Welcome to Through the Photographers Lens,
In this week’s post I thought I share a rather interesting trend I’ve noticed and wanted to know if I am the only one to notice it. “Cookie Cutter Rappers!”
In the last few years I have been contracted to shoot album/mix tape covers, posters and “Red Carpet” events that featured some of your favorite rappers and many you don’t know. I was cleaning and archiving some of my photos from the past to keep things fresh and clean in my office and I noticed all of the rappers seemed a little too similar. So much so that I found myself filing a couple of them in the wrong folders because they looked so much alike. I then went back through the work I had already done to make sure that I had not made the same mistake more than once. In clicking through the photos I saw the same thing over and over again. Sagging pants below the reason (we all know how I feel about that), $200+ T-shirts, horrendously expensive sneakers, fitted hats, the same 10 tattoos (you know them all), dental applications (Grills) and the belly button length chain (reminiscent of those of the early 70’s) with shiny ornament dangling from the end.
I feel the need to clear something up at this point. I have nothing against owning nice things and trust me I have done enough interviews with artists and I have heard the same excuses for the purchase of such things. One of my favorite answers was “I buy all the gold and diamonds to replace the chains of oppression heaped on my forefathers heads.” I am not even going to go into neither the whole blood diamond nor the ecological ramifications of strip-mining for gold and platinum. And I will bite my lip in an effort to not speak on the murder and modern slavery that is going on today to acquire these minerals (these are fodder for future articles). I do however want to address one answer I keep getting when I ask the question, “Why spend these huge amounts on things that will only depreciate in a short amount of time when you could change lives FOREVER with those same amounts?” The answer I get more so than any is “this is how I express who I am and my individual tastes… I am different from all the other rappers because…” Sadly, I have to admit when I hear this preamble, stop listening or start mouthing the words because I have heard them so many times.
I remember when hip-hop started, you heard The Sugar Hill Gang and you knew you were listening to the Sugar Hill Gang and not Grand Master Flash and the Furious Five. You knew that Run-DMC was the “King of Rock” and you didn’t question it. LL Cool J “Rocked the Bells” and the dance floor flooded with party goers who didn’t want to hold up the walls and nurse drinks until a fight broke out. Stevie Wonder said “I wish those days could come back once more cause I loved them so!” AMEN Brother!!!
We now live in a world, and maybe I am just showing my age, where I turned on the radio in my car (a rarity indeed) and couldn’t tell if I was listening to Lil Wayne or Drake or any of the other sound/look-a-like’s. It seems like the only thing that is getting played these days has to fit into a very narrow marketing formula and not true individuality. God forbid you learn something from a rapper about current events and /or history that is verifiable other than they have been wearing Louis Vuitton since the early days of slinging rock in the PJ’s. Now we’re a generation of the tough guy, the killer, the dealer and the baby daddy. And the ladies are not exempt from this by any means. I remember the toughest thing you heard a female rapper said was “If it aint rough it aint right…” now they too are packing Lugers and lying in court. Yikes!!!
Now while I understand the need to have a cool story to tell your friends, I don’t understand why all those stories are the same. If you want to be individual then just be who you are. If you come out with a song create your own music (article coming soon!), if you are going to produce your own clothing line please make sure that people from the PJ’s you came from can afford it and for God’s sake, FIND SOME NEW TATTOOS!!!
Hip-hop got its start the same way gospel music got its start. An oppressed people needed a way to cry out and let the world know the pain and struggle they were going through during their particular point in history but they also gave a sense of hope, strength that didn’t come at the barrel of a gun and faith that whomever they called God would always be there for them and bring them through triumphantly. When did Hip-Hop make that sharp left turn down the wrong street and become the very thing it stood against? Come on folks, let’s not let the marketing department decide what good music is anymore!!!
What are your thoughts?
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