Hip Hop Culture is NOT Youth Culture.

DMX do be putting his heart and soul into his performances. I have long felt that X is one of the dudes I could pretty much take to any hood and feel comfortable. He rocks like that. Kalefa from the Times says,

X has built a hugely successful career (all five of his albums have made their debut at No. 1) by highlighting the kind of turmoil that rappers more often hide. Even more than Eminem (who balances his paranoia with a mischievous sense of humor) or Tupac Shakur (who balanced his laments with smooth, swaggering boasts), DMX makes it impossible for listeners to ignore his suffering and desperation.

X has been charged with possession of crack cocaine pipes and, on another occasion, cocaine. (Plenty of rappers brag about selling it, but smoking it remains absolutely taboo.) He has also been charged with animal cruelty, reckless driving and, strangest of all, impersonating a federal agent

I will co-sign on the fact that X is transparent with his emotions in a ride or die way that is severly endearing.
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A couple weeks ago, in the Sunday Times,
Benjamin Bridwell, of the "Band of Horses", had an insightful review of Ghostface.
He says,

I am a big fan of all the Wu Tang stuff, so I was anticipating “Fishscale” (Def Jam) for a while. I bought it the first day, and we’ve been listening to it constantly for the past month. The guy is just murdering the game, in the lingo. The whole album is so hungry, it has some of the best hooks on it. The lyrics are out of control and hilarious. “Be Easy” is an awesome song: it’s all about New York. There’s also the song “Kilo” featuring Raekwon, which has great female backing; the lyrics just grab you. I can’t quote the lyrics because it’s a family paper, but on the sixth song he comes out and he says, “Ya’ll be nice to the crackheads.” You really should be nice to the crackheads, they’re struggling.

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Davey D makes some very important points in his article that ask's whether hip hops main audience is white.
He points out that:

• The statistic started in 1991 when Newsweek Magazine did a cover story on Gangsta Rap and in their article they put out an un-researched statistic that said 80% of Hip Hop's audience is white and that its reflected in record sales.

• "Granted if one goes to a Mos Def show or even a Wu-Tang concert you will see a majority white audience in many cities, but does that translate to that 80% white [hip hop] audience?

• The article is informative in that it offers a chronology of how, when and where Hip Hop was played on the radio.

• Radio remains segregated, but not nearly was much as it was in the past. Davey points out how Top 20 rock/pop stations started playin Hip Hop. As a result they retained the amenities of being top 20, w/o having the stigma of being a nigga station.
  

What difference does it make if hip hops major audience is White or Latino or Black?

Historically, a variety of ethnicities have enjoyed Black Music. White folks rocked with Motown. Japanese folks lovingly patronized 1950's jazz and currently shows mad love to underground AND mainstream hip hop acts.

Hip Hops audience is not the major problem.
The major problem is that Black Culture is Equivicated with Hip Hop Culture. Which is dead wrong.

A people are NOT DEFINED by a music.

Music can be influential.
Music can play a major role in our lives.

Music can motivate you.

But to equivicate a genre of music with the definition of a people. Not cool fam.

We are more than Hip Hop.
That, by and large is the Problem that Bill and O has with Hip hop.
Where is the self awarness?

Where is the hood accountability?

Why inna f*ck ain't Damon Dash invested in real estate IN MARCY. IN Harlem. In Bushwick?
Why aren't their 15 Magic Johnson's? Its a war out here fam, and trust, between Ratner and Columbia, n*ggas gon' be in Philly, Maine.

That is For True.

And Trust fam. This housing/education/work situation is Huge. It makes me wanna say that THE situation is bigger than hip hop. What I will say is that Hip Hop's potential is amazing. Our current situation is BIGGER than Hip Hops current status. I think that is a a more accurate statement.

It is fatal to base ones culture on a movement that is driven by youth. Young people that that are largely hyper-undereducated and are so influenced by the dominant cultures message that they yet spend, spend, spend. They buy Akademics this and BAPE that 'till the cows come home. Hyper consumers and producers of little.

I am not turning on HH. HH was there for me when my family wasn't. What I am saying is that complex situation, requires a multilayered analysis.

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Wow. That was a late summer rant.

On to more , ahem, lighter topics.
So Gravy really did get shot, AND STILL GO UP to Hot 97. Peep this expose from the New Yorker Magazine by Ben McGrath.

For moral support, Gravy had assembled a sizable entourage—three or four dozen men—and outfitted them with extra-large blue T-shirts that read “Gravy” on the front and, on the back, “Brooklyn ‘Get Up,’ ” a reference to the first single from his forthcoming album. Punctuality is unusual in the rap world, but Gravy and his crew arrived early for his session, and when he presented himself at the Hot 97 studio, on Hudson Street in the West Village, at a quarter to seven, Flex sent him away and told him not to return until ten. Gravy went around the corner to get something to eat.

A couple of hours passed. “Then, after I got a sandwich and came out of the store—da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da! ” Gravy told me later, mimicking the sound of gunfire. “The only thing I remember is falling, and knowing that I’m shot—just don’t know where. It’s not like, when you get shot, ‘Oh, I got shot here.’ Nah. You know you hit, so your mind frame is—you pumped, your adrenaline is going. I reach my hand over, and I see I’m bleeding. I didn’t see the hole. I can’t see behind my ass.”

Gravy is an enormous man—well over six feet, and more than three hundred pounds—with a caboose to match. The bullet, it turned out, had struck him in his left buttock. “Straight clean shot— through the ass, through the thigh,” he said, gently rubbing the front of his pants leg.

I nominate Gravey for the Gully MC of 2006 award.
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That was a big 'ol August Hip Hop post.
Isn' this weather lovely?

I "found" that Mary song, Sincerity, I have been on the hunt for it for a hot minute.

All I knew was the beat. But. Sh*t. Sometimes that is all you need.

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