Dan Charnas' "The Big Payback" (Book-R)
mannybolone
Los Angeles, CA 15,025 Posts
Anyone read this yet? I'm looking forward to getting to it this winter.
Charnas was just on Fresh Air, talking about it: http://www.npr.org/2010/12/09/131932127/a-history-of-the-big-business-of-hip-hop
Charnas was just on Fresh Air, talking about it: http://www.npr.org/2010/12/09/131932127/a-history-of-the-big-business-of-hip-hop
Comments
agreed, a great interview. it is becoming more and more obvious how much terry is infatuated with rap and the culture around it.
Picking it up tomorrow. Can't wait to read it!
glad to hear that. amazon here i come!
:face_melt:
It makes most previous hip hop histories look like pamphlets.
One huge omission is Peter Brown, though. Mentioned only in passing, and not by name. Possibly according to his wishes?
As the man is prone to saying - "that's my sound!"
Next time you see him tell him the boys at Academy miss him.
Charnas definitely seemed to focus on the "big" names/labels and P&P, as important as it was, doesn't seem to have made the same kinds of industry waves as other labels, despite P&P's following by heads-who-know.
You're in for a treat though; I had a shitload of fun reading that book. Just finished it two nights ago.
No doubt. I had small nitpicks about stuff that went unmentioned but I think you're right about him skipping folks who he couldn't interview. Suge, for example, doesn't get much by way of background.
I do think the "but what about the South?" contingent will have legit beef though.
His chapters on rap radio are a highlight.
Likewise... thanks momma Ferrari! She got it for me after hearing the Fresh Air interview... looking forward to reading it.
First off, this is an incredibly well-researched book, particularly the first half. So many stories that I'd never heard, and a lot of details that other writers might have left out, fearful of pissing someone off. Charnas does a great job presenting many behind-the-scenes people, and his detail with numbers and the various deals that were made is a real insight into the industry - certainly should be enlightening to those on Soulstrut who are still in denial about the degree to which the music industry and record sales have plummeted.
But I really had a problem with how Charnas concludes the book, particularly in the final chapter and the epilogue. He presents the success of a handful of individuals who reach the top and sell their companies for millions to large corporations as a success story for hip-hop and Black entrepreneurs. While I find the individual success stories he presents fascinating, Charnas pushes a view that corporations co-opting hip-hop music and culture is the validation, the signal that says "we've made it!" The view that the path towards success is through corporate partnerships and joint ventures just doesn't sit well with me, nor does it seem particularly sustainable, given how some of these ventures have turned out, and how the industry has imploded over the past 2-3 years in particular.
I get the feeling that this book was pretty much finished in 2008, right as Obama was elected. I know it's only a two year difference, but it already feels somewhat dated, given that in 2011 things like Jay-Z's partnership with Live Nation aren't looking too hot. There's a whole nother narrative here about how a few people made a sh*t ton of money but failed to create anything sustainable, and neither maintained creative control nor passed the torch to a younger generation. The careers of nearly every single individual Charnas writes about date back to at least the early 90s, if not the early 80s, despite their early recognition, particularly in the late 80s and early 90s, that hip-hop music is by and for kids. Like the rest of the music industry, the industry Charnas writes about is aging and struggling immensely at staying young.
I'm not mad at Charnas at all - this is really one of the best books on hip-hop I have ever read and as gripping as non-fiction can be. I just think there are some real issues that aren't addressed, in favor of presenting the success stories of a few people who were in large part, quite lucky. It's indisputable that there was a large group of people who despised corporate involvement, and their voices are auspiciously absent from the book, even though many of these people were themselves entrepreneurs and enjoyed very impressive independent success for quite some time in the 90s and early 2000s.
As I told Oliver the other day, I think Charnas should do a B-Sides to this with more stories and background, and hopefully try to include some of the folks who were left out of the full book - after all his research I'm sure he has nearly endless stories to tell, and I'd love to hear more.
I'm about half way through the book now, so I have not yet read the parts of the book that you found problematic. However, I think that the corporate success = hip hop's success trope rears its head even in the earlier chapters. I, too, found this unsettling, but more so because while I found Charnas's retelling of events riveting, I felt a little let down because he didn't offer much in the way of interpretation.
I also think your comments about the changing nature of the music industry are spot on. Will keep these in mind as I read on.
