The points which I took away from this week’s readings play really well into the main focuses of this class, and the things that I will take away long after this class is over. The first point, highlighted in both the Bitch Media piece on Home Alive as well as the DIY chapter in Prof. Habell-Pallan’s American Sabor, is the emphasis on the do-it-yourself nature of a lot of American popular music. The second point, highlighted throughout the class, but this week in Ludwig Hurtado’s Country Music is Also Mexican Music, is the racialized history and ethnic influences of many popular genres often taken for granted.
Home Alive, the nonprofit focused on women’s self-defense, originated through punk rock and the value that the scene placed on participation and self-reliance. I thought that it was really cool that the filmmakers who documented the nonprofit followed that same DIY value, “we taught ourselves to edit and how to use a camera. Home Alive taught themselves to teach self-defense classes and we taught ourselves how to make a documentary”. I think in pop music there is often a notion of artists maintaining a super-polished aesthetic, where they have their own camera crew, film production, stylist, songwriters, along with countless others supporting them. However, it seems like a lot of these genres which now see polished, commercially successful artists originated from a similar DIY aesthetic as The Gits (as well as the DIY skills of the DJs who forged the sound of hip-hop).
The other point, which ties in to some of these preconceived notions that I had prior to this class regarding many popular genres, is the severity of the racialization of American music, often at the hands of record labels (as well as general American culture, like having ICE recruiting booths at country music festivals). We have learned of many examples of this racial (and gendered) influence and exclusion, and the issue spans from rock to hip hop to country to indie rock/punk. The piece by Hurtado was really eye-opening to me, mainly due to my previous notions of country music. It was almost like a ‘duh’ moment when the lines were drawn between Mexican rancher/cowboy culture and how that influenced the idea of the American (white) cowboy. I hope to be able to take these ‘duh’ moments and be a more aware consumer of music, and try to understand the cultural influences many genres incorporate beyond the superficial, commercial level.
Following along with Prof. Habell-Pallan’s discussion of latin influence in hip-hop in American Sabor, I wanted to check out some songs she discussed and explore the artists and their sounds while having just learned about some of their history and influences. Seeing as hip-hop originated in the Bronx in the hands of many latino DJs and MCs, I decided to listen to Big Pun, a latino rapper from the Bronx popular in the late 90s and early 2000s.
Twinz (Deep Cover 98) with Big Pun and Fat Joe stood out to me. The back-and-forth between the two was really sick, especially Big Pun’s complex rhyme patterns, “dead in the middle of Little Italy/ little did we know that we riddled some middle men that didn't do diddily”
Following along with the sampling that’s common in hip-hop, and a focus of the last few weeks of this class, I also chose the song that Big Pun samples, Dr. Dre and Snoop Dogg’s 1992 song “Deep Cover” which was also sick. It’s interesting to hear how the two pairs rap differently on the same beat. Also, Snoop Dogg has a cameo in the Big Pun 98 version which is cool. Personally, Big Pun and Fat Joe do the beat more justice, but the Dr. Dre and Snoop version iconic and the first time the two ever collabed. If the beat and the "I can feel it" sample sounds familiar, it was also sampled on Tyga's 'Dope' with Rick Ross.
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