Why I Love Hip-Hop: Leaders Of The New School - Case Of The P.T.A. (Video)

1991...the key word in this post is yes.

Yes, that is Busta Rhymes along with Charlie Brown and Dinco D and yes, they make up the original line up of Leaders of the New School (Cut Monitor Milo/Milo in the Dance, cousin of Busta Rhymes, would join the group for the second album, T.I.M.E(The Inner Mind's Eye). Yes, Charlie Brown is wearing all Cleveland Browns paraphenalia. Yes, Chuck D of Public Enemy fame, christened this group, Leaders of the New School (known by heads as the LONS). Yes, this intensity while spitting rhymes that make sense is not seen enough today. Yes, this tape (yes, I had tapes) Future Without a Past stayed in my Walkman. Yes, this album helped me survive 10th grade...my worst year EVER. Yes, I still remember the words to this song. Yes, I screamed them when I saw Busta Rhymes perform last year. Yes, this was my second favorite group -- my first still being De La Soul -- until they broke up due to personal infighting.

Why I Love Hip-Hop - Nas - World is yours (Q-Tip Remix)

The Remix...House music and club music did it but hip-hop took it to another level. Yes, this is the same artist and song that I just posted...but Nas decided, well, let me change some lyrics here and there and get a beat from Q-Tip instead of the Pete Rock classic. It's the same song but reworked enough to give it a different vibe.

Why I Love Hip-Hop - The World is Yours

I am starting a series that combines my love for hip-hop with my jones for YouTube...it's called Why I Love Hip-Hop.

Hip-hop is catching a lot of crap lately. Hip-hop is the music of my life. The essentials of hip-hop, the writing (graffiti art), the rhyming (rapping), the djing and the b-boying (breakdancing) are the cultural expressions of working-class black and latino youth...but, it has spread world wide. Some of this spread has been perpetuated by those who wish to profiteer off of hip-hop. But there are some that still believe in the power of words and a beat and believe in the core of what made hip-hop special: stories told with honesty and dexterity. The flair doesn't come from jewelry, cars, and scantily clad women...those are machinations of those that see hip-hop as a cash cow. The music is about the rhyme, the beat and the interplay between both. I will highlight some examples that I feel that merit mentioning. There are so many more...this is just one fan's opinion.


Whose world is this? It's mine, it's mine, it's mine...

This song was damn near my anthem summer of 1994. I had just graduated 2 weeks earlier and I was participating in my normal Friday night ritual. Yo! MTV Raps! from 12am to 2am. I did it before I took the ACT and the SAT and I did it after I got back from prom. This is the second single from one of the most highly regarded hip-hop albums ever, Nas's debut Illmatic.

As soon as that Ahmad Jamal trio sample (from the song "I Love Music" hits), it takes me back to the optimism I had back in 1994. This was before 9/11, this was before the petty east coast/west coast stuff, this was before Bush's robbery of the White House, before Monica Lewinsky, before Katrina, back when Pac and Biggie were tight with each other...those were the days.

This is how hip-hop should sound...it should have this kind of soul, this kind of personality. This is why I love this music.

Do YOU know about the Jena 6?

This video is about a travesty in Louisiana...no, not Katrina.

Chris (from Columbus) puts it extremely well.

While it's not right to meet intimidation with violence, our legal system doesn't seem to have come very far in the days of horribly lopsided and unfair trials that were consistent with the Jim Crow days. The legal system still dogpiles on people of color without the means to defend themselves. Speaking up for legal rights doesn't imply condoning of actions (the argument of many opponents to real judicial reform). It's just the right thing to do. If you are going to send people to jail, do it fairly.

Def Poetry - Common - A Letter To The Law

And y'all thought I was kidding when I called Cheney gangster...

KRS-ONE - Sound of Da Police

If anyone ever feels why black folks are hostile toward crooked cops (legit cops are too few and good human beings and the bad ones mess it up for them too.)...

TELL THE TRUTH - Mos Def - Immortal Technique - Eminem

Weapons of mass distraction...

What Cleveland Metropolitan needs.

Maybe this is all the CMSD needs...(thanks Carmen)



Why aren't there movies about black and latino teachers inspiring their youth other than Stand and Deliver and Lean on Me. I know Jaime Escalante and Joe Clark aren't the only educational role models for Latino and Black students. There are teachers, black, white, asian, latino, male and female that won't let kids fail without the drama and the schmaltz. I know some of them personally.

