WHAT KILLED THE UNDERGROUND

It's not as if the Venn Diagram for Defari and Atmosphere fandoms has that big a circle in the middle, anyway.

xpost: as i said in my post obv not all ppl are getting what they want

i want to know why the hell i only found out about cormega this year! it's not like i'm THAT out of the loop! cormega = pretty fucking hard, also there's plenty of people who straddle the nerd scene / regular people divide ... um, i'm kind of reaching here, but i get the impression that house music, for example, has its contingent of diehards who keep the music fairly below-the-radar without "overnerdizing" or complexifying the sound. so they retain some or most of the overground values ... uh, we're talking like your big french house contingent or your frankie bones massive or whatever ... they seem to me to be a pretty viable force in the industry too - benny benassi isn't exactly haddaway, y'know? i'm wondering if rap music has a similar diehard contingent that isn't an almost-strictly-regional scene (like the mixtape scene in new york).

i dunno. someone school me. why did i find out about cormega from the french of all people??

Not every new 'underground' MC right now is white ethan, it seems to me that's just the case with all the ones that Defari doesn't like. It's not his nor their 'fault' he doesn't like them, shit/taste is subjective; there's no 'fault' to be had in a matter of someone not liking/getting/being able to not wretch-when-listening-to a certain music as far as I see it. I really fail to understand the disdain for the spread of a particular style of music throughout a sector of a culture that maybe didn't perpetuate it (but doesn't fail to appreciate it as we both are evidence of). That's what I'll say 'bout this (at least until the buzzedness wears off).

Now I'm not saying that hip hop should model itself on rock in any way, I'm just gonna use rock as an example, okay? Rock reached a certain point where it splintered fundamentally. The phrase "rock and roll" which had meant a certain very specific set-up was extended to include almost any pop music made in a certain spirit (which isn't to say there weren't and aren't still today people who want to artificially narrow it down again with arbitrary definitions, and you know what we call them).

Hip hop has achieved a kind of cultural singularity by which the multifariousness of its being has expanded dramatically. To yearn for the rebirth of a "real hip hop" possessed of a certain set of largely nostalgia-oriented characteristics is misguided, cause the genie isn't going back in the bottle.

Don't be a hip hop Rockist, E.

But you should be glad that underground hip-hop is dead because now there can be a rebirth! And besides hasn't there been a lot of mainstream-y underground-y stuff out this year? C-Rayz Walz, SA Smash, Danger Mouse + Gemini, new Gang Starr record, Jaylib, even Non-Prophets (ok, probably not). Sort of makes yr argument retarded and moot.

To answer the question why 'nerd' hip-hop blew up I think is easy - supply and demand. There are more people who identify with intelligent nerds than intelligent thugs sadly there are even more who dig sensitive thugs who need hugs.

(seriously though Ugly Duckling sucks not all 'nerd' hip-hop is corny/bad De La Soul knock offs)

Well, Big L died years ago, MOP signed to the Roc, CNN split up and Nore went Neptu-pop and made the best records of his life, Sadat X got old, the Beatnuts got repetitive, Dilated are busy whingeing, clearly, the DITC album got canned years ago and Diamond D seems to have given up.

I guess they all got pissed off with only going gold and decided to grab a piece of that action...

unlike yourself.

http://www.poemcees.com

They've got links to other DC-based groups too, so it's more than just "Dan pimps his brother on ILM".

who are obviously far worse people on principle than the smug, presumptuous white ppl who make comments like these

What, the nationwide "underground" of people putting on shows in their neighborhoods trying hard to get signed, or the smaller labels that aren't aiming for the mainstream? I mean, was 50 Cent underground until he got signed? Are you counting stuff on Def Jux as underground just because it has a smaller audience (predominately white high school and college kids)?

Define "underground," I'm at a loss here.

do people still do that? or do they just start distributing limited 7-inches and cdr in the hopes of getting picked up by a boutique label? (lex, stones throw, etc.)

And there's still mix tapes and street corner cd's by independent 'middle ground' rappers, but are you saying that the system for building it up from the underground to the mainstream doesn't work anymore?

Right about the time that Tupac and Biggie got shot.

It sure worked for a gentleman by the name of 50 Cent.

