OK, I put off clicking on your link for a while because “a sub-genre of hip-hop” immediately turned me off, hip hop being only a simulacrum of music. But I don't hear any ghetto Negro aspects to these tunes. They're more like Western music played on middle eastern instruments, a la mebbe, David Bowie or even Jimmy Page in his Eastern haze/days.
Which means I can listen to this music with some pleasure. If my assessment (of hip hop) offends you (or your readers) I offer my appy polly loggies. This means I kinda like this mix of Eastern tunes.
That being said, the photo of Miss Scarlet is pretty amazing. Thanks, Ebear!
That was Wikipedia saying that, not me, and the sub-sub genre bit was meant as a joke. FWIW, I believe hip hop was originally an attempt to draw kids away from the inner city drug and thug culture that was emerging in the 70's, but like anything the music industry gets its claws into, it became a parody of itself and flipped into promoting the very thing it set out to discourage. That's the opinion I've heard some of the early rappers express, and while the style never appealed to me, I think it did start out with a positive message. Same thing happened to rock, country, and other popular genres. Once they became commercialized they lost their original creative spark. It's that creative spark I'm looking for, not the mass appeal. Most of the artists I've featured are on the fringe of the music biz and are either self-published or are on minor 'indie' labels. You can do that today much more easily than in the pre-internet days when a band that signed to a major label often had to follow a script imposed on them by a producer whose main goal was marketing. Russia has its share of commercial pop music of course, but I'm more interested in what's happening at the margin, where a lot of creative energy is focused and the goal is to just play good music, not become rock stars.
OK, I put off clicking on your link for a while because “a sub-genre of hip-hop” immediately turned me off, hip hop being only a simulacrum of music. But I don't hear any ghetto Negro aspects to these tunes. They're more like Western music played on middle eastern instruments, a la mebbe, David Bowie or even Jimmy Page in his Eastern haze/days.
Which means I can listen to this music with some pleasure. If my assessment (of hip hop) offends you (or your readers) I offer my appy polly loggies. This means I kinda like this mix of Eastern tunes.
That being said, the photo of Miss Scarlet is pretty amazing. Thanks, Ebear!
That was Wikipedia saying that, not me, and the sub-sub genre bit was meant as a joke. FWIW, I believe hip hop was originally an attempt to draw kids away from the inner city drug and thug culture that was emerging in the 70's, but like anything the music industry gets its claws into, it became a parody of itself and flipped into promoting the very thing it set out to discourage. That's the opinion I've heard some of the early rappers express, and while the style never appealed to me, I think it did start out with a positive message. Same thing happened to rock, country, and other popular genres. Once they became commercialized they lost their original creative spark. It's that creative spark I'm looking for, not the mass appeal. Most of the artists I've featured are on the fringe of the music biz and are either self-published or are on minor 'indie' labels. You can do that today much more easily than in the pre-internet days when a band that signed to a major label often had to follow a script imposed on them by a producer whose main goal was marketing. Russia has its share of commercial pop music of course, but I'm more interested in what's happening at the margin, where a lot of creative energy is focused and the goal is to just play good music, not become rock stars.