"I Ain't Dead, I'm Just Mackin'..."

okay, so i was reading the Davey D blog post about rap juggernaut Nas' new plate Hip Hop Is Dead which also discussed whether or not hip hop is, in fact, dead... so this is my response. my opinion on the issue is pretty adamant (as you'll see), but please feel free to respond...

"this record is fresh, but hip hop is not dead, dying, or whatever. it's popular right now for people spoiled by easy-access to good hip hop videos and music to say it is.
so, as usual, it takes a couple years for some mainstream cat to say what underground niggas have been sayin' all along... and now that nas and jay-z are saying hip hop is dead, i'm gonna hafta have this conversation (again...) with late comers... this is really all just proof that hip hop isn't dead...

on the other hand, some things are dead that make you FEEL like hip hop is dead:

YO! MTV RAPS IS DEAD: and with it, the movement for fair, balanced, varied representation of what's happening in hip hop. now with multimillion dollar videos, payola, and other assorted CORPORATE crap influencing rap shows, the possibility of a show like it (and the once-great competitor, Rap City) that really programs based on a love for hip hop, not the mighty dollar, is dead.

RADIO IS DEAD: but that's like saying "concrete is dead"... if you are depending on CORPORATE- controlled radio to tell you what's going on in hip hop, not only are you stupid, you're also lazy, and hopelessly out of touch. if you are one of the lucky few that live in a city where your radio stations are run by people who truly love the culture and care about promoting good music, you probably KNOW hip hop isn't dead. the rest of us just need to stop listening to the radio. now, i hear there is some hope in the form of satellite radio, but i refuse to pay for radio... the internet does the job just fine for me...

BIGGIE AND TUPAC ARE DEAD: so stop trying to crown somebody "king of hip hop", "the south" "new york" or anything else... while it's fun to argue over who the greatest rappers are, it actually is kind of stupid to believe in these titles.
case in point, LL Cool J (a rapper with more staying power than any emcee i've ever seen, and just as much right to the title...) was on Letterman promoting his album G.O.A.T. (which stands for "greatest of all time") a few years back, and chuckled when Dave asked him if he really thought he was the greatest rapper ever. "Naw man... rappers don't take this stuff that serious..." seems we can all learn a lesson from the original todd...

hip hop fans need to stop trying to be on the bandwagon of whatever/whoever is hot and just support the rappers they like. if we spent time looking for and supporting good music instead of crying because the radio/video shows don't do hip hop right (i grew up on hip hop with very little support from the radio, crybabies!), no one would even think to blog on this topic.

maybe Nas should have called his album Hip Hop Is Corporate, or Hip Hop Is Vulgar,or Hip Hop Is Producing Crap or Hip Hop Is Not A Valid Career Path, So Some Of You Need To Stop Rapping or some other such title... but it's a pretty good record, either way.

holla!
samax.