disgusting sex drums

Christ, you people wanna be retards without the unwelcome intrusion of people you talk shit about, then be retards on IM.

Trife have you heard the new Xzibit? As polished Dre-funk-commercial as he gets, it makes a pretty good case for new roughness.

simon, how dare you?? i'll have you know i listened to the whole of the last track.

anyway, track 6 contains the line "in bizarro world where co flow is the new pop sensation", so maybe you're right after all, simon!!

...

track 13: "i've been nastiest one since birth." where were nas's lawyers that day? "as i flow fluently"...um...uh...um...

(ahahahahahahahahahahahahaha)

Anyway, the new thing is the whoo-whoo theremin from Brandy's "Full Moon" which is also on the new 112.

if it's a legit question, the answer is zero.

time heals all wounds, tom.

(kinda like the police in respect of punk, or something, i don't know)

(ie i'm not sure that "mainstream" is any clearer than "indie" or "avant-garde": they're all terms borrowed from prior contexts, where not all the details apply => yet the details are where the argument is, resolutuion of which is why the analogies are being drawn)

mark, i don't exactly know how high nwa charted, but i doubt it was high enough to really make any sort of dent in the public consciousness. (meaning: my mom [and i at age 12] knew about "ice ice baby" and "u can't touch this", but didn't know about "fuck the police" except for maybe some quick soundbite on the newz.) a year or two later i saw the video for "express yourself" on yo mtv raps at like 1 am and it freaked the living fuck outta me.

was naughty by nature 1990 or 1991?

anyway that's problem: does mainstream rap mean THE MAINSTREAM OF RAP or RAP FOR THE MAINSTREAM?

(she also didn't know what purple rain was. sigh.)

it wasn't just the charts but also the whole debate abt protecting yer child (the parent guidance stickers) from listening to this stuff. there was also a court case here in the UK abt whether their first alb should be banned or not (as i recall).

But the thing that drives emotions so high about this one is that its always mis-cast about some sort of race and class and personal issue rather than a simple matter of aesthetics. To say that undie hip-hop is somehow there for the ears of white kids is to pretend that white kids aren't out there buying millions of Jay-Z and Busta Rhymes and Nelly records (or do they "not count" because they're actually mainstream? -- how indie would that be!): the point is that the undie stuff appeals to a certain type of kid, a kid who buys into all the rhetoric of "serious" "intellectualism" that has mainly been the province of indie -- and yes, that kid is usually white and middle-class, but isn't that sort of a separate issue entirely?

PS: except for Nitsuh's post that he inserted before I managed to post this, which is ace.

Besides, at least one of the examples you use works just as well for indie: a big part of undie fetishizes the "old-school" four elements -- a big part of indie fetishizes sixties-style guitar-pop, but that hasn't stopped its fans thinking its more clever than what's on the radio. Looking at "sound" isn't as helpful as it should be in figuring out how it's going to "feel" to people, and the fact is that even the most regressive "undie" stuff feels more clever and intelligent and special to the people who like it than the stuff that sells loads.

(Maybe that something is the feeling of cleverness - that strikes me as a rubbish reason for listening to music, though, so I'm not sure that's it, because I don't actually think that underground rap fans are stupid or misled or suffering false consciousness or anything like that.)

Blast from the past! This debate from 2-and-a-half years ago, in pre-ILM days (gasp as you see how ILM postahs have shifted!)

http://www.netcomuk.co.uk/~tewing/2000_04_02_singlesa.html
http://www.netcomuk.co.uk/~tewing/2000_04_09_singlesa.html

And I think something quite related actually is true, only it's a matter of foregrounding: the undie stuff is earnest and showy about its "intellect" or "progression," while the mainstream stuff I know of that has it is stuff at-face about banging beats and rocking crowds. Which is to say: it can be not-about which one has it, but about which one flauts it, which one makes it its surface-level raison.

Anyway if you want to get at the thing that's the real defining line that loads of people are scared to talk earnestly about, it's this: lyrics. Lyrics lyrics lyrics. Loads of people, white and black, find the lyrical personas of mainstream rappers really off-putting and not-likeable -- which is doubly important when thinking about the traditionalist "undie" groups (J5, or the Roots, or whomever) -- and saying that the "conscious" lyrics of Blackalicious are more "intelligent" than a lot of mainstream MCs isn't particular different from having said that Replacement lyrics were more "meaningful" and "intelligent" than "Talk Dirty to Me" or "Cherry Pie." Some people say that out loud, although they usually sound stupid because they couch it in dismissive generalizations about how all hip-hop is about "money and hos." Some people don't say it out loud, because they're afraid to sound like prudish Christian rock fans offput by "actual" rock music.

Just speaking for myself, I'm ridiculously open-minded about beats and production -- I don't care if you use samplers or MIDI synths or a fuckin' Speak-and-Spell -- if it bumps or swaggers or envelops you in sinister ambience then yay. Ask me who's better, El-P or the Neptunes, and I'll stare at you blankly and shrug 'cos I really can't choose either way. But I pay too much attention to lyrics and voices, and while I consider the "Grindin'" beat to be possibly the most mindblowing thing to be happening in popular music right now the subject matter is something I don't really have much appreciation for (you sell crack? Well get the fuck out of my neighborhood).

