Collaboration Extraordinaire

This time I’ll be musing on the subject of collaborations, not the usual ‘Eminem (feat. Dr. Dre)’ fare, instead I’ll be looking at some of the more outlandish and altogether amazing combinations of artists. Unfortunately as I have zero contacts in any aspect of music, I can’t do as I’d like to do and give the stories behind the link-ups and the circumstances surrounding the ideas, but hopefully there will come a time when I can write such an article. Instead I think I’ll just have a look at some of my favourites.

For a start I think these are my top 5 unlikely collaborations:
1. Wyclef Jean & Paul Simon
2. N.A.S.A. & Tom Waits
3. Robert Plant & Alison Krauss
4. Johnny Cash & Joe Strummer
5. The Streets & Muse

It was the Wyclef/Paul Simon combination that set me to thinking about weird and wonderful collaborations. I have no idea how this would have come about and at first I thought it was just a sample of one of his songs I hadn’t heard, but after checking his website I was informed “Paul added his talents to the new Wyclef Jean single ‘Fast Car’.”. Before I actually listened to the song, I was skeptical but upon hearing it, I must admit it is one of my most played songs at the minute. I think that is probably the essence of the unlikely collaboration right there, as they are mixes of artists that on paper, should never work, but in reality the mix is often brilliantly realized. This brings up the question of who did think of this combination? It beggars belief that someone in Wyclef’s camp (maybe even the ‘clef himself) thought ‘I know what this track needs, Paul Simon!’ but whoever it was has my heartfelt thanks.

If my memory serves my correctly, it was producer T Bone Burnett who brought together Plant and Krauss for what was one of the most unexpected standout albums of the last few years (it won album of the year at the Grammys). The duo’s voices work amazingly well together, but few people would have thought of pairing the former Led Zepplin singer with bluegrass royalty Krauss. I’m a huge Alison Krauss fan, and as I didn’t really like Robert Plant’s other post-Zeppelin group Robert Plant & The Strange Sensation I couldn’t see how his voice could possibly work with hers (which has to be one of the best voices in any genre of music at present). However, yet again my fears were misplaced as under the watchful eye of Burnett, they produced an amazing bluesy album.
The Johnny Cash and Joe Strummer collaboration is a strange one, as there are a few different stories behind how it came about. One is that Johnny Cash sung his parts over the vocal Strummer recorded for his own version of the song, which appeared on the ‘Streetcore’ album with his band The Mescaleros, and certainly if it isn’t that recording, his vocals are almost identical. Another is that Cash came to England and suggested they record a duet in honour of reggae music and its greatest icon Marley. Whichever of these is true the recording is one of my favourite of Cash’s final collaborations. Their voices work well together, and while not in beautiful harmony like Plant and Krauss (as it can’t be said either had the greatest vocal ranges) their delivery of the lyrics is very poignant as these are two icons, from completely different musical worlds, celebrating the work of another huge star from an equally removed genre. The minimalist production and sparse guitar seen in much of Cash’s final work just tops off a really great recording.
The track featuring The Streets and Muse is probably my least favourite of the collaborations listed as I think it comes across as sounding slightly forced. I find the blend of Mike Skinner’s voice and his backing music hit and miss at best, and I don’t think it really works in this instance, with neither artists stamping their individuality on the track, or wholeheartedly attempting to mix their styles to create something new. Writing this has however brought to mind another unlikely union. That of Jay-Z and Linkin Park. Linkin Park are one of those bands who, mainly due to their lyrics, are pretty universally derided amongst anyone who claims to be a music connoisseur. But, whatever you think about the content of their songs, I think you’d find it hard to say they don’t make some pretty catchy riffs, just the kind of thing that would (and indeed does) sit well behind Jay-Z’s cocky delivery and lyrics. It isn’t strictly a collaboration, more of a collection of ‘mashups’ of their respective hits, yet for its complete originality (which spawned a thousand and one copycats, including, incidentally, The Streets and Muse) I believe it deserves a mention.
The final crazy combination is between elecronica serial samplers N.A.S.A. and Tom Waits (who I hope needs no introduction). I stumbled upon this on one of the excellent Now Hear This! CD’s free with The Word magazine and, after some hefty research (the band’s last.fm page) I found out that the idea behind N.A.S.A. (namely “to bring people from different worlds together through their shared inspiration and love of music”) has led them to become one of the most prolific odd collaborators. In addition to Tom Waits they have also enlisted the services of the late Ol’ Dirty Bastard, Karen O and David Byrne among others. The Tom Waits song itself is a strange affair, also featuring outlandish rapper Kool Keith, who provides the verses to Waits’ choruses.
I could go on even further about each and every one of the collaborations that have confused and delighted me. However I must know when to stop, so I’ll just say give them all a listen, love them or hate them though, I think you must agree they are all very interesting listening, especially if you are a fan of any of the artists featured.

