Posts by Russell Brown
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Muse: The Very Odd Future According to…, in reply to Rich Lock,
I got 99 problems…..
And I'm checkin' my privilege
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Damn you Ranapia, you’ve got me going now.
Righto … in May, 1988, I went to see Public Enemy play the Electric Ballroom in London, with my friends.
It’s a small basement club and they were only playing there because the Hammersmith Odeon had responded to a media panic by canceling their booking.
The atmosphere was tense, and got really tense when Professor Griff stepped up, said “Dim the lights – I don’t want anyone to take a pot shot at me,” and delivered his “white people are wicked” speech. Knowing what I know now, it was mostly Nation of Islam UFO fucking bullshit.
To add to the flavor, my friend got mugged for his wallet. He was devastated, not least because he was discovering his Maori identity at the time, and had been relating to a lot of the empowerment rhetoric in the show. He was very let down by what happened.
But, extremely memorable gig.
I later interviewed Griff, who was then under fire for some seemingly anti-Semitic comments – again, Nation of Islam bullshit – and was surprised at how much I liked him. He was polite and serious.
Still later, we saw Public Enemy at the Brixton Academy (“we” including my elder son, in utero) and they were great. But the Guardian reviewer was fucking nuts.
Flavor snuck out on stage before they came on and urged a good-natured cheer from the waiting crowd. The Guardian reviewer described this as “Nazi-style rabble rousing”. The review went on in a similar vein. It was unbelievable.
Still later, back in NZ, I saw PE at the Powerstation. It was just a big, happy party. Afterwards, Chuck D and Jonah Lomu did a man-hug.
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Muse: The Very Odd Future According to…, in reply to Craig Young,
Rich: Yeah, it was NWA, but Tiki Tane took it up, probably because it also reflects some Maori and Pacific Island experiences and perveptions of policing practice and policy in Aotearoa/New Zealand.
And probably because it qualifies as an old-skool party jam. He was MCing a club night. not necessarily making a political broadcast.
And he had the right to freedom of expression in that context, whatever the New Zealand Police might have thought.
He had the right outside that context. He doesn't have to prove he's doing the tune in a worthy way.
Clearly, there would be a problem with actual and purposeful incitement to violence against the police or anyone else. But not everything in a pop, rock or rap tune is to be taken literally.
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Muse: The Very Odd Future According to…, in reply to Craig Young,
However, there’s a particular subgenre of such music that does have objectionable lyrics that condone violence against women, homophobic violence and intra-community gang violence. While I don’t condone or endorse its censorship, I do have the right to disapprove of its content *without* urging its censorship.
Fair enough. I also feel sad about what hip hop became when the corporations got hold of it, and I hope that Tyler, who seems to be a very talented individual, might move on from the extreme and ugly vernacular he presently favours (surely he can't stay angry at his father forever?). I personally don't want to listen to that shit.
But I don't see him as some base gangsta either.
I have no problem at all with hiphop and rap lyrics that discuss poverty, experiences of institutional racism and other forms of social injustice within their lives- including Tiki Tane’s attitude toward police officers, come to that.
I have no general problem with rap lyrics that discuss parties, money and booty either. Not every rapper has to be a sociologist.
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Muse: The Very Odd Future According to…, in reply to Keir Leslie,
Surely the hugely creepy thing is Coney’s ability to engage in censorship without any process being followed, any natural justice, any ability for people being affected by the decision to have input, etc. etc.
And there would have been input. There are smart, media aware young people in the local hip ho scene who would have been ready to argue a case. It would have been a debate worth hearing.
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Muse: The Very Odd Future According to…, in reply to Craig Young,
Does hate media result in hate crimes?
I'm not real comfortable with Odd Future being described as "hate media". The music's misanthropic and often offensive in its themes and language, but it's not the same thing as Beenieman's "coming to Jamaica to execute all the gays".
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Muse: The Very Odd Future According to…, in reply to Craig Young,
But, hey, this isn’t a positive musical genre. Wow, people of colour killing each other and doing the work of white supremacists for them…
Is this your characterisation of all hip hop?
I really hope not, because that would be a patronising, ignorant and racist thing to say.
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I confess, it's taken me too long to realise what a sweet way into town the Western Line is from Pt Chev. Baldwin Ave is a 5 min drive from where I am, and a fairly safe place to leave the car if I'm in for a big one.
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Muse: The Very Odd Future According to…, in reply to 3410,
Wouldn’t you want to find out the answer to this before describing Coney as a “self-appointed censor”, because if there was no threat, then wouldn’t she have been just exercising her right to free speech?
The decision appears to have been made as a consequence of her statements as a councillor. It's the lack of process here that concerns me.
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Speaker: Why Auckland, and New Zealand,…, in reply to Sacha,
I believe the Greens (and many public transport advocates) were pushing this before the Council very gratifyingly and publicly hopped on the bandwagon.
The Auckland Council endorsed the route almost as soon as it was constituted: how’s that bandwagon-jumping? ARTA announced it had a developed a provisional route back in March 2008. Both Banks and Brown supported it in last year’s mayoral election – and both actually voiced support for it before the Greens launched their excellent fast-track campaign in July last year.
Certainly before Labour agreed to support it. And ‘generous’ is a contrast with some of the attitudes expressed in the other direction, which we don’t need to revisit here. It was great to see the parties working together contructively at that Britomart launch event last year, alongside Heart of the City and other organisations.
Yes. I just don’t see the point in phrasing it as some sort of policy-pinching. People have been trying to get this thing done since the 1920s.