(many many xposts)

Yeah, the only place where I've actually seen and had access to an underground scene like you're talking about is in New Orleans.

it sounds like a complaint which overlooks how the underground has evaporated/shrunk through natural progression and success of the genre alongside technology (internet). i mean the hip-hop overground is bigger than the underground and has been for some time - same has happened with dance in the UK post rave-scene (different but some parallels). why is it so important for there to be a strong underground now anyway (unless you maintain that there should always be one which is fair enough as the social situations that beget such a subculture seems prevalent as always) - when it seems easier than ever to blow up overnight?

So by siding with Defari and holding this claim at the same time, you're basically admitting he is aiming for the top but doesn't have the talent (or maybe his talent just hasn't been recognized, etc.)

SIDE A
1. Raskass - "Sonset"
2. Gemini - "Funk Soul Sensation"
3. Whoridas - "Taxin'"
4. The Wascals - "The Dips"
5. Ten Thieves - "It Don't Matter"
6. EyeCue - "Crooked Letter Eye"
7. The Roots - "Pass the Popcorn"
8. Aceyalone - "Headaches and Woes"
9. Third Sight - "Rhymes Like a Scientist"
10. J-Live - "Braggin' Writes"
11. A Tribe Called Quest - "What's the Reaction"
12. BUMS w/Saafir - "Rain"
13. Saafir - "Can You Feel Me?"
14. Juggaknotz - "I'm Gonna Kill You"

SIDE B
1. Ahmad - "Homeboys First"
2. Gift of Gab - "Swan Lake"
3. 15 Guys - "All-Star Lineup"
4. Casual - "Get Off It!"
5. Common Sense - "The Bitch in You"
6. De La Soul - "Once Again..."
7. Souls of Mischief - "Ya Don't Stop"
8. Gravitation - "Waiting to Exhale"
9. Pharcyde - "Pandemonium"
10. Siah and Yeshua - "A Day Like Any Other"

Also trife I don't get why you think rap would be somehow immune to the same eddies of indie that have spooled out of rock music (rancid or fertile: your call), that have spooled out of jazz music (ditto). People who like jazz and rock have had to deal w/the fetishization of avant-gardism for decades! If rap WAS somehow immune from the "indie guilt" phenomenon I'd fear for its relevance really.

i think you may be overstating the case somewhat here. you look at a year like 1966 for jazz, ok yeah there was a controversy over whether coltrane had moved in the right direction by alienating elvin jones, and the avantgarde/free split in jazz of course much ballyhooed by music hipsters. but the REAL story in 1965 was the appearance on the map of artists like Ramsey Lewis, George Benson, Lee Morgan laying the groundwork for accessible modal bop with albums like "Sixth Sense", Les McCann refining his sensibility ... the big news in 1969 wasn't the BYG series, it was "Swiss Movement"! it was whatever sent bob james from albums like "Explosions" on ESP to "One" on Koch. if anything has been fetishized in a big way it's TRAD JAZZ and not FREE JAZZ (unless you count your twentysomething record store hipsters and wire-readers free jazz has always been a miniscule slice of the pie)

i'm not such a good rock historian so i can't give you that history.

but there IS - i think - a clear parallel with hip-hop, here. even in the big crossover period of the late 60s when soul-jazz and pop-jazz were forming (and fusion was in incubation) trad jazz was still this middle where you EVERYONE learnt how to play (let's not talk about crossover jazz today, since hiphop hasn't reached its eighty-year mark quite yet) ... see again Bob James and Pharoah Sanders who both started with trad and both ended up doing freer-than-free and crossover work, too.

the same was true in hip-hop ONCE UPON A TIME ... like, Divine Styler and Spice 1 came out of the same scene!! could anything like THAT happen today?? i think there's reason to mourn the loss of this middle ground ... both by ethan, because it produces intensely skilled mcs BUT ALSO by robin, because it produces an avant-garde that actually engages with something other than itself.

trad jazz : serious-looking guys in 2003 in turtlenecks and cords playing all acoustic billy strayhorn tunes :: hip hop : true-school guys like rasco, the beat junkies, taleb kweli and big l (on the better end of the quality spectrum)

That said I don't like Atmosphere or Aesop Rock either. =P

well, of course. i get the sense you bring up closer walk and new orleans as albums that didn't "keep with the times" wrt bop. i'd chafe at the suggestion that anticon are misunderstood charlie parkers and art blakeys and that the so-called "music for the advancement of hip-hop" is the new bop. charlie parker and art blakey weren't trying to break with the past, they'd played with the masters for years and kept doing so even as they were inventing the new music.