PEACE
G'
One of the things that made the book quite enjoyable for me was the plotting of events so that they flowed together easily, and characters that were introduced early, sometimes quizzically, were able to return to great relevance later. In that sense, I thought the book wrapped up well, despite its focus on a few very successful men (I question the idea that anyone was "lucky" there); and while there could've been a million other stories told, at a certain point this had to become a book, and a good one, and I can understand why many weren't. For instance, there are probably a number of good reasons to have not included Peter Brown's family of labels, as I complained about upthread; while I continue to believe that his diversification and hustle could've been important to the overall story, I shortly got over it. This is an exhaustive, 600+ page book and there's simply not enough room for every little thing. Charnas could certainly write a "B-Side" book of similar length, telling all the stories he neglected to here. I doubt he wants to.
The big shortcoming was any length of discussion about the internet's multitudinous effects on every level of the rap game. Mentioned in passing, it clearly deserved more depth.
I also agree: I doubt Dan will want to do a B-Sides book. BUT, I do think this book brings attention for the need of other journalists to pursue those stories left out.
NO BRO BECUASE TEN YEARS IN WE STILL AT THE HEIGHT OF OUR CAREER BRO
LAST MONTH ALL SHOWS SOLD OUT BRO
ALL AGES ALL COLORS BRO
@ 1:35 BRO
Album 1 was fascinating as it delved into hip-hop's very beginnings. As mentioned before, Charnas has an uncanny ability to turn anything into a story, and then weave those pieces together to build the bigger picture. The man's knowledge is encyclopedic and I can't get through 2 pages without jotting down a producer's name or song title to Google later on.
So far, so good. Highly recommended, even if you aren't a hip-hop fan per se. This book makes me wish I was a kid in NY during the 80s.
Album 1 was fascinating as it delved into hip-hop's very beginnings. Charnas' knowledge is encyclopedic and I can't get through 2 pages without jotting down a producer's name or song title to Google later on.
So far, so good. Highly recommended, even if you aren't a hip-hop fan per se. This book makes me wish I was a kid in NY during the 80s. I'll come back to this thread when I'm done to continue the discussion.
I feel that Charnas' profiles of Joe and Sylvia Robinson, Rick Rubin and Russell Simmons kind of separate the book into three somewhat distinct sections. Granted, there are other elements that section off the major phenomena that are discussed in the books, but Charnas' portrayal of certain figureheads really colored the book and the histories presented. Although the Robinsons were crucial in putting hip-hop out there, from the very beginning they're villainized for shady business tactics. But as the book progressed, there were plenty of shady business proceedings discussed, but without the same chastising of producers or industry personnel that Charnas easily spewed when it came to the Robinsons.
Second, it wasn't until towards the end of the book that I realized how much of it was about Rick and Russ. Yes, I know, they're basically the godfathers of hip-hip, but I feel that some of the commentary bordered on Rick and Russell worship rather than being simply biased commentary. Charnas spends so much time talking about how cool Rick was, how he was the big man on campus, central to the party scene, everyone loved him...and then he'd "balance" out the description by offering some "negative" tidbit about how dirty and unorganized his dorm room was. Details about Rick getting into conflicts with neighboring dormmates about playing music too loudly, and then getting away with it by justifying the importance of playing noisy beats to the student council, were at times superfluous and irrelevant (although very entertaining, and I'm glad they were included despite my ranting).
I cannot deny that the visionary and forward-looking genius of Russell Simmons helped shaped the direction in which hip-hip went, but if he wasn't the visionary that the Robinsons failed to be, if he was unable to realize the potential cultural impact hip-hop was about to have as the Robinsons also failed to do, wouldn't his initially unorganized business set up have resulted in the same shadiness that brought the Robinson's down? It's almost as if the fact that Russell's endeavors were both culturally impactful and financially lucrative made it okay that there was rampant nepotism and whatnot at Def Jam. On the other hand, the Robinsons were "bad guys" because they tried to make a quick buck off of "rapping DJs" without regard to the potential longevity of hip-hop as an art form. Perhaps I'm over-analyzing, but a book of this length deserves the same amount of analysis and conspiracy theorizing that I would shower upon any one of my trashy dime store novels. I suppose a big difference is that that Russ had a lot more respect for hip-hop artists than others in the industry did at the time.
I really enjoyed this encyclopedic history of hip-hip which was embellished by many of Charnas' own experiences as a long-time hip-hop industry insider. I'm deeply impressed by the amount of research and interviewing that went into this book and highly recommend it.