The Smithsonian Museum of Hip Hop
mandrew
2,720 Posts
"The historic Smithsonian Institute is in the process of indoctrinating Hip-Hop into their own history books by launching an upcoming exhibit: ???Hip-Hop Won???t Stop: The Beat, The Rhymes, The Life???. This will be the first ever effort by the Smithsonian to collect and preserve the subject.A press conference by Russell Simmons, Ice T, Crazy Legs and more will be held on the morning of February 28th on the 4th Floor in the New York Suite of the Hilton New York. A host of other historic hip hop artists have been invited to join the publicity feast, including Afrika Bambaataa, Kool Herc, Grandmaster Flash, Fab 5 Freddy, Reverend Run and Darryl McDaniel of Run DMC and MC Lyte. ???Hip-Hop Won???t Stop: The Beat, The Rhymes, The Life??? is seeking a host of memorabilia to add to the growing list of permanent items already on hand within the Smithsonian???s catalogue. Items that are being sought after include vinyl records, handwritten lyrics, clothing and costumes, DJ equipment and microphones, photos and much more. The museum is continually on a quest to best represent American History by documenting the American experience in all forms and facets. Roughly 4 million visitors have walked through the Washington D.C.-based Smithsonian Institute since its inception over 150 years ago in an effort to view some of their 3 million catalogued artifacts and objects."source: http://soundslam.com/articles/news/news.php?news=060222_hiphopknowledge will be dropped
Comments
PS - That was Bobbito's room on the cover of Ego Trip right?
If you mean the book, no.
I don't remember who exactly (maybe Monk or Mao), but not Bobbito.
Man Ice T is gonna be lonely at that thing. Where the rest of the West Coasters at?
OK y'all can make Blowed jokes now.
I was reading the book last weekend, and that was the basement of the egoTrip office (the one where the plumbing doesn't work, as they said in the book). How could anyone sleep in that room? You wake up spooning the Biz puppet.
Vanilla Ice getting his own display =
FBI Notes on NWA/Ice T =
CO-SIGN. Wow. That was an embarassment...I was so excited for that, and about halfway through was just like, "This sucks; I'm out." Had to run through the gauntlet of the Hip Hop Gift Shop to get out...Man, who was asleep at the switch on that one?
serious? Wow.
I have a friend who was working there during the exhibit. She claims it was a fuckin nightmare. Old ladies talkin' about " I love Salt and Peppa"
Correct, the room pictured on the cover of the Rap Lists book is/was the old ego trip office. It was one of two rooms we occupied in a basement. It wasn't my bedroom (nor er, Bobbito's, nor Monk's - both friends of ego trip, tho). I can confirm that members of ego trip did occasionally sleep in the room while we were working on the book & on severe deadline. To my recollection there was absolutely no spooning (but then what folks did on their own time is their Biz-ness).
That is all. Please now to be continuing w/ Smithsonian thread, thankyouverymuch.
-Mao
why? that's interesting.
There's so much to Hip Hop culture that having police records of artists does a disservice to the culture. Nothin' like folks highlighting the criminal nature of the game. Cant we see MC REN's rhyme sheet from Straight Outta Compton.
If u like that kind of peripheral stuff........to each his own.
I never saw the exhibit, but it seems pretty clear to me that the significance of the FBI notes (very different from police records, mind you) has more to do with illustrating the potency and political capital that rap and rappers had in the late 80s/early 90s. Corny or peripheral or not, I'm sure that was meant as a tribute to the culture, not some kind of glorification of criminal street cred. Personally, I don't think there should ever be a hip-hop exhibit where it is considered inapproriate to point out that the FBI keeps tabs (and taps, for that matter) on everyone from Chuck D and Ice T to Biggie and Tupac.
When u talk about NWA how much does the FBI's notes weigh in on their contribution to the game?
i also never saw the exhibit, but these are pretty much my sentiments exactly. i would lub to see the fbi notes on nwa - it conjures up thoughts of tax-sponsored task forces set up to analyze the lyrics of "fuck the police" and eazy-e's appearance on yo mtv raps, or something.
regardless, i take your word that the bk museum was wack.
the smithsonian is usually pretty classy though so lets hope they do it up right.
a buttload. all of the attention paid to nwa by politicians and the feds were a huge contriubting factor to their notoriety and success.
When does the artform get discussed?
this is what I'm talking about.
I'd love to see some Bear County Jamboree type shit featuring Biz, Ice T, etc.
To my knowledge "the artform" (as if you can separate form from content in a case like NWA) already gets discussed in at least 10,000 books, articles, web forums, college courses, hip-hop conferences, curated exhibits, etc. PER DAY.
So if u didnt see the Fbi notes on BodyCount/SOCompton In the exhibit, would u feel like something was missing?
Just because 10,000 cats discuss it doesnt mean u have to follow the pack. Maybe a different curatorial decision SHOULD be made.
Dude, that's my next installation piece. Check it at the Whitney Bienial.