Did I Like This? (Straight Outta Compton)
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You Belong on the Radio: Music Video Edition (1)
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I know the last time on this series, I basically promised to try something else. My thought was to look at charts from different continents to get a more diverse view on what happens culturally outside of “Western civilization.” But the problem is that you either don’t get charts from specific countries or the lyrics aren’t in English or it’s just the same songs like everywhere else. Then I thought about going back in time, but I have something special planned for next week already. I almost thought of giving up and doing a straight charts analysis, when I remembered something I had wanted to do already: music videos! So, today, I look at the German Singles Charts again, but only at the videos of songs I haven’t discussed already. There’s nothing like good random parameters.
Read MoreMusic Box: Pulp's "This Is Hardcore"
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Pulp’s This Is Hardcore, released in 1998, is a testament of anxiety in our culture, the diary of someone failing at life despite having success, a war report from the front of unsuccessfully battling to fill the void. Pulp, the Britpop band that had been releasing albums for over 10 years before suddenly having enormous success, published this album three years after Disco 2000 was an international hit and the fallout was wearing them down. Artistically I consider this album their masterpiece, despite its flaws. It’s a bit messy, untrimmed and unfocused at times, but when it hits its mark, it goes straight for the kill. It’s unflinching and bitter and cynical but always with a certain sense of humor and full of brutal honesty. And it’s brilliant. You might feel uneasy and slightly embarrassed while listening to it, but you might also get an idea of an artist struggling with life in this culture, but never stopping from telling us about it.
Read MoreYou Belong on the Radio - U.K. Music Charts
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These posts seem to be popular, so let’s finish up the Big Three with looking at the U.K. Singles Charts. Though, looking at all three now, I see that the difference between them is not as big as it once was, since there are many repeats. I remember a time when the U.K. charts was full of hip new indie bands. Yes, I'm old.So maybe we have to shake things up a little next time…
Read MoreDid I Like This? (AmeriKKKa's Most Wanted)
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No gangsta rap analysis could be complete without taking a look former N.W.A.’s Ice Cube (and eventually N.W.A.). As far as I remember, his first album I knew was also his first album, so today we look at the provocatively titled AmeriKKKa’s Most Wanted, which was released in 1990.
Read MoreYou Belong on the Radio - U.S. Music Charts
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So, here we go through the charts again. This time I’ll look at the Billboard Hot 100, which are the singles charts for the U.S. Since I almost know no current music, I know as many songs here as in the German charts, so the surprise factor should about be the same. Be ready to be offended! Here we go!
Read MoreDid I Like This? (Cypress Hill)
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Today we’re going to look at another “real” gangsta rap album, the eponymous and debut Cypress Hill by Cypress Hill, released in 1991. While they are now mostly known for their weed music, their first album was of a different caliber.
Read MoreMusic Box: Slut's "Alienation"
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Slut’s Alienation (released in 2013 on Cargo Records) is one of the most persistently favorite albums I’ve ever known. You know those albums that you listen to and you realize you like them and whenever you want to listen to music, it’s the first thing that comes to your mind? And how that, depending on the album, stays this way for some days, weeks, maybe months, but then the really big thrill has gone? I’ve got Alienation in September 2013 (as an especially pleasant birthday present, because I didn’t even know there was a new Slut album) and it’s still the first thing I think of when I want to listen to music. I don’t think that happened before over such a long period of time. The album is a variety of styles, reminding the listener of Radiohead and The Beatles at the same time. But to me, that obviously works, mainly because it’s the music Slut does best but in those different, often electronic, styles. I really loved their previous album StillNo.1, but four years later Alienation hits all the right notes for me.Lyrically, Slut always tackle a similar area of themes, which coincidentally, fits to some of the topic I’m interested in: monotony of our daily lives, disillusion, criticism of society and romances that never hold up to their ideals. The album title gives away the basic premise of the album: how we, in our culture, have become alienated from each other and ultimately from our selves. The songs don’t offer solutions and only vague explanations, but are more concerned in painting a picture of estrangement and disenchantment, of people looking for a way out, some desperate, some resigned. It’s thought-provoking and sad, but still danceable, which makes it all the more a great album.
Read MoreYou Belong on the Radio - German Music Charts
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Inspired by someone‘s suggestion (you know who you are, constant reader) and following something I did many years ago, I decided to start a new series about music. Here’s the plan: I look at the music charts to see what the most popular songs are actually telling us. Most people can sing along the lyrics without ever thinking about them. If you do that, sometimes you discover interesting, disturbing or surprising issues. Today I look at the top 10 of the German single charts but only pick the songs where I find something worth writing about. Whatever I write about the songs does not necessarily say anything about whether I like them, so no one should feel offended. I don’t know what will happen, but that’s part of the appeal!
Read MoreDid I Like This? (Naughty by Nature)
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The album I picked for today is different than the rest because it is not connected to all the notoriousness of other rap albums. The album is the eponymous Naughty by Nature by Naughty by Nature, released in 1991.
Read MoreMusic Box: Morrissey's "World Peace Is None of Your Business"
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When I think of political music, I either think of the 60s and 70s, Gang of Four or hip-hop (at least some of it). I could think of Morrissey and the Smiths but it’s not the first thing on my mind, since Morrissey is more known for making political statements outside his music nowadays and Meat Is Murder and Margaret on the Guillotine are still in the minority compared to his other songs. So I was somewhat surprised to listen to his new album and realize, hey, for an old man he sure has some statements left to make. Maybe I’m just so surprised because his last albums didn’t feature many political songs in comparison. But here is his new album, after years of delay, and its title already makes some allusions that make you think: World Peace Is None of Your Business.
Read MoreDid I Like This? (Power)
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After two obscure choices that were on my mind when cooking up the idea for this series, I want to come to something more ‘profound’, I want to say, although that might be the wrong word. My next pick is an album that also has a special place in my childhood gangsta rap heart and this is Ice-T’s second album Power, released in 1988.
Read MoreDid I Like This? (The South Park Psycho)
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Because I enjoyed my first re-listening to 90s hip-hop so much, I dove a bit more into it and realized two things: 1) I know a lot of albums from 1990 to 1992, but almost nothing from 1993, making a radical change in course for my music taste (and for the worse since it was time for Eurodance), which also means I listened to all of that rap music between the ages of 10 to 12. That amazes me and will continue to do so when I listen to more albums. 2) I know a lot of albums from that period. And this was the beginning of the 90s without the internet. I didn’t even have a lot of money, so I have no idea how I got all that music. I had a good friend with similar tastes but that doesn't explain where all the music came from.
Read MoreDid I Like This? (Banned in the U.S.A.)
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What many don’t know about me is my hip-hop past. When you are very young, you don’t listen to music consciously until at one point you hear something that grabs you. For me, that was hip-hop, or rap as it was mostly called back then. I must have been around 10 or 11 when I got introduced to that kind of music and something spoke to me about it. I mainly started with Public Enemy, one of the most political bands of the last century, so I like to believe that this aspect made it appealing to me. But I was very young, so who knows. Anyway, although my musical tastes changed several times over the years, I always fondly remember hip-hop music and come back to it from time to time. I then also like to believe that the genre has changed for the worse and that (as the cliché goes) everything was better in the past (which normally isn't true). But then again, Kanye West’s My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy is one of my favourite albums of the last couple of years.
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