I was sitting in my Media-Management class yesterday and we were talking about the snob effect. Our teacher told a story from back in the day, when the song "Losing my Religion" by R.E.M came out. (REM are dope by the way) He said he loved that song and wanted to tell everybody else about it. There was this girl in his class, who has been a huge R.E.M fan for years, and when he told her how much he likes this song, she said she hated it... just for the fact that he liked it so much.
This is kinda what I spotted in the Hip Hop scene. It is cool to like something, as long as just a few people know it. It becomes kinda uncool to like things everybody likes, mabye because people are trying to be indivdual, I don't know. But I can't just unnderstand it.
My prime example for the Snob-Effect is Talib Kweli. Back in the Black Star and Refection Eternal days the Underground Heads were totally in love with him. I mean, Black Star and Train of Thought are 2 classics in Hip Hop History, no doubt. I think the first time I heard him was, when I copped the Reflection Eternal album, it was the album of the Month in a Hip Hop magazine and I got it shortly after christmas. I put it in the cd player and started playing some Madden 2001. The CD sounded kinda magic to me, no incredible bangers on the first listen, but the whole thing was totally different and dope. It developed to be one of my very favortie albums over the years. But I don't like it because it wasn't so popular when it came out. I like it because Kweli got dope lyrics and Hi-Tek delivered some great beats. Same with the next album, "quality" (I'm still wondering why he didn't call it "Kwelity") Dope lyrics, mostly dope beats, but somehow many people started saying he fell off, and it continued with Beautiful Struggle and Eardrum, Kweli's lyrics ans themes are just as strong as they were back in 2000, the selection of the beats kinda changed, but who would want to have beats that sound exactly like on Train of Thought, I mean, I don't. I kinda have the feeling that people were hating because they were more and more people who liked him. I mean, even if you talked to an average person, with an average music taste, this person mostly knew him. 
I hate haters, cause there hate mostly ain't really reasonable. They just love to hate. Those people must have a really boring life, I mean, I have a lot of fun, basically because I can enjoy Underground and Mainstream stuff, I don't limit myself. I'm laughing about shit other people don't think is funny, but I don't care cause I got a fun life! Back to the topic... Let's take a look at Beautiful Struggle, I mean, I love the album, there are 2 or 3 tracks that I usually skip, because I hate the beat, but the rest is just pure dopeness. He covers many themes and has a really versatile choice of beats, which is dope in my eyes! And what I really acknowledge, is the fact that he always got High Class videos! I mean they are really creative, he never had half naked video chicks running around and I'm sure he never will! On Eardum I can't even identify a bad track, I like all the beats and all the lyrics, that's why it is my album of the year. I mean, he got Pete Rock, Madlib (not the biggest fan of him but on this album his beats are dope), Just Blaze and Will.I.AM, who wants to complain about that? Will i am is always making dope beats if they aren't for the BEP or himself, lol.
And who else can feature Norah Jones, Justin Timberlake and Kanye West without losing his credibility? (I like all of em) I don't know if you hear the story about the thing with Justin Timberlake, so I will tell it real quick. Kweli met justin on a trip to Africa that Cameron Diaz organized and MTV filmed. I will qoute Kweli from an entry in his forum: "It was one of the most uplifting experiences I ever had, even though I was the only black person. Shouts out to Justin, Cameron, Jimmy Fallon and the film crew for taking 2 weeks out of hectic schedules to go to Tanzania for free and do REAL humanitarian work, not the bullshit abstract shit the starter of this post is talking about. I had been to Africa twice before, once with the Malcolm X Grassroots Movement and once with Le Nubiannes, but this was the Serenghetti, where we lived in tents amongst the lions cheetahs and hippos. You get to know people like that, and Justin was real cool. I liked a couple of records on justified, but I was not an NSync fan. He knew all about Reflection Eternal, put me up on Jeff Buckley, and I put him up on the Supernatural. 2 years later, we were working in the same studio, and he gave me a blueprint for the Nature, which he said was not making the album, but he still wanted to do something with it. I took it and made the best of it I could. I was not going to release the song until my album was leaked 2 months early. I felt as if I owed the consumer who was purchasing some bonus cuts, in case they already heard it."
