Chuck D vs. Hot97 re: summer jam
staxwax
1,474 Posts
summer jam 2014 - Chuck D wasnt feeling it - taking hot97 to task
gauging by the twitter reaction he's got rosenberg et al. schvitzing - the situation is nagl for hot97
Chuck D on Hot 97's 'Sloppy Fiasco' Summer Jam: 'Goal is to Change Urban Radio'
Chuck D wants Urban radio to "get it right or be gone" -- and he's not just talking about Hot 97 in New York. The Public Enemy co-founder has been in a Twitter war of words with the Hot 97 team since the station's Summer Jam concert on June 1, when he derided "what a sloppy fiasco (the station) has made of Hip-Hop."
Reached by Billboard backstage before the group's Parklife Weekender festival appearance Sunday in Manchester, England, Chuck D (born Carlton Douglas Ridenhour) said his unhappiness about the Summer Jam -- particularly over the prolific use of the N-word and a line-up he felt did not adequately represent the New York hip-hop community -- was "the last straw" in a general dissatisfaction over the state of rap and radio stations that play and brand themselves with the music.
"My goal by year's end is to change the face and sound of urban radio," Chuck D, 54, promised. "I've been in this shit 30 years, too long to just sit and let it be. I'm not going to be the grim reaper. I don't want to be the grim reaper. But people have to stand up and we need some change, and it's time."
This year's Hot 97 Summer Jam featured performances by Nas, 50 Cent, Childish Gambino, Iggy Azalea, the Roots, Nick Minaj, Wiz Khalifa and many more. Ridenhour says he was particularly disturbed that the use of the N-word was so readily tolerated by the station and festival organizers.
"That shit is over," he noted. "If there was a festival and it was filled with anti-Semitic slurs... or racial slurs at anyone but black people, what do you think would happen? Why does there have to be such a double standard?"
Citing the New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival as an example, Ridenhour added that he felt it would be proper to include a contract clause for performers "to at least be civil in the presentation of the art form they've been granted with."
And though he said that he's "not trying to be a moral compass," D added that he also feels it's time for record labels to also consider clauses "saying you can't be derogatory to the community you can from" in contracts with their artists.
D said he was also disappointed that the Summer Jam lineup did not include enough local artists, especially for a radio station from the birthplace of rap and hip-hop culture.
"It's just a sloppy presentation of the art form, the worst presentation known to man," D explained. "It's negligent. There needs to be a greater representation of the culture and the community on that radio station." Broadening the discussion to the state of Urban radio in general, D said that, "When people say the word Urban, they don't know what that means. When they say urban music, they mean playing black artists -- and artists outside the community. It should be a representation of playing music by a lot of different artists -- non-black artists, too. I just want to see artists be able to have fair game."
Though D labeled comments that Hot 97 personalities Ebro Darden and Peter Rosenberg made to Billboard in response to his criticisms "a bunch of hogwash," the MC said his argument is less with them and more with station ownership.
"It's about their bosses," D said. "That's where the discussion needs to go."
But D said he doesn't require a direct role in that discussion for himself. "Why would I sit down with them? I don't have time for that. I don't have to show 'em shit; they're grown people. I ain't wasting my time. Let them sit down with the community and the artists. They'll tell 'em. I'll watch from afar. But they better get it right or we'll destroy the platform of Urban radio across the country."
D did, however, say he'd continue to monitor and speak out about the situation, mostly via written commentary and via his Rapstation.com site and radio station, as well as other outlets.
gauging by the twitter reaction he's got rosenberg et al. schvitzing - the situation is nagl for hot97
Comments
From gitty-up they were on a "HOT" format, and way removed from the Golden Years of Hip Hop Radio.
Biggie and Big Pun 50 times a fuckin' day?
Let them self implode and erode. Ride that shit out.
Its different when he confronted 'BLS for playing Crack It Up joint back when the game was fertile.
I dont really see that station as a serious cultural threat.
I just like the fact that Chuck is stirring the shit - if we all agree basically, with what hes saying, why not get behind it.
I hope he can garner support and at least kick up a lot of dust.
like the man says - fuck a corplantation.
btw i actually enjoy the ebro and rosenberg morning show - the banter is great, the playlist - not so much.
Mostly, I agree. But there is still a fair amount of good ish coming out...but unless Drake is featured on it, it gets no play anywhere.
Peace,
Big Stacks from Kakalak
Y'all all buy and wear the same shit does not a culture make.
You dont have to be 15-25 years old to make an impact on the younger generation.