Chocolate Rain / Best Week Ever Version

Tay is a very good sport. I love the R. Kelly shot...

Are you ready...

Are you ready for some kickball?

Maybe you're thinking "man, I haven't played that since elementary school". Well, some adults were playing kickball yesterday at Shaker Middle School...and I was among them. A fun time was had by all. Why were we playing kickball?

Because of WAKA: the World Adult Kickball Association. There are two Cleveland-area divisions: The Great Lakes Division, which is scheduled to start play a week from yesterday and the Rock and Roll Division, which is having a preseason pick-up game next Tuesday.

For more info, hit up WAKA . Yes, that's a working URL.

the losses of insularity

Sometimes, you lose a lot in life from what you don't do and who you don't connect deeper with. I have met many people in my life that, because, at one point, I was so insular, I didn't connect with as deeply as I should have. These were people I could relate to and people I could understand that understood me. I ran into one of those people a couple of days ago....actually, this week, I have run into a few of those people.

Handsome Boy Modeling School promo video

Handsome Boy Modeling School...this is my next career move. Forget web development...anybody got 60 dollars?

Oh no, not you too Lime Spider!

I just read this today and it broke my heart. One of my favorite haunts in Akron (it's a damn shame that it took me so long to find it) is The Lime Spider and it's closing in September. It's the only place in Downtown Akron that has 1) independent rock shows, 2) a plethora of beer, both mainstream and microbrew and 3) WIRELESS!. I was trying to think of a place in Akron proper that has decent food and wireless.

All I could think of was Panera Bread (which, technically, is in Cuyahoga Falls)..and the Lime Spider late nights. ( Big ups to the bearded grill guy whose name I don't know).

I will definitely represent there a few times before it's last call for the Lime Spider.

Common's new CD or Why People Don't Buy Music as Much...

I bought Common's new "Finding Forever" CD 2 days ago (it came out 3 days ago) and...wow. Common is the same man as he was when he started rapping...but he has not been shy about the fact that he has grown since "Can I Borrow A Dollar". Growth is a part of life that is often devoid of hip-hop. People don't talk about how to grow themselves, their communities, hell even the losses that result in growth experiences. This is real life. Forget what BET is showing you. Forget what MTV is showing you. Common is real to me. I can relate to songs like "Book of Life" from "Resurrection" about being young, black and full of life questions after college doesn't go as planned.

People don't buy music because they don't feel music. It doesn't touch your soul, the essential part of who you are or who you are aspiring to be. Common's CD does that for me.

I hope you all find music that strikes you like that. If you don't have a relationship like that with music (or some kind of art), you are missing out.

A fine example of journalism...

I got a bulletin from the Dennis Kucinich for President campaign and they sent a YouTube video with a 1978 interview of Dennis by Tom Snyder (who just passed, RIP). Tom is asking some hard-hitting questions and Dennis isn't ducking.

They don't make politicians or journalists like that much anymore.

He's been saying the same things for the last 29 years. It's all about the people and serving the will of the people not, as he put it, genuflecting at the altar of big business.

The video is here...

I also love the blacksploitation-esque music.

Straight Outta Touch

As any of my five readers know (Tim, next time I see you,I owe you a Red Stripe on me. Hooray beer!), I have been critical of Mansfield Frazier's writing (see my post from April of this year called "Imus and Gangsta Rap") on CoolCleveland in his Straight Outta Mansfield column. While I appreciate the fact that CoolCleveland has a black writer, he is very critical (though some of it is deserved) of youth -- especially black youth.

This week's column is no different. Mr. Frazier makes some strong points about the complacency of councilpeople in areas that started to brown over the last 30-40 years. Instead of creating structures that promoted racial harmony such as Cleveland Heights and Shaker Heights, they let the people in the neighborhoods (mostly white) see them as a threat simply because of their skin color. I partially blame realtors (I think that any realtor that said sell because "they" are moving in should be punished...and not in a nice way.)