People always wanna see the worst case, they say he did a track with Justin just to boost the sales, but if you think about it, isn't any feature guest kind of a try to boost sales, like a feature of Masta Ace on a track of somebody pretty unknown, isn't it the same intention? You just hope that the fans of the feature guest will buy the album too. Or is it the fact that you hung out together and you were vibing and just came up with the idea to do a track together? You can never tell, but both options are reasonable...I think Kweli's progress was really right! Building up his own label to do whatever he wants, trying to support oother artists that he likes and giving them a chance to be heard. Eardrum really seems to be his "I don't give a fuck album". I do what i wanna do, cause that is what i like. I can do a track with Norah Jones on a Madlib beat, I can make a track with Justin Timberlake about what's wrong in the world... He is REAL!
The Essence of what I wanna say is, you shouldn't care about what other people say, if you like the T.I. joint, cop it! If everybody likes Kweli, maybe it has a reason, but don't care about that, if you think it's dope, cop it! If you don't like it, don't, but don't say he sells out because he did a Track with Justin or something like that, actually blend out the fact that it's justin on the track, just listen to the melody and the words, the track is dope!
Please do me the favor and think about it! There is always a progress in music, if everything sounded like 94 today, you would complain that there is no change. Now you miss this time, but just pull out your OC album, your Big L album or your Jeru album an you are back in 94... There is really no problem. And if you got the right does go back to 2008 and bump the new Kweli, bump the Blue Scholars Joint, bump Strange Fruit Project, or bump T.I or Justin Timberlake, cause it's good music!
To close this up I will post a short video journey through Kweli's carreer.
Much love, as always, thanks for listening (reading), cause that is really rare today, people refuse to listen, cause they are "deaf"...
SoulClap
Respiration
The Blast
Get By
The Proud
Never been in love before
Listen
More or Less
17 comments:
Amen. Great Post.
Soulclap=ill as fuck! He should be running wydu not that bitch Travis. I hate the Beautiful Struggle though, but I feel Kweli's other LPs.
I agree with your points Clap, I am probably guilty of doing it myself. But not with Kweli. But in my defense I was never big on Black Star and while I liked Reflection Eternal, not to the extent that most people did.
And I love the fan mail, but I could really care less what someone who has their screen name "dakuntpounder" cares about me....but thanks for reading. And yes, it was me that allowed your comment to go through. Much love.
Soul clap- I like your write up here. But, I beg to differ one point. I don't like today's music period. I think it has evolved, if I have to call it that. I personally think it has regressed. Two examples of what I am talking about: I read an article with Daz of Dogg Pound. He said he wakes up in the morning, goes in his studio and pumps out 30 tracks before breakfast. Second: I think it was Vibe that had Lil Wayne on the cover a month or two ago and it was titled something like "The Top 100 Lil' Wayne Songs of 2007". How can quality product be out there with the guys pumping out 100's of tracks a year? Sure there are some quality artists out there. But, look at what is at the top of the charts: it is the Chicken Noodle Soup's of the world. Let me ask you this: would you rather have Amerikkka's Most Ice Cube or the "We Be Clubbin'" Cube? Even he is going back to his roots-have you heard his new song and video? Metallica, again, fans have been grumbling for years after the Black album, and they have been promising that the next album will go back to their roots. One more example; if you go see a Robert Plant concert, do you want to hear his solo stuff or his Zeppelin stuff? He got pissed and quit touring for a long time because all the fans wanted to hear Zeppelin. My point is this, I am mad that my music has turned into diluted garbage. I miss when it wasn't commercialized. I miss when I had to wait a whole month to get my rap news (when the Source would hit the newsstand). I miss when we mixtapes meant the DJ was scratching one song into the other and he wasn't screaming all over the tape. Hell, I miss cassettes! Your opinion is fine but don't tell me I would complain, cause i faint if we could go back to that time. I am an Ol Skool head til I die, Trav knows this and I think he even laughs at me cause of it. I would rather spend 2 hours searching for one more Trendz of Culture remix that I don;t have then listen to Kanye's never changing flow. Thanks for the soap box, I am going to go listen to the 80's on XM and I may even throw in EPMD's first album for good measure.
Peace,
Brian
Dope post. I am going to contact you about something else later.