x-post

I guess I don't really understand what you're saying/analogizing?

i also don't want to get nailed down on my analogy here, i was really trying to make the point that no, it's not sufficient to say that the "new underground" is the misunderstood avant-garde a la can, or neu, or the sex pistols, or albert ayler, or roy ayers ... you can easily problematize those analogies, and in general they're weak arguments against the "new underground" and even weaker arguments for it, because it basically bypasses any discussion of hip-hop as such!!

yeah that's what p. diddy was working on, too! i think anticon's efforts are going in a different direction. i also mean to say that jazz has always had a middle, where pop and avant can meet on equal footing, that middle seems to be lost in hip-hop now.

am i missing something in what you're saying?

It's the "regional" stuff that you mention which continues to do this kind of slo-burn blow-up that doesn't ever seem to end, and it's got room in it for weird baldy internet typists and over-enunciators.

do you mean provincial or non-universal and 'avant garde' ? what's important here ? eg cockney rhyming slang like 'the sweeney' is fun, but only if you know what it means, just like using Moari words in rap,.. it depends on your intended audience. Not arcane in any investigate further sense, just provincial.

the words, and if so are they telling you anything new ? (presume delmar not interested in that) ? the rythyming of the words (whatever happenend to free verse, iamabic pentameter, cause 4/4, 8/4,.. type stuff more likely = boring music. Why should everything rhyme in time) ?

the music will have to adapt, cause unless you're shakespeare rhyming words will only limit their range as much as already proved in most pop music (which i hoped merging of with rap might have saved exactly via free-er wording), but if there's shakespeare's tourette's bro w/beatbox on every corner, uh, so what ?

btw i don't listen to almost any hip-hop now except what i hear on the "alternative" radio, and if that's "alternative" or a-g or whatever, it still sounds like little progress has been made in what i've heard, whether it be "i'm the man, street experience" style spitting in my face boasting 'bout his bitch blah or politics on a more universal scale, and also because the musical "beats" still seem so generic, however they're flavoured or layered

(and having just heard RZA's instrumental soundtrack to 'Ghost Dog' and reflecting on it as just wordless music, again i'm left feeling "so what" ?)

mr eon: "in '96 when everybody was singing shit on hooks, the underground came with that raw '88 style... now everybody's doing this artsy fartsy emotional shit, i dont think its hip-hop"

hating on aesop rock/def jux/etc is a way of 'keeping it real,' stevem - positioning not critique

i kind of see this as the more crucial point in the argument, in that this is exactly what "nu underground" artists are up to. in what way does a new LP on [undie label] manage to critique commercial hip-hop the way the wu-tang did in 94? instead they position themselves to sell to a preconverted "true school" audience of autechre and postal service fans.

-- vahid (vahid), Tuesday, January 20, 2004 8:28 PM (3 years ago) Bookmark Link

^^ this is the shit i meant

ThaFormula.com - You know I remember when underground stations used to play gangsta shit along with B-boy shit because it was just dope hip-hop. But somehow in the last few years something changed and all of a sudden if you weren't bustin' no spaceship intergalactic lyrics, or talkin' about coffee shops or nerd shit, you weren't considered real hip-hop?

J-Zone - Now I'm not blaming these guys cause I like these groups, but I think it kind of started with the Souls of Mischief and Freestyle Fellowship shit. See, they were out to prove a point that everyone on the West Coast ain't on no gangsta shit which was cool. But then everybody after that got on some shit where it's wack to do the gangsta shit, and then after that the only people who felt L.A. was the mainstream.

ThaFormula.com - What happened Zone? How did this nerd rap make it this far?

J-Zone - It just lost its edge completely. Anything rugged is described as non hip-hop. Everybody is scared to be considered thug or scared to be considered rugged. Everybody is scared to be funny. People just want to talk about the world ending over these spaced invader ass pseudo-techno beats and it's fucking noise to me! All this shit is noise. All this fucking art fag shit is straight noise to me and it just sounds like crap. People are so busy elevating and uplifting that they forget how to entertain. Back in the day X-Clan and Public Enemy would do both, but nowadays people are so busy trying to be prophets and save the world. Everybody is wearing all this corduroy shit and it's just like all his fucking space shit!! FUCK ALL THAT BIG WORDS SHIT!! That's why I listen to what I listen to, because I don't wanna hear all that big nerd shit. I wanna hear, "In My Neighborhood" by Spice 1. That's my shit.