The youth that Councilman Polensek railed against (which is quite unbecoming of a representative of the City of Cleveland) was acting up not just because his mom didn't raise him right. I don't know her or him so I can't really say. But, I can say this. Many kids, black and white are getting the short shrift from the city. Where is the rec center that was promised to the Collinwood neighborhood years ago? Where are the after school activities? When kids have nothing constructive to do, some become destructive. While personal responsibility should govern every young person's actions, they are more likely to make constructive choices when there are more constructive options are available.

This kid is an example of what neglect of neighborhoods has done to Cleveland. It's not just about black kids, white kids, Latino kids, Asian kids or Native American kids. It's about the green that these kids grew up without because if any of these kids had parents with green, they wouldn't be in this environment. The massive selling off of Cleveland's jobs, the expense of retooling and the inability for the educated to find jobs have created a downward spiral for all of us.

The mom of the kid threatened to sic Al Sharpton or George Forbes on Councilman Polensek? What are they going to do? Please, don't get me started on black "leadership"...if Councilman Polensek did make the race of a kid an issue, then black Collinwoodians should remember this when he comes calling for re-election and proceed to use their vote to get him out. As far as if he would do the same to a white ne'er do well, only Councilman Polensek can answer that one.

Me and Cleveland...

I posted a comment on REALNEO and I said something that really encapsulates my feelings about Cleveland:

I grew up during arguably Cleveland's worst historical period. I am the product of black and white suburban flight. I am the product of Cleveland Public schools (post-Remedial order and pre-city takeover). I am the product of dedicated honors program teachers with short resources and good parents who didn't have either the resources or desire to move. I am the product of forced busing and tax abatements for Gateway, the BP Building, The Galleria, Tower City and other projects that took (and still takes) money from the schools. I am part of the first class of students subjected to the Ohio Proficiency Test which has become a tool to narrow the education of young Ohioans everywhere. I have taken all that Cleveland has thrown at me and I still exist. Cleveland owes a lot of people. Cleveland owes the next few generations more than it gave mine. People of my generation are used to thinking of Cleveland as less than a prosperous place because it hasn't been such during out lifetimes...and people wonder why I hate Reagan and Voinovich so much. Though there's much contempt and frustration, Cleveland was home when it wasn't en vogue to be home...so I can say whatever I want about it.

How do you feel about your hometown?

Realization...

I just came to a realization...I don't have to rewrite War and Peace everytime I blog. I just have to write something of meaning, not short, not long, just meaningful.

I think that's why so many bloggers experience burnout. The key? Write something little every day and, should I need to write something bigger, I think it may come out easier.

This is how people such as Jack can post for years straight. I ran into Jack again at the July Cleveland Blogger Meetup and he mentioned that he has been blogging for a couple of years every day. I realized, I hardly ever write. I always want to write these long pieces completely encapsulating my point of view. I don't have to do that. I put too much pressure on myself.

This is why slow and steady wins the race...

getting in the president's ass...

When I said that someone should get in Dubya's ass, this is NOT what I meant.

burying "nigger"

The NAACP decided to engage in their first relevant act of the new millenium (truly, what have they done?) and it's...burying the word "nigger"? Come on! It's nice to see that black America has all of its' problems solved to the point where this is the primary concern. Our schools are educating kids exactly as they should be. Our colleges are priced reasonably enough for all kids to attend. Everyone has reasonable child care and health care...

...oh, wait, we don't have these things?

Then, why are we wasting time with this?

I see the NAACP's publicity stunt (it wouldn't be a publicity stunt if it had relevance) as another bourgeois way to "pile-on" to hip-hop. Hip-hop has needed to be more responsible for what is said on the mic way before Michael "Kramer" Richards and Dumb Anus (excuse me, Don Imus) every uttered the words they showed their asses in the national limelight. But, why do they get to shirk responsibility and deflect it upon us. Imus essentially said "Oh, the rappers do it, so it must be ok." What happened to responsibility for the words that are used that folks have been preaching to hip-hop since its' existance? Responsibility is a bedfellow of the first amendment not something you can remove at your convenience like a comforter on a warm night. The public has left Imus alone since he decided to blame his malfeasance on hip-hop...and bourgeois and misguided black folk have jumped on hip-hop's case....again.

If only institutional racism or educational reform could elicit such a response from the black elite (I refuse to call them black leaders...who are they leading?)...