inside outside ra ra ra

i want to address a few topics that have come up within the course and also from the blog.

grime

firstly, Linus responded to one of my previous posts about grime videos. I agree that grime videos (and a lot of the lyrics) center around the image/ego of the mc. In some ways thats a broad critique of both hip - hop and grime and possibly a large amount of other non-folk musics. Even the 'so sensitive life constantly hurts' emo frontman is selling a carefully crafted cultural niche. Instead of 'my guns the shiniest/ my mags are the spiningist' its replaced by 'i even cried when sally got knifed in home and away' or something. For most mc's though how big/bad i am etc is a popular topic. I find interest in seeing how different mcs handle the topic and challenge the conventions. (eg Dizzee rascal) Shakespeare didn't invent the sonnet sequence but made a great deal of flipping it on its head from the inside.

In saying that grime has some hard work ahead to keep itself interesting and distinct
from hip-hop in terms of both sound and visual representation. Grime has been going through a bit of a low in terms of quality and output while dubstep has been enjoying its time in the lime-light. Interestingly dubsteps BPM has increased and Grimes slowed down to around the 70bpm mark. Basically a lot of whats come out recently sounds like weak hip-hop which is a bad turn. Its getting a bit far fetched but I'd be interested to have a look at how the Affect surrounding a scene changes the BPM. on the plus new albums from dizzee, kano and roll deep this year.

In terms of how the videos are looking i took what you said as a bit of a challenge. It took me ages but i eventually found a grime video where the artists don't appear in the video at all.

DISCLAIMER: plenty of people were harmed in the following images. If you dont like kind of X-rated funniest/wierdest/scariest home videos i wouldnt watch the following.



its the best video i've seen for ages. I think it is actually futuristic (future is now kinda way) that 3d drum and bass videos never reached. It seems to match the grittyness/grimyness of the beats/lyrics in the grime aesthetic. It opens up a whole lot of questions about the economy of images now that the internet is so prevalent. Its an entire video made without the director ever picking up a camera. also, because of the large anarchic streak in the internet so many of the images available still have the novelty or newness that is all but dead on tv and village 8 style movies. The only place it pops up on tv is the news. I think the video makes a comment about the kind of detachment that occurs in hyperreality where for example we had all seen multiple simulations of sept 11 in movies before it even happened. Also its quite a good visual representation of why grime is grime and not shiny-happy-people-esque. Anyway its a massive step away from the Gangster video cliche that Lupe Fiasco sums up:

"now come on everybody lets make cocaine cool - we need a few more half naked women up in the pool - and hold this mac 10 thats all covered in jewels and can you please put your titties closer to the .22's - and wheres the champagne, we need champagne now look as hard as you can with this blunt in your hand - and now hold up your chains slow motion through the flames now cue the smoke machines and the simulated rain -------- but not too loud cause the babies sleeping......"




gangster/baby image is from 50's movie called 'I killed hip-hop tryin to get rich' or something.

Minstrels

I found a video that further complicates the minstrel idea by involving issues of non-essentialist identity. This guy does actually have Jamaican parentage but couldn't look anymore white/bbc if he tried. its a dancehall soundclash some time in the 90s. I researched him a bit and he was quite a well respected 'soundbouy' in the scene. alot of people ive showed it to have a hard time believing its not a joke. Its an interesting look at how much we are effected by the visual appearance of musicians. The minstrel figure we saw in class seems (and probably is) quite ugly racism but i think with black/white Otherness its been a long history of mixed fascination and fear on both sides.

anyway introducing sir david "ramjam" rodigan:

the musical

below is a clip from dancer in the dark. i wont say to much about it but its a good clip in terms of looking at where 'escapism' is in the contemporary musical and also questions about diegetic and nondiegetic sound. I can watch the ultra violence of the grime clip above without blinking but this movie killed me. kind of an upside down view of realism or something:






all done