Roots & Routes: genres
Without looking at the history it's easy to overlook some things with respect to any genre or how it came to be. As far as rap and hip hop goes, if I'm not mistaken Jamaican artist, Dj Kool Herc was the man who founded the early American genre now known as rap, having musical breaks in between. Of course rap has changed some over the decades, But Herc's style emerged from the Western & South section of Bronx, NY. Kevin Donavon, AKA, "Afrika Bambaataa" soon followed, doing something along those lines but his Rhythm influences were more funk and Western Indian as he is of Western Indian descent. His stage name was derived from a Zulu chief by a similar name in Africa whom he admired and met many years ago, not by way of his own heritage. A lot can be said about the roots of the music we listen to and how it all connects. But ask any musician worth their weight in gold, and he or she will likely tell you that Jesus was in fact the first rapper, Paganini invented shred, and Muddy Waters invented electricity!
another thought provoking topic...
Maybe the cliche actually is true: money doesn't buy you happiness. But fame doesn't necessarily mean you are "revolutionary" "great" or accomplished either. As far as monetary wealth, most people living in the U.S. are already extremely rich by comparison to people in other parts of the world. Anyone in any part of the world is unimaginably rich compared to people 200 years ago, in terms of the material luxuries they have, most of which had not even been invented 200 years ago. But all this material wealth hasn't led to any sort of mass happiness. Has it? When I see the number of exceptionally miserable "rich" people, it leads me to think that money buys them a certain comfort, but that comfort, like most other things in life, gets boring, fast. Read more....click here.
LONG ROAD: short attention spans
In order to do something truly great in terms of creative achievement, one must be able to draw attention and participation. We find more interesting people as we press on. The tasks grow larger with demands by the audience, and for what even they do not know. People have a commonality when they require more stimulation. A craving and desire to exercise the far reaches of their imagination. Artists go on to create, often without an end in mind.
the Majesticans 2.0
what is the future of music? the default answer is techno related "futuristic" sounding rythems and melodies. do musicians honestly think that? of course not. but where to go if not rehashing or combining genres to create something apparently new. if you're hearing it on the radio, it has already been done so why immitate? in the past 20 years we've watched the genres of alternative rock, gangsta rap, and r&b die out and reinvent to unsettling homages. today, rock music sounds like distorted country, country sounds like rap, and rap sounds like mother goose nursery rhymes. the innovations are happening in dark places. the "backpacking" 25-35 year old hip hop kids are more comfortable in the underground now that the internet has allowed for the scene to be profitable and interesting. the bossalaus movement is found here. the future of music is defined by groups of individuals in the tradition of label/crew identification. the expansive communication possibilities require that bands and music producers cross over and become more visible. before, 90 % of networking was handled by a label, now one can accomplish equal or greater exposure with a clever social network campaign.
