after class. we still chill outside of class and shoot the shit about the The Time and Houston rap and whatever.

the thing he always told me regarding the sociology part of his class is that, he feels like there's about 10% of people, even today who've grown up on hip-hop as the dominant mainstream music, who understand what it really means to the people who live in the areas where it's major.

like, I did a two hour presentation on 90s hip-hop and when I got to the Bone Thugs/Three 6 Mafia stuff, these black girls were all up in arms about their satanist imagery and misogynistic lyrics. I broke it down to 'em about how this was the height of slasher flicks and people who'd grown up on that, they were imitating the entertainment they enjoyed right down to the samples, it wasn't something you were ever supposed to believe in or model yourself after, etc. etc. And he hipped a lot of people to the deep introspection in a song like Snoop Dogg's "Murder Was tha Case" which most people in the class thought was just a dope beat + flow / terrible murder celebration.

I don't know, those were my favorite classes in school, and yea I said more than once out loud "we're not really talking about the music though" but I got to go off during that presentation. Otherwise, he said we have to have THESE conversations before people can talk about the MUSIC, because if people aren't appreciating hip-hop for what it means then it really doesn't matter if they appreciate how it's made.

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"This is the streets, and I am the trap." © Jay Bilas

http://www.last.fm/user/NodimaChee
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