Music in the Digital Age

I never knew how to work torrents, until i thought I'd give it a proper go earlier this week. I finally got it to work and set about downloading some albums I wanted. I'm no stranger to downloading music, I get bootlegs from a forum and download from Limewire regularly, however when the downloads started finishing from the torrents I started feeling a bit weird. For some reason I felt really guilty as if I was nicking the music (which I do on limewire without any concience problems) and not as excited about finally getting the music as I thought I would be. I think it's something to do with the ease of it and the volumes which you can download in such a short space of time. Even with Limewire there is some work involved it takes time and effort to find rare recordings and full albums but with torrents its just choose and click which cheapens the experience for me. Subsequently I now have about 8 or 9 albums on my itunes which I feel bad about having, and I think I'll have to physically buy the albums to be able to fully enjoy them, which is a strange concept to say the least.

Also I usually won't download a full album of a band's material as instead I like to get a cross-section of their whole back catalogue (say 5 or 6 songs spanning their career) then if I like them I can buy their CD. I think this is why I don't particulary like downloading from torrents or exclusivly listning to music on Spotify. Spotify is good if you want to get a feel of a lesser-known band or if you want to listen to a varied lot a music you may or may not like without it clogging up your computer (like playlists of the artists performing at an upcoming festival) but I wouldn't want that much music at my fingertips all the time. I pride myself on having built up a great collection of music on my computer and in my CD and record collection, but it has taken me quite a while. I just wouldn't appreciate it as much if I had downloaded the whole lot in a day or if it had all just been there at my fingertips to stream. Another fault of the endless resource of Spotify or the huge power of torrents is the removal of the mystery and unknown element of bands. I like nothing better than to find music from a band I love that I previously had no knowledge of, hearing a rare EP or a previously unreleased demo feels as good as finding the band in the first place. Being able to download a whole back catalogue is not appealing to me as you have it all there and there is no room for exploration of the band and the chances of you listening to it all become slimmer as you don't need to seek out the music.

I've digressed a bit from my original subject but I think the major point is that I don't like to not have to work to get the best from a band; that sounds unbelivably pretentious and self-congratulating but I really think it enhances the musical experience. Recently I've been listning to quite a lot of LPs because you can't really pick and choose like you can with Itunes and Spotify. You put the side on and listen to it all the way through, the effort involved in changing disks and tracks means you generally listen to a complete album or side, and in that way songs you maybe didn't like at the start grow on you and you don't tire out your favourite songs as they come around as regularly as the less liked ones. I've got songs on itunes I've listened to 50 times in the space of a week and now can't bear to hear and I think thats quite sad as my constant cherry-picking of my music database has led to me losing interest in a lot of great music. I believe that the availability of everything all the time in music is harming people's listning experiences as there is hardly any work involved in obtaining the music, so the sense of reward is lessened. I know some people like nothing more than to have gigabytes of music from each and every artist, leaving nothing for the future. But for now I'm done with torrenting and think I'll stick to my slow and steady build-up of a great catalogue of music.

Essay on Gangsta' Culture

As an easy restarting point for this blog I decided to recycle a university assignment I wrote erlier this year, the title of the piece is 'Explore how gangsta culture can inform us of the plight of Mexican/African-American men in contemporary America'. It is almost certainly too formally written for a normal reading audience but nevertheless, see what you think.....

