Can we still call it music?

I’d like to think I have eclectic taste in music as much as anything else in my life but I can’t help but feel disappointed with the quality of music these days. I’d love to believe that it’s just one of those things that happen when something becomes popularized but with my obsession with accountability, I refuse to let them off the hook.

My personal beef is with Hip-hop. Like many people around my age, I vividly remember when the genre was in its infancy. Rebel music. A sub-culture. Meaningful. Thought provoking. Reflective of a section of society rarely seen or spoken of. Representative of….something.

But like most genres, when businesses found that there was money to be made, the quality of music took a sharp turn downward. Sadly, overnight the songs went from describing social ills to “superman that hoe”. Honestly, as much as I detest the idea of “gangsta rap”, at least it was (for the most part) was representative of something.

Though the allowed glorification of selling drugs and murder have seriously hurt the genre, so has the meaningless objectification of women. Now, don’t get me wrong. Hip-hop was never meant to be warm and fuzzy music. It was meant to be a constructive way to describe the pain, anger and misfortunes of America’s socio-economic lower class. But at what point is enough, enough? When can we expect the B.S. to be taken out?

Hip-hop was not the first and will not be the only genre to have a watered down product mainstreamed. However, when a genre becomes a corporate money making medium can we still call it music? Yes, I know technically it is. But, I mean in the metaphorical sense. When the soul of the music is taken away and replaced with a ‘winning formula’ is it still music? Or better is it still a musical intellectual property? Those who produce the music knows what will sell and for what reasons. Exploitation of that fact and the replication of it, produces major profits but nothing inspiring.

I’ll enjoy the day when the B.S. can be pulled out of the music. Whether or not I’ll live to see the day is another matter. I know Hip-hop detractors will read this and say, “well it’s a bad genre to begin with”. However, much like poetry or spoken-word, Hip-hop can be a wonderfully metaphoric, thought provoking genre once again; if we let it.

This all comes inspired by something MC Lyte said on VH1 recently about Hip-hop and its treatment of women, “support the music that supports you”. Truer words were never spoken.