ThaFormula.com - What year do you think it all started to change?

J-Zone - Something happened around '95 or '96. Like Puff and Foxy Brown and them were jiggy on the East and like Death Row had mad imitators on the West. People were complaining about Mack 10 and West Side Connection with the synthesizer beats so everybody was trying to be different. I'll admit I was tired of all that shit too so you know everybody turned to the underground. The first few years you know, you had Ras Kass and Hiero on the West and in the East you had early Company Flow shit, Natural Elements and it was cool. But then like '99 and 2000 all of a sudden muthafuckas started getting way into that planet shit. They just went all the way out. That fake Afrocentric shit got in the picture. That's why when I made "Bottle of Whup Ass" that's when I first started performing to promote "Music for Tu Madre" and I was doing shows with all these people and I was like, "yo, these muthafuckas are not having fun!" I was like this shit has gotten to damn nerdy and it's like every year I've gotten more sarcastic and more of an attitude 'cause I'm like this shit is getting nerdier and nerdier. Rap was about having some kind of edge and it's like nobody has the edge. Also, there is more rappers then there is fans, that's the muthafuckin' problem. People come out trying to analyze saying shit like, "Oh, that punch line wasn't that slick." Yo, just be a fan man. You know, I'm J-Zone and I make music but I went to go see EPMD a while back cause I'm a fan and I went as a fan, not J-Zone. Nowadays it seems like your performing in front of a bunch of MC's. Muthafuckas saying, "oh, he's not saying anything intellectual." I'm like, shut the fuck up man and just enjoy the show. I don't even go to rap shows no more man, but the last one I went to, I went as a fan and I think that night at the show in L.A. a lot of people left their rhymin' hats at home. Overseas the shows are crazy 'cause muthafuckas come out to have fun. In New York, your performing for a bunch of MC's just standing there mad at the world. There's Hip-hop, and then there's all that space shit and nerd shit.

ThaFormula.com - So has that space/nerd shit spread even in New York? Because I thought it was mainly deep in L.A?

J-Zone - Oh! It's fuckin' everywhere.

ThaFormula.com - It seems to me that the commercial scene and underground scene are the same as far as brainwashing people into believing that this wack shit is dope?

J-Zone - Yeah, I tell people that the underground ain't nothing but a poor man's commercial game. It's the same shit. This nerd shit has to go, it's a disease. I think a lot of people feel this way, but they are scared to admit it. I'm not scared to admit it. I know I might disappoint a chosen few and lose some fans, but if that what it takes to get to the bigger cause, then I'm with it. I honestly feel in my heart, FUCK THIS NERD SHIT!! I don't wanna be typecast as another nerd group and if I got to lose 5 fans, that's fine. I don't want no one putting me in that group. I don't want to be compared to no nerd ass underground shit. Somebody who reviewed my first album said it's a mixture between "Amerikkas Most Wanted" and "Mr. Hood" with his own shit. I like that because KMD represents the East Coast shit that I like, and "Amerikkkas Most Wanted" represents the West Coast shit.

ThaFormula.com - There seems to be no respect for OG guys like E-40 and them from these underground kids who talk all this independent shit?

J-Zone - Those cats were paying dues in like the late 80's sellin' out the trunk. E-40 invented the independent game. How you gonna be a fan of nerd independent rap. I mean o.k. if you don't like 40 fine it's an acquired taste, but to say E-40 ain't hip-hop? If it wasn't for him none of this shit would be happening because Sick-Wit-It invented that sellin' out the trunk shit.

ThaFormula.com - How many tracks did you end up doing for Biz Markie's upcoming LP?

J-Zone - He picked a few beats, but we wound up only using one. My shit is supposed to be the single and the video. I'm not getting my hopes up 'cause I know how the game goes, but if mine still winds up being the single and video that will be a big move.

ThaFormula.com - Have you gotten any other production work because of this Biz Markie project?

J-Zone - I've spoken to a few other rappers, but some of them said they like the beats when I'm on them, but they don't want them. Then I come out with them and then they like them. No one really wants to take the risk on my production because it ain't the normal Boom-Bap shit. At the same I'm not gonna stop in my tracks because people are frontin'. That's why I have Old Maid, because I have my ideas and beats. If people ain't gonna use my shit, I'm not gonna give up and say "alright I'm just gonna sit here and wait for somebody to pick." I'm gonna keep on putting out my records on my record label, doing what I wanna do until someone comes.