Like the slave songs and early blues before it, hip hop and gangsta rap (which can be seen as the point at which gangsta culture entered the mainstream public consciousness) began in protest against the disenfranchisement and second-class living which many blacks were faced to endure in the latter part of the twentieth century. Unlike the other forms of music chronicling the trials and tribulations of the African-American people, rap took a direct stance against this, angrily opposing the circumstances in which many blacks lived instead of merely describing or lamenting them. The genre became a huge success and bought those involved in its creation (such as Grandmaster Flash, NWA and Public Enemy) huge wealth and status, and as a result the genre has come to symbolise the empowerment of African-Americans and their renewed abilities to speak out against the trials faced in their daily life, and their dissatisfaction with the inequality still endemic in US society. Along with the music came gangsta culture, the films narrating life in the inner-city ghettos and housing projects and memoirs of those involved in the lifestyle which often chronicled a life of crime and violence. They took over from the militant African-American groups such as the Black Panthers as the voice of the young black generation and, in the public consciousness bought these pro-black sentiments into the mainstream through the vehicle of popular culture. They achieved this by combining America’s mainstream sensibilities with their outspoken views on life for the average African-American citizen. In this essay I will use a number of different sources to explore the ways in which gangsta culture can inform us about the plight of minorities in America and, in particular that of African-Americans.
One of the ways in which gangsta culture (especially early-era hip hop made from the late 1980s until the mid 1990s) can be seen to educate us, the listener, about the struggle faced by African-Americans is its delivery. The majority of rap music has lyrics that are written in a first-person form, this is key as if you view rap as a chronicle of the rapper’s life or a commentary on the environment they are living in, then the rap song in a first person form becomes a diary or memoir set to music. Hip hop and rap are, like certain other key genres of music, not only products of the time but also significant accounts of the situation in a certain era, one which some argue cannot be captured by outside sources as accurately. This is very much the same approach as historians now have to the works of early artists in other genres such as Woody Guthrie, whose dust bowl ballads are now seen as important historical records of life in the time of the Great Depression. As much of early rap music was seen as a reaction to the disenfranchisement of minorities in America and the racism still prevalent in much of modern American society, it can also be viewed as protest music, again with common links to artists in other genres such as Pete Seeger, whose union ballads became a rally call for striking workers in the 1960s; like Seeger, artists such as N.W.A and Public Enemy call for action from the people and many of their lyrics contain visible anti-authority themes. Unlike many protest musicians before them however, early hip hop artists used violent and aggressive themes in their music to emphasise and underline their views.
As well as relating the struggle of African-Americans to the listener, many artists also hit back against authority and the indifference of America to their plight through calls for violence and retaliation; one example of this is in NWA’s authority-baiting Fuck Tha Police, in it Ice Cube delivers these lines: “A young nigga’ on a warpath, and when I'm finished, it's gonna’ be a bloodbath, of cops, dyin’ in LA, Yo Dre, I got somethin’ to say, fuck the police”¹. An outburst of aggression against the authorities such as this was a huge shock to mainstream American society and even more so when the album it was taken from (Straight Outta Compton, released in 1988) went platinum in the US. The success of the album and, in particular Fuck Tha Police, showed that there were many out there who identified with the statements and ideas the lyrics contained. This aggression however, shows the frustration with the conditions many African-Americans lived their lives in, and in some ways, counters the aggression and brutality of a police force in which racism was still ingrained. I believe this delivery of such subjects is, while shocking and possibly gratuitous in its violent imagery, one of the most emotive and cannot be equalled by outside sources proclaiming the ills being suffered by African-Americans. For this reason gangsta rap is very important in a historical sense and, while not always factually accurate or particularly intellectual in its delivery, there is no doubting its representation of the sentiments of the previously-unheard voices of young black males growing up in disadvantaged neighbourhoods and, as the sales of gangsta rap music shows, there are many who felt this music contained an important message.
Hip hop is a music form that is criticized and analysed almost daily on the news, as people try and blame the culture surrounding it for creating and glamorising the troubled situations it commentates on, however many rappers believe that those outside the ghettos cannot comment on the music which takes its inspiration from the struggle of growing up and living there. In response to this debate, former NWA member Ice Cube wrote the 2008 hit Gangsta Rap Made Me Do It in which he pokes fun at the notion that gangsta rap is to blame for the vices of society, in the closing section of the same song he states “for all ya niggas that don't do gangsta rap, don't get on TV talkin' about gangsta rap, ‘cause 9 times out of 10 you don't know the fuck you're talkin' about”². This sentiment is echoed in the lyrics of many other rap songs and shows that those who grew up in the inner-city ghettos feel that they are the only ones who can talk with authority on the lifestyle they experienced and the plight of those living in such areas. This is again backed up by the use of the first person narrative I previously mentioned.
Another important aspect of black society that gangsta culture reveals is the emergence of the voices of the previously marginalised black youth. Before the surfacing of gangsta culture as a mainstream cultural phenomenon, young blacks were disenfranchised and their views were somewhat unheard in popular culture; Bakari Kitwana, author of The Hip Hop Generation underlines the lack of young black voices in the mainstream: “It is difficult now to imagine Black youth as a nearly invisible entity in American popular culture. But in those days [pre 1908s] that was the case. When young blacks were visible, it was mostly during the six o’clock evening news reports of crime in urban America”.³ However gangsta culture went some lengths to changing this as hip hop artists and other exponents of gangsta ideals made their own opportunities to express their opinions on a range of topic that affected them, including the conservative white mindset which branded the majority of young black men criminals and, in some cases, second-class citizens. As well as documenting the lives many young black males lead in American inner-city ghettos, many outlets of gangsta culture offer explanations for aspects of these neighbourhoods.