Idea: if the "put a pop/rap vocal on a rock track" school of bootlegging is getting tired, then get some Mos Def and Aesop Rock acapellas and drop 'em over Timbaland/Neptunes instrumentals or something.

okay, i think this whole thing, in the end, comes down to three main "types":

type a: prefers the evolution of the elements of hiphop via the petri dish of engaging with popular culture at large, the steps forward made by engaging with a dancefloor audience (anyone who denies the importance of a hiphop song in a club is being irredeemably rockist, and that seems to be most people on ilm who can't deal with anything other than dance music in a club format [barring pointless "eclectic" dj sets or the dreaded "indie disco"], the whole scenius vs. genius debate, who feel that underground hiphop - despite the sonic inventiveness, lyrical dexterity, whatevah - is contributing nothing to this progression.

type b: argues against the commercialization of hiphop, engages with a musical style that - to paraphrase sasha frere-jones again - was previously required to provide funk, talk charming shit in unison, discuss trousers (as opposed to providing semi-funk, talk ugly philosophy alone, discuss watches aka now) as a gnostic sect, a series of rites, recieved history, and "appropriate" behavior. not unlike, in it's way, US hardcore.

type c: sez, fuggit, there's little to no difference between the two, between "backpacker" and "charthop", the two are equally valid, complement rather than contradict each other, etc.

none of these three types are completely right (in much the same way none of them are completely wrong), but each refuses to admit this. MOST people on these two threads (yes, including myself and simon) fall into some nether region between the three, but closest to c.

the hardcore analogy is apt, i think; i'm not the first person to make it obviously (simon reynolds, frere-jones, and peter shapiro in discussing def jux have all made it.) hardcore is - by and large, today and yesterday - a music which DEVOUTLY (religious metaphors and language are hard to avoid here) avoids engaging with the mainstream (even when "avant-garde work requires the survival of the order it first flared against, or its full radicalism no longer properly registers"). yet, ostensibly, hardcore is the only genre which evolved rock into the 80s and 90s: post-punk, noise, post-metalcorewhatever. these are small increments, yes, and it makes no bones about not attempting chart success in any way.

maybe this is why rock is "dead" from a mainstream pov; new ideas are purposefully cut off from the center, content on the margins, so old themes-ideas continually get recycled until it all bloats up and shits blood. which is what, i think, a lot of chart rap fans are wary of happening to hiphop as well - a music who's cultural and artistic value is not yet exhausted - when the jermiahs on the sidelines are constantly predicting it's bloated, encroaching on 30 years demise. it's a forest for the trees thing, except i can't work out which is which.

(i realize this has been said, in one form or portion or another, throughout this thread. i just needed to codify it for myself.)

I'm not sure why Vanilla Ice should expect respect from anyone, even though I think "Ice Ice Baby" was pretty good.

THE MEMORIES!

Who besides 3rd Bass ever dissed Hammer on a record?

Didn't the DOC make fun of him in a video? "Mallet! MALLET!"

i hate el-p because he's got the flow of a constipated turtle, all random sputterings and farts until it finally loosens and he spews in all directions with little regard to the toilet bowl of my ears.-Jess

I agree completely, and that's why I love his rapping! I'm always confused by this antipathy to El-P's rapping as if he's doing this pretentious grad-school thing on funcrusher (and especially on FanDam on which I think his rapping is perfect) but really i love the off-the-wall ridiculousness of it. i can't really listen to funcrusher all the way thru but i'd say about 3/4ths of it is fantastic. My good friend likes his rapping too - he also likes fucking ma$e for christsakes. El-P's rapping is fun and I enjoy it and I found Jess and simon's smarm pretty off-putting even though i undoubtedly have v. similar taste to Jess when it comes to hip-hop.

i was searching ilx for the word "disgusting" and this thread popped up. i tried to read/understand it, but there is too much backstory that I don't know -- it's completely impenetrable. in one way, that is very pleasing to me. in another way, it's infuriating. but who cares because "disgusting sex drums" is the best thread title of all time.

three of my favorite things

that's why i clicked on it, but i didn't understand what was going on at all -- 11 years ago? dang. then one post from deej in 2004?
"disgusting sex drums" deserves better

someone on fb just posted a link to this

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-nwNqLr3_3g

i was searching ilx for the word "disgusting" and this thread popped up. i tried to read/understand it, but there is too much backstory that I don't know -- it's completely impenetrable. in one way, that is very pleasing to me. in another way, it's infuriating. but who cares because "disgusting sex drums" is the best thread title of all time.

― mambo jumbo (La Lechera), Friday, 31 January 2014 06:04 (20 minutes ago) Permalink

this perfectly sums up all of the thoughts I had when I saw the thread title and then opened the thread

what the guy playing the bass drum is doing is kinda hemiola-like

I just discovered whatever this style of music is on youtube (electro chaabi or something?) and I think this video fits the thread title:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7KVmuLj0X1k

totally disgusting
that dude is awesome

also obviously i need to follow the alan lomax archive youtube feed
whoa

here's another that I found down the same youtube hole

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7Cu40iWLOho