Pace.
i didn't really read the entire thing, soulclap.. but what a great write-up/post idea.
you should do this more.
and i agree with travis that i've been guilty of the snob-effect-- for lack of a better term, we'll use your concept-- but i don't start to hate on an artist when they get popular.. i just seem to spend less money on them. i don't economically support them as much. not on some hater-shit, but i don't wanna buy a cd with songs that are already on the radio a lot.
don't get it twisted, i will spend money on artists that i really really really like no matter how popular they get. it's the mdeiocre ones imo that might get the cold shoulder from time to time.
for example: common gets the snob effect. he's always been a great artists and different and underground and the potential to blow but even before his success with this last one, i stopped buying his cds. i might still see a show, but i haven't bought his last 2-3 cds. yes, i dl-ed them. btw, his joint with lily allen is pretty dope, but the rhymes when he name drops the famous couples bothers the shit out of me.. like, he was reaching to get a mainstream audience, and to me, he didn't pull it off.
kanye, on the other hand, (trav and all the ye haters will kill me!!) i've spent money on this guy and will continue to. i'm just utterly impressed with his skills and progression. same with eminem.
anywy, very niepost soulclap. keep it up.
i love you man...great blog.i like the way you right your reviews and stuff. i kinda agree with brian though about the music nowadays...but hell yeah, in general its just a matter of taste. i grew up listening to too short, cube, tone loc, wu, nas,...and i still listen to that old shit cause it keeps reminding me of my teenage-years. people today grow up with the new type o hip hop (i call it hip-pop)...but in ten years they will be saying: damn i miss the good old days with my t.i.´s, lil weezy, and so on.
greetz from frankfurt,germany
dM
myspace.com/danielmiagybeats
Whoa, I'm not a Kanye hater....I loved the last album, I stuck up for it on Eric's site. And when you see my top albums of the year, you'll see that it's no hate. I think he is a jackass, but makes good music
Wow, first off, thanks for the good response! I didn't want to attack anyone with it tho... I respect anybody's musical taste. (besides techno, lol)
I might think different if I was older, but I'm just 22, I started listening to Rap 10 years ago, after the goen age. I copped most of the good albums from that time and I'm a huge fan of it too. I mean it was like every album was dope. I think there is still as much dope stuff as it was back then, it's just not that easy to find. I'm not a lil wayne fan either, haven't bought any of his stuff and I still don't know what the hype is about. And if someone records over 100 tracks in a year you can be sure the quality won't be that good. I will post my top 20 albums of 07 in the next days, so stay tuned!
hi there. great post! i'm a fan of kweli, but the beautiful struggle is not a good album. in my opinion, an album with just one producer will always sound better than an album with different producers on every track... mike
sorry for the misuse of words, trav.
but why is he a jackass?
why do people think he's arrogant and braggadocious?
aren't all rappers like that?
it's dope when a nigga talks shit and means it.
like, some earlier dudes rhymed about cribs and planes and boats and whatnot, but when hov or puff or those upper echelon guys did, it was real talk.
btw, i agree, too that if you banged out 100 songs, they can't be all dope.
but the same goes for 13 songs on an album.
also, if you go to a club and talk to 20 girls, you might hook up with more than 1. but if you got no cojones and only talk to 1-2 chicks all night, you might go home with a wrong #.
the 100 songs-- some of it gotta be practice. the 20 chicks, they can't be all dimes. some is just practice to get rid of the nerves before you get your real swerve on.
Eh, I love Talib, he uses his brain no doubt. I have always hated when people put him down by calling him to preachy or to nerdish. Give me a break, put your gun down and pick up a book. Stop listening to garbage that does not relate to your lifestlye and start learning from your music!
Eardrum and his previous albums have all been legit. I loved eardrum, i never went back on my word for that.
Reminds me of common fans, hating on him as well is not what listeners should be doing, especially if they understand the elements of hip hop.
Soulclap, best post you have done so far! Travis that other dude who called you names is just constipated. Give him a few days.
Peace!
Excellent post, and I never knew there was a video for "The Proud" but now I know!
Keep it up, this is the best post you've ever done S.C.
Yo, great write up SoulClap! I can't believe I never came across this blog before. I think you hit a nerve that everyone of us is guilty of, unintentionally or not. Let me be the first to admit... I bump that Justin Timberlake! LOL
great post
Great post.
A few things, though.
I am very much guilty of the Snob-effect, but in Kweli's case I don't think he fell off at all.
I didn't buy the albums after Quality because I preferrd him over Hi-Tek beats (old Hi-Tek, nowadays it's hit or miss, with him).
I liked the First Reflection Eternal, but Quality didn't conform to my taste. The free album with Madlib was dope, instead.
I mean, right now, Kweli > Mos Def...
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