Seminal ‘hood movie’ Menace II Society (1993) shows the inescapable culture of violence and crime that surrounds many disadvantaged black youths through the protagonist Caine’s struggle to resist becoming part of the violence endemic in the world he inhabits. The film was marketed as a very shocking account of life as it really is in the ghettos of Los Angeles; as the film’s tagline “This is the truth. This is what’s real.”⁴ emphasises. The film’s aim was to accurately portray the day to day struggle faced by young black Americans in districts such as the Watts district of LA and draw people’s attention to many of the troubles faced by those who live in these areas in real life. The brutal reality was shocking to many at the time the film was released. The final scene of the film in which Caine is killed in a drive by shooting in retaliation for an attack he perpetrates earlier in the film, comments on the futility of striving for peace in such environments, and in some respects allays the blame of violence among young African-Americans as a product of the society they are raised in.
Hip hop too deals with this aspect and goes some ways to offering explanations for the causes of unrest in black ghettos and the problems many would have associated with young black males through mainstream news coverage. In Tupac Shakur’s lament to modern society, Changes, he says “I'm tired of bein' poor & even worse I'm black, my stomach hurts so I'm lookin' for a purse to snatch”.⁵ this particular lyric captures a previously unheard viewpoint on an issue that many would already have been aware of. This shows another way in which the outlets of gangsta culture can help to better inform mainstream America of the troubles faced by African-Americans as it allows them to tell their own side of story and so people are no longer compelled to judge after hearing only one theory on the causes of problems (in this case violence and crime) in black districts.
Like the Menace II Society’s aforementioned proclamation that its depiction of ghetto lifestyle was ‘the truth’, many hip hop artists have also claimed their representation of the struggles faced by young black men and the reasons behind such trials are also the truth, and they discredit the mainstream views of black predisposition to violence and crime. Former NWA member and group leader Eazy-E explains: “We’re telling the real story of what it’s like living in places like Compton. We’re giving [the fans] reality. We’re like reporters. We give them the truth. People who we come from hear so many lies that the truth stands out like a sore thumb”.⁶
This claim is disputed as some claim hip hop artists and other exponents of gangsta culture sensationalise and fictionalise their experiences and economic gain. It is clear that since gangsta culture’s emergence into America’s mainstream consciousness it has been under much scrutiny from sections of American society, perhaps most of all by black activists who, in the beginning felt it backed up many of their sentiments. Many see it unsuitable merely for its lyrical content, and with much modern hip hop and gangsta cinema mainly concerned with feeding the ego of those producing it (50 Cent’s film and game franchise being the perfect example) or discrediting other rappers on the scene, it is clear the motivations behind hip hop and other areas of gangsta culture are changing. Chris Rock speaks about this transition in his stand up routine “In the old days it was easy to defend rap music, it was easy to defend it on an intellectual level, you could break it down intellectually why Grandmaster Flash was art, why Run DMC was art...but its hard to defend I’ve Got Hoes in Different Area Codes, its hard to defend Move Bitch, Get Out the Way”⁷. Although Rock uses this for comedic effect, the point raised is still valid: has rap lost the ability to comment socially and intellectually on issues relating to young black males in America? I believe the answer to this is no, although the amount of songs that contain lyrics that can be taken as accurate representations of the lives of normal African-Americans have significantly declined in recent years.
Rappers such as Common and Ice Cube are still producing material with a series message relating to the plight of young black males in modern day America. This is perhaps less the case with films, as the majority of new releases such as 50 Cent’s biopic Get Rich or Die Tryin’ (2005) use themes of poverty and disadvantage merely as fuel for the star vehicle rags to riches story. Despite its lack of relevance to the plight of African-American males, I feel the new wave of gangsta culture is still able to educate us on aspirations and dreams of many young blacks.
Overall I believe that there are a number of different ways in which gangsta culture has helped to inform us (outsiders to African-American culture and society) about the plight of African/American males and other minorities in the US. One of the key aspects it brings with it is the ability to give young black males a voice. Before gangsta culture many were disenfranchised and unrepresented in both popular culture and the American social consciousness. However the mainstream success of many products of gangsta culture (such as hip hop or hood films) mean that the views and experiences of young black males are now much more noticed in society. As previously mentioned hip hop is also important as it documents the experiences of a generation, that otherwise may not have been able to record such aspects of their lives and again the mainstream success of the culture helps to broaden the awareness of a lifestyle and culture than mainstream American society may not otherwise have known. A by-product of giving African-American’s a voice in the consciousness of America is their new ability to identify the problems they face and publicly voice their dissatisfactions, enabling those removed from their particular society to understand the causes of things they may before have passed judgement on, despite being ignorant of the facts. Although there are some criticisms directed towards modern gangsta culture especially, as it can be seen to have lost the serious message of early hip hop. However the continued popularity of this new brand of gangsta culture, with its self-promotion, gratuitous violence and womanising shows the changing psych of the new young black generation. I believe all of these aspects contribute to one major function of gangsta music and that is education. From City of Quartz and Boys N the Hood to Bitches Ain’t Shit, every product of gangsta culture helps to show the many complex aspects of the lives of young black males in America and through this we can better see their troubles and successes, aspirations and fears. As Bakari Kitwana, author of The Hip Hop Generation writes: “Collectively, hip-hop-generation writers, artists, filmmakers, activists, and scholars... laid the foundation for understanding of our generation’s worldview”. ³