But I just dont think kids are lead by the radio anymore.
clear channel owns everything and or viacom, and it's all payola
plenty of great new hip hop out there but you ain't gonna hear the new jay zone record, Hologram Kizzie or starlito EVER on channel zero
its up to the informed open eared listener to find their own way
that paradigm of commercial radio being relevant today is dead,I think chuck is righteous and his age has nothing to do with this conversation.
he is doing the right thing,but forcing artists to sign waivers about vocab seems harsh but i understand where he is coming from.
there is no real easy answer to this equation in 2014 since media is now streamed and there is no "yo MTV raps" or "the box"
informing the hood/household
look at what kanye and jay z have turned into
shit is just horrifically repugnant
that coupled with the shit production values and so called super stars like lil wayne,drake,manaj and all the other garbage hoisted on the population = one big pile of shit
ps
i always want to ask one of the clear channel "dj's: whats its like listening to black dog and baba o'reily 10,000 times a year....does your soul crumble a little bit more when you cue up "fly like an eagle" again mark coppalla?
cosizzle. plus someone oughta force these guys to start putting some money in pockets of artists outside of the drake wayne jayz circle. I can understand a lot of frustration from golden era acts who rightfully should still be getting their shine for their contributions all being blacklisted by clearchannel and the like. I mean seriously fuck these guys and their capitalist bukkake fest. I hope Chuck and the interwebs tear them a new asshole and so doing put a slight brake on the mindless brainwashing of youth. for all the smarmy salty jaded old man wisecracks we all have on offer here are we seriously going to deny how much pe nwa pharcyde etc etc et shaped our generation, the way we think - they made a huge impact on youth culture - now theres minaj and drake.
Something about Rosenberg makes me cringe horrendously.
Have any artists chimed in to support Chuck?
how about this?
or this
or this
new york stand the fuck up
yea and immortal is gonna have primo do his next album
- I don't want to ever hear Rosenburg talk shit about/to Chuck D. Even if Chuck is in the wrong, Rosenburg should play his position. Watching all these DJs like him, Ebro etc. they believe they are on a level on or above the 'talent'. Convinced they are the celebrities and the force behind the 'culture'. arrrgggh
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in rosenbergs defence - i think hes largely coming correct. I think chuck is indeed stirring the pot to make waves but his larger point - and most important one imo - is that corporate execs set the agenda and are pushing their own financial interests via a huuuuge platform masquerading as 'urban' or 'hiphop' radio. As a vet and one of the most significant contributors to the music chuck d has every right to call these guys out and try to readjust the landscape from a tidal wave of schlock to something that has relevance and perspective to the music he co created that they are feeding off - instead of pimping it out in a disgusting fashion so really - go chuck.
also chuck d has made it quite clear - while engaging in dialogue - that his beef is with the owners and agenda setters and not so much employees like ebro epstein rosenberg and the like.
chuck is not trolling hes going after a highly visible targets in a provocative way to air out his opinion - which is totally legit so rosenberg still needs to stfu
Bingo...ain't no kids fucking with Frequency Modulation to get their daily dose of 'what they are supposed to like' in 2014...shit is as antiquated as horse n buggy.
A kid would look like Benjamin fucking Button if you saw em' fiddling with a radio trying to find their 'fave station'.
Both cobwebbed parties should save their breath in this 'debate'...because neither are relevant; especially if they are splitting hairs over a dead vehicle for music.
http://elitedaily.com/music/how-one-generation-was-able-to-kill-the-music-industry/593411/
I'm surprised by how low spotify is in this graph I guess that shows how fractured the streaming on-demand music market is. It would be interesting to see if they lumped all on demand streaming sources together (spotify, groove shark, beats, whatever else is out there).
The killer for radio is that all this stuff is available on a phone and everyday exponentially more people use their phone as their primary music/audio source while in transit.
b/w
The wording of that graph is so horrendous that I assumed it was translated from a different language.
I mean. I appreciate Chuck and where he's coming from, but kids gonna be kids and a bunch of old angry dudes aren't gonna change a damn thing about it.
His energy could be better spent IMO on shoring up/expanding legacy rap radio, which is already happening on WBLS (Marley's show is apparently #2 rated urban and caters to 35-50 demo)... the Sirius old school channel is hot basurington. start there.
Kids these days have no CLUE who PE is/was, and that boat sailed when their parents were teenagers. So it goes.
You know I agree for the most part, but at the same time...yes, if the radio played more options than 1. more people would listen to the radio and 2. more of those new options would be embraced more than they are now.
To me, it's not about content as much as it's that certain artists are ramrodded down our throats 24/7 at the expense of others that basically get no play at all.
But then it does become about content when those artists being pushed on us are invariably the most consumerist artists anywhere with very little to say beyond LOOK AT ME AND ALL THE STUFF I'VE BOUGHT.
I don't really think Chuck D is going about it the right way, but it is a mess that needs to be sorted at some point.
the Hot97 demo is not. fucking. with. 95% of the shit any of us give a shit about. and most of these kids are not consuming their shit thru the radio so having an ally up there is relatively meaningless.
if radio doesn't matter, let it die.
I think it's kind of a great time for rap music right now, a lot of good shit out there that is meeting with success.
I remember when underground shit never got played on the radio. I remember when PE never got played on the radio. Back then there were precisely NONE of the channels kids have nowadays, including but not limited to the traditional record biz.
1990 might have been a golden era of the music you like getting played on the radio in your market. It was not a golden era of radio playing a wide range of music. In fact no era ever was. Radio has always been about corporate control forcing music on the public.
I would argue that today, with satellite and internet radio, the market is more open not less.
And hell yes, music in 1990 on the radio or anywhere for that matter was far more diverse than it is now. In the years since, all the different brands of rap and rock and pop have been whittled down to sounding pretty much all the exact same kind of pseudo-melancholy boring. I pull my hair out when I wind up having to listen to the music selection of 20-somethings today. There's very little deviation from what's become the norm for them. They don't seem to mind, but I find it sad.