ThaFormula.com - What are the upcoming projects we should be hearing you on soon?

J-Zone - The next project is my single. A new Al-Shid 12" is coming out in about 2 months. I have a Celph Titled single lined up. We're finishing that up now. I'm working on something with Louis Logic and I'm getting' back in the lab to work on some more shit. Like I wasn't thinkin' of doing another album, but lately I've been getting a lot of ideas.

ThaFormula.com - Is there gonna be an Al Shid album?

J-Zone - Were still just working on music now, but he's also doing his own things. He makes beats and he's got his own crew. But we have a new single that's done and should be out in November. I was gonna stop Rhymin', but if people keep frontin' I'ma say fuck it and just do it 'cause I mean, I'll do a beat for low money if I really feel the artist, but a lot of these people are low money and there on that nerd shit. I wanna bring back that fun shit with dope interludes. I'm ready to start pissin' people off 'cause people can't sleep on you if their mad at you. If I get people hatin' on me for a cause that I'm with, then I'm with it cause I mean this nerd shit has got to go man. I just feel like a lot of these nerd cats have never lived life. They are so busy rhymin' and being nerdy and being underground that they don't take time to live life. Go play some sports, talk to some chicks and live a muthafuckin' life. I don't think they talk to women. I don't they play sports or go out. Their whole life is hip-hop and that's just gay to me. I mean rap about something else then rap. Talk about other things man. It's alright to do a song about doin' hip-hop for the love here and there, but to have a whole album just dedicated to being a nerdy ass rapper rhymin' all that space shit that don't make no sense is wack!

I don't care if you're white black a bitch or a fucking bum off of the streets. If you rap about shooting people, smoking blunts, wearing timbs, drinking hennessy, and whatever else, I'll buy your music. If you rap about your girl, but don't call her a bitch, fuck you. If you rap about the economy and how its hurts migrant workers, fuck you. If you rap about your rap telekenisis or some equally retarded nerd shit, fuck you. That basically how I break it down to an extent.

-- dat nigga delmar, Wednesday, January 28, 2004 12:55 AM (3 years ago) Bookmark Link

Haha. Your xp got in the way of me posting that. dat nigga delmar OTM

i stole that post from sohh i think

i want that shit tatted on my fist

I haven't read the whole thread, but the Defari & J-Zone bits at the top and bottom are definitely what's up. I hate the hiphop scene here, because the only things that get championed are nerd rappers with names like Common Market and Optimus Rhyme (actually, that's a great name, but damn if I wanna listen to anyone who calls himself that) and Macklemore, who raps about his white liberal guilt, and anything that sounds like it was made by actual humans, instead of backpack-bots gets overlooked.

I haven't read the whole thread, but the Defari & J-Zone bits at the top and bottom are definitely what's up. I hate the hiphop scene here, because the only things that get championed are nerd rappers with names like Common Market and Optimus Rhyme (actually, that's a great name, but damn if I wanna listen to anyone who calls himself that) and Macklemore, who raps about his white liberal guilt. Anything that sounds like it was made by actual humans, instead of anonymous backpack-bots, gets overlooked.

if that's all you're seeing and hearing then i can see why j-zone and delmar's comments might appeal but over here they just sound like complete fucking retards.

i mean not really anymore than a whole other bunch of people making boring/predictable music but still

(oops, doublepost.)

Okay, I was serious about agreeing with one of those two. Figure out which one.

$$$$$$$$$: YEAH ME HIT IT, WHY YOU ASK? WHAT??? ME OWN MOTHER?????

Shaddup Trife

― Gear! (Gear!), Wednesday, January 21, 2004 7:14 PM (4 years ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

ahaha just listened to MACKLEMORE on his myspace rev

ahaha just listened to MACKLEMORE on his myspace rev

― is that my man hannity?? (deej), Saturday, November 22, 2008 5:49 PM Bookmark

This dude is like the most popular rapper in Seattle now. :/

ahaha just listened to MACKLEMORE on his myspace rev

― is that my man hannity?? (deej), Saturday, November 22, 2008 5:49 PM Bookmark

u_____u

haaah