’t pay much attention to that.  There are so many people and everyone is so busy and in such a rush that others don’t have time and energy to care about each individual as much.  And in a way I like the idea of this.  I like the fact that one can go about their business without others wondering who this person is, why he’s dressed like this, or what he is up to.  You go into a store for a chips and beer, and the cashier doesn’t really care about you.  He serves you quickly, because there is likely another customer behind you, and that’s another dollar.  To him you are just another buyer.  I think it’s great when strangers don’t care about your business because it allows you to be yourself, not attract attention, and not think about what they think about you.  You don’t have to answer to “Hi, how are you? Did you find everything you were looking for today?”  Everyday encounters aren’t elevated to special occasions the way they are in small towns.  You can simply be an object to others; another number in the city.

In recent time I’ve come to accept a wider array of very explicit vulgar gansta-rap. I’ve been a fan of Crucial Conflict for some time, but recently I really started to appreciate Waka Flocka and the likes who are kind of the underdogs in the genre that focus on exaggerating and glorifying the disgusting cruelties of violently raunchy, masculine dirty street/gang life. It’s easy to dismiss this type of music as silly and useless, but I feel that on the contrary it serves a crucial role of bringing awareness to issues regarding problems of the bad parts of town. By showing and often exaggerating killers and gangster’s mentalities in Waka Flocka Flame’s Bustin’ At ‘Em: “Shoot first, ask questions last. That’s how these so called gangsta’s last.” He precedes the song with this dangerously scary motto as a warning to anyone who thinks of messing with him, or the subculture he represents. “Ain’t no talkin’ homie, I’m jus’ bustin’ at ‘em.” By showing a corrupted way of thinking it brings awareness to the values and conditions of this subculture, which creates discourse and thus opens the doors for possible political and social change. His songs are about as scary to me as terrorists, and I would never feel compelled to actually hang out with such groups of people. But, the more vulgar and urgent it is the more the song will call people to thought and action; the more seriously they will be taken…

In Waka’s other song “O Lets Do it,” he asserts that he influences “drug dealin’ music.” And I think this is great, because it creates so much social and political fear of “this music/these people.” Partially it propagates criminal and racial problems even further because Waka isn’t really proposing any solution, but somewhere between matter of factly and proudly acknowledging his effect on our society which is hauntingly unsettling. (But still beautiful). Nevertheless, his music preaches a certain camaraderie among his dogs (friends and close ones) He claims that he will rob kill etc. for his homies in “This is For My Dogs.” This is a very romantic idea, that shares similarity with numerous other classical plays, movies, songs books where the protagonist promises to do anything for his significant other.

Now, for the uber-cool art nerds, I want to throw in a contemporary art comparison: Santiago Serra. His work questions the morality of capitalism, arguing that degrading actions are not unethical in a capitalistic society because the people that are being degraded are being fairly compensated for their degradation, and they all participated voluntarily. I don’t know when he started doing these pieces, if it was before hip-hop started or after, but nevertheless the two share similar philosophies.

Lastly, I want to throw in one of my favorite quotes about art:

“Artists don’t solve problems; they create them.”

And I think that it is important for us, artists, to continue to cause as many problems and as big of problems as possible, whether they relate to violence, gender issues, or economic beliefs, and let the “other” people deal with or solve them. We cannot get caught up in ethical debates surrounding our own work. Ethical or not, we must put it out there, and let others decide. These other people need this, and it’s a strong, if not the only way to initiate change.

I think artists should continue to exploit their reality even if its absolutely repulsively cruel. Because without doing so, I don’t think people can become aware of their realities, in order to form opinions about it or initiate change.

I also think the popularity of this music indicates people’s repression, particularly that of violence, and power that I feel is prevalent in American culture. It seems manifesting these repressed themes can only be expressed through art because their expression even in minor forms is increasingly controlled and socially unacceptable. I don’t think its merely violence that is increasingly controlled, but other social standards and behaviors as well.

The Song Remains the Same

Recently, I’ve been thinking about (again) how inevitable some things are in our world. Like how inevitable that parents play a parental role, children are forced to respond by playing the children role, politicians play the role of a puppet, outsiders see the world as if they are outsiders, and consequently insiders treat outsiders like they cant be insiders. These relationships don’t go away and one feeds off the other in a never-ending pattern. Waka Flocka’s subject matter in rap has existed for probably over 30yrs now. There were rappers 10 yrs ago, 20 and 30 yrs ago that rapped threatening lyrics about ghetto and gangsta life. People responded in different ways, but some people respond with fear and feel like waging a war on gansta rap to not let their children hear it etc. So I don’t know if this music has brought about practical change.

Nevertheless, rappers attempt to keep making this music that should in theory initiate change. Perhaps it is our political system that doesn’t allow for change once the doors for change have opened. So here in 2010-11 Waka Flocka is bringing awareness to an issue. But I don’t think that change will ever come unless the political system or some systematic way of life and law and beliefs is altered. So I feel his voice will continue to be looked down upon by people who dismiss his music as violent garbage that ruins our country, and he will inevitable stick to creating more violent songs, because that’s the only way he knows how. And I think that even if he is aware that he isn’t bringing about change, I believe that he must continue to do what he does. This is what the system asks of him, and he seems to be a good candidate for that role that keeps the system going. Unfortunately, I don’t know if him taking up that role or rejecting it has any effect on the functioning of the system.

It’s a pretty clever way to fight the man, or the system if you think about it.  It works well with how commercialized rap has become in our capitalist society.  The rapper sells his music to “the Man,” and “the Man” sells his music to the public.  He is essentially selling weapons against himself, and negative propaganda, but he will do this no matter what values the music preaches as long as he can get rich doing it. And if he doesn’t do it, the next man will.  So really it’s him that’s making the choice, but someone making the choice to release this danger into our society at such a scale is inevitable.  It’s great though that he sells something that he is probably in complete opposition to.  Whether rappers think about it like this or not doesn’t matter, what matters is how their music functions and what philosophy it creates or fits under.  Perhaps it went beyond punk rock in terms of figuring out how to become part of the system and exploit it, rather than completely reject it.