Point Blank - Raised In The Ghetto

Showing some love to Tilt Rock, youknowtheygotsoul!

YouTube Link To Official Vid

VH1 Hip Hop Honors 2008

The usually disorganized chaos that is a VH1 show rang true on Monday night television with the VH1’s Hip Hop Honors 2008. I guess they were trying to say that they knew the time since they didn’t get played on prime time, airing at 10pm Eastern, but with Flavor Flav announcing the honoree who had just been on stage, at least twice, it became quite clear that they really didn’t know what time it was, let alone what time it is.

But really, who cares about post production when you have a list as long on legends like HHH has.

The Honorees

Cypress Hill
De La Soul
Naughty By Nature
Slick Rick
Too $hort

Performers

Wyclef Jean
Kid Rock
Lil Jon
Big Boi
Ghostface Killah
MC Lyte
Bun B
Biz Markie
Q-Tip
Scarface
Busta Rhymes
Cee-Lo
PE in almost full effect aka Public Enemy - “Mista Chuck” D & Flavor Flav
Estelle
EPMD
Fat Joe
Gym Class Heroes
Jim Jones
Juelz Santana
Mack 10

and…

Luther “Luke” Campbell
“The Queen” Latifah
Eve
Joy Bryant

Hosted by “$2 gets you to all the Boroughs” Tracey Morgan

There is no greater honor than being sent up by your peers. If having Fat Joe and Busta coming out in full Cypress and Ricky D. styles wasn’t enough, there was a full on tribute to Isaac Hayes, in true hip hop form. With a list like the one that Hip Hop Honors delivers, it’s tough to separate the best from the best, but I have to say that Fat Joe’s send up of Cypress Hill in particular stole the show, and Lyte’s flow is always unstoppable. It was also great to see PE and EPMD… ah hell, it was great to see hip hop on TV period.

It’s really too bad that any cats outside the US are blocked from watching the video clips on VH1, I mean really.  Just who do the corporate legal suits think they’re kidding… the cool kids know proxies.

Oh and, why did VH1 make De La rap Me Myself & I?

Plug 1… Plug 2… Don’t they know that they hate that song??? I mean, they really do hate performing it, and it shows. I feel for them everytime they struggle through it. I mean, if they are being honored, then let them choose a damn song that they love and want to do. You corporate types better lay off the “remember when” crack pipe. Hip Hop needs to breathe. The only thing that lives in a vacuum is dust. and mites. and Aunt Beatrice’s nose pickins.

Madvillain - Rhinestone Cowboy 

Dig.

Back in the Day, it was fairly easy to pick out the “sellouts” and artists that were commercial yet lacked any real talent. It was, for the most part, mutually agreeable upon whom to give the gas face too, and who was safe from such disrespect. Back in the Day, artists like Hammer and Vanilla Ice, though able to run arena shows, couldn’t get any props from any block within the city limits of any said arena they played. Back in the day sold out shows didn’t equal street cred, in fact the opposite was true. Now, I don’t remember if these cats actually had sold out shows at arenas or not, but for the sake of my argument, I am assuming they did. What is true is that even in nice Toronto, you were asking for trouble if you wore a Hammer t-shirt. Now that’s a great story involving HDV that I’ll save for another time.

These days, it isn’t always so easy to draw these type of lines. Most definitely, it is still true that a large proportion of talented Recording Artists get dissed by the majors, even cats who have a catalogue are shown the door or encounter closed doors. It seems to be getting worse with these labels becoming super labels and then mega labels in turn. The media is even spinning types like Vanilla Ice as talented from their generation, as media seems bent on being history revisionists for the masses, makes me wonder who’s controlling the ropes.

However these days, an artist or song will receive some commercial success and it isn’t wack, sometimes these songs are really good. Also, however these days, is the fact that the rap loving public isn’t so polarized, so an artist may be hot to some while others would disagree. So while the same radio stations play the same songs and artists, a new dichotomy has emerged. Rap music no longer has a single voice. Gone are the days of lamenting for real success, as in when will hip hop go from underground and be welcomed by mainstream, and this has been replaced by who can bang out the dopest track the fastest. Hip hop has gone mainstream and a second reactionary underground has emerged. The new underground is diehard and unlike the old one, the underground loving public’s voice completely rejects anything that smells of pop.

So this new underground voice may have the same slogans as before, and in fact use the same slogans as before, but the difference is, the old underground disseminated what was and what wasn’t, and wanted in. The new underground disseminates what is and isn’t and is radically entrenched on the edge, completely rejecting the idea of welcoming the establishment.

So here we are, I’ll use a very specific example, 50 Cent. This guy was underground, has street cred (no, I’m not talking about the drug type of street cred) and went pop. He is hated and loved. Does he have banging tracks? Some will say yes and some will say no. The iconic-in-their-ability-to-polarize Hammers and Vanillas have long gone but the public sentiment of villian still remains. This sentiment even affects groups like Public Enemy. Artists that have stayed true have their share of haters, in modern times. So are we in an age of hate? Not exactly.

It’s just harder to spot the villians.

Years ago, I had my list of all time rap records. At the time it was a list of albums, and I’m sure Tribe was on there, BDP, etc. but over the years I have forgotten who exactly was on my list. This is because I had one of those moments, one of those moments where you realize your philosophy was wick-wick-wack, definitely an eye opening experience if you will.

Back then I was working at a well known place inside a well known stadium (which recently had a name change). The names don’t matter, but what matters is that I had come in that day, excited to tell my co-worker my epiphany, for I had just made my list of the best of the best, and I felt it was comprised of strong selections, Rap Music’s “Must Haves”.

My friend is one of those types, a fellow person who digs the music, you know the ones, you meet them everywhere, and you have that feeling, that shared experience of the love for the music, you don’t have to speak it.

So, after many discussions about hip hop, I related my list to him, and he smiled and nodded at each and every one that I spoke of that day. What he said afterward has affected me to this day, and I live by these words.

Today I can’t remember exactly, word for word, what was said. I live it now, it is a part of me. Essentially, the words were this: You cannot name the “Best of the Best” because the “Best of the Best” is still to come. In other words, don’t make your top 10 list just yet, because the history of the music is still being written.

Now, this was well before the “Hip Hop Is Dead” ideology that’s going around today; we’re talking early nineties here. However, the philosophy of a living, breathing culture still exists, you just have to find it, and find it within yourself.

Now that is something you can share.