¹N.W.A. (Ice Cube, MC Ren, Eazy-E), “Fuck Tha Police”, Straight Outta Compton (Priority/Ruthless, 1988)
²Ice Cube, “Gangsta Rap Made Me Do It”, Raw Footage, (Lench Mob, 2008)
³Bakari Kitwana, The Hip Hop Generation: Young Blacks and the Crisis in African-American Culture, (Civitas, New York, 2002) p. 196
⁴Anon, “Menace II Society”, The Internet Movie Database, http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0107554/ (13 May 2009, PM)
⁵Tupac Shakur (Tupac Shakur, Bruce Hornsby), “Changes”, Greatest Hits (Death Row, 1998)
⁶Eazy-E (quote found in) Mike Davis, City of Quartz, (Random House, New York, 1990) p. 86
⁷Chris Rock, Never Scared (Warner, 2005)

Back

Alright anyone out there who is reading this, this was a sweet ass blog for 2 whole posts but then me and Cheryl sacked it off. Now I'm back with a vengence so I facy posting some stuff on here. If anyone wants to help me write stuff or even suggest stuff for me to research and write on, then just contact me however you can on here or email me at bigeyesam@hotmail.com
Stay sweet x

Compression - The Loudness War.

I first heard of compression a few weeks ago now, while reading an interview in Stylus with 65daysofstatic front man Joe Shrewsbury and since then, it’s been something I haven’t been able to get out of my mind every time I listen to a CD.

Compression is a form of music production which alters the overall sound of a record to make it a lot louder. In a nutshell, the idea is to squash down the crescendos and boost the quieter troughs, to create an even level of sound, which can then be boosted up to a louder volume. This is because every band on the radio is aiming to be the loudest band out there so their song will stand out above all the rest. A band wanting to stand out isn’t exactly a new development though; I mean what band doesn’t want that? But compression isn’t the best way to be going about it. With entering into this ‘loudness war’ the songs end up losing all the depth and quality they started out with and as a result, all their individuality and heart. And isn’t that the reason bands form in the first place? To create something uniquely them that they can be proud of, not something that will conform to earn them the most money or radio play.

Compression may be useful for the radio and iPods, but music was initially made to be heard live and loud, listening to the intricate details and distinguishing different instruments and sounds, not mashing it all up into one. Hearing all the different frequencies and the guitars fading off into the back as the drums kick in, not the mention the anticipation of a good build up and the buzz felt when the climax of a song kicks in.

So when I had researched this technique, my first port of call was to listen again to ‘The Destruction of Small Ideas’ the latest album from much loved post rock band 65daysofstatic, which completely went against this idea of mastering with compression. And, listening to it at full deafening volume, you hear the quality and beauty of the sound return, and it reminds you what music, no matter the genre, could and should sound like.

If you want to read the Stylus interview you can find that here:
http://www.stylusmagazine.com/articles/interview/65daysofstatic.htm

Or, for you technoheads out there, a more in-depth article on compression can be found here:
http://www.stylusmagazine.com/articles/weekly_article/imperfect-sound-forever.htm