SPlDEY

• What even is Hip Hop?

  SPlDEY

  May 2017

  Jimster said:

   There are still folk doing it this way.
  
  

  Edan
  
  
  J-Live 
  
  
  Off the top of my head..
  
  - D

  

• What even is Hip Hop?

  SPlDEY

  May 2017
  I've been thinking about this one for a while now actually.. I thought some of you wouldn't just dismiss my naivety, and are mature enough to have a respectful discussion. I've been a hip hop fan for well over 27 years now, and now that all of the illusions in hip hop have been shattered for me. I come to this question:
  
  What even is Hip Hop?
  
  Kool Herc, Keith "Cowboy" Wiggins, and Afrika Bambataa all take claim for creating "Hip Hop."
  
  
  
  The earliest forms of Sampling goes well back to the 30's within the genre Musique concrète
  
  
  Even the term Hip Hop doesn't have a clear origin. 
  
  
  
  
  When the reality is that Kool Herc borrowed the technique from Dub music. 
  
  
  
  The technology necessary to make sample based hip hop wasn't even commercially available until the 80's, with the affordability of the Roland Tr-808 & E-mu SP-1200.
  
  Help me figure this out if it is not merely an art form, not a culture, not a movement, not a genre, not a fashion, nor a lifestyle.. 
  
  There's so many sub-genres that have spawned off from Hip Hop now, and are unfairly lumped underneath it, and it encompasses every other genre through sampling. 
  
  

  Wikipedia says: 
  Hip hop music, also called hip-hop[3][4] or rap music,[4][5][6] is a music genre developed in the United States by inner-city African Americans in the 1970s which consists of a stylized rhythmic music that commonly accompanies rapping. 
  

  
  Okay so basically "stylized rhythmic music." Every genre of music falls under this category. 
  
  Encyclopedia Brittianica says: 
  
  

  Hip-hop, cultural movement that attained widespread popularity in the 1980s and ’90s; also, the backing music for rap, the musical style incorporating rhythmic and/or rhyming speech that became the movement’s most lasting and influential art form.

  
  So what is a Cultural movement? 

  a group of people working together to advance certain cultural goals

  So then, what are the cultural goals of Hip Hop?
  
  Artists of NYC working together to become rich? DJ's and Rappers working together to make slamming parties? Black artists joining forces to rise up from poverty? It doesn't make sense. 
  
  
  
  I'm going to argue with this song that the genre of "hip hop" is actually just another sub-genre of funk and disco music that sometimes uses sampling with poetic speaking as opposed to singing.  So the reality is rapping would have been the most innovative aspect of "Hip Hop" even though we all agree that rapping was not a new idea even in 1970. Right?
  
  
  
  
  So, my best guess is that it ultimately comes down to Hip Hop is a STYLE OF PARTYING that evolved from Disco, and borrowed from Jamaica's music culture except the American DJ's incorporated many different genres of music.
  
  It originated with parties thrown in New York around the 1970's where the DJ's combines the two techniques of sampling records and combining them with announcers speaking rhythmically with slang to excite the dancers. Which was fully embraced, and adopted as an important extension of black american culture . 
  
  
  
  All credit due to the many originators or innovators of these Parties. This brings to me to my last question: Why is the MUSIC GENRE not just referred to as Remix music, or the Sampling genre. 
  
  bonus question - Shouldn't these songs be more important?
  
  
  
  
  </rant>
  
  - damo

  

• Film-Strut: Mulholland Drive

  SPlDEY

  May 2017

  ppadilha said:

  Junior said:

  I seem to recall conversations with people where they looked to break down the complex genius of Inception for me.
  
  On the other hand, when I went and watched The Matrix at the cinema on its release, it was pretty visually mindblowing and a lot of fun. Not sure why I refused to engage with Inception in the same way. Perhaps because it is so depressingly po faced.
  
  Speaking of overrated directors. That Christopher Nolan. My god.
  

  
  people said the same thing about Insterstellar, as if it was some sort of deep existential experience. There was a decent sci-fi film somewhere in there, crammed between two action movies.
  

  Interstellar was definitely Christopher Nolan's clear homage to 2001: A Space Odyssey. Which in my opinion Kubrick's film is one of the most complex highbrow art films of all time. It's pretty obvious that Christopher Nolan loves puzzles. Which works in a way that is actually quite similar to how David Lynch approaches film making. Both directors require a deep attention span, multiple viewings, interpretations and discussion to reveal the deeper meanings of their films. The big difference being that David Lynch makes odd decisions influenced by dreams or ideas that come to him subconsciously to create his films. Where Stanley Kubrick made very clear calculated decisions, and forced the audience to come up with their interpretations of what he was trying to say similar to a puzzle. I think that David Lynch sometimes make decisions that he's not even sure what their true meanings are himself. 
  
  - spidey

  

• Film-Strut: Mulholland Drive

  SPlDEY

  April 2017

  SPlDEY said:

  David Lynch is one of the surrealist directors that I hate the most. That being said I thought Eraserhead, elephant man and Mullholland drive were excellent compelling films. b,121b,121Mullholland drive made 100% sense to me, until the film switched over. Then it left me thinking WTF until the end of the film, and made me question understanding any of the film. Probably was the only film that has ever done that. It begs for being rewatched, and I think after multiple viewings that you gain a full understanding of where the narrative is trying to explain. b,121b,121Blue velvet and lost highway are super overrated. b,121b,121I still haven't seen inland empire yet, but I'll probably catch it on rental. b,121b,121I still wish jodorowsky would've directed dune. b,121b,121- spidey
  

  I guess, 9 years later I can safely say that I definitely don't hate David Lynch as much as I did back then.
  
  I think it's entirely human to feel this incessant desire to want to organize information in your head. For example 999999999999999999999999 is much more satisfying then 28-7418-2#9C74274-821787874878f. I think the problem most people in America have with understanding complicated films is that they are naturally trying to figure out a Beginning, Middle, End and possibly even a moral deep meaning.
  
  The reality is that nature is not designed to give you a satisfying experience. Things typically just happen, and it's up to you to find your own meaning to it. I noticed that most directors that focus on the language of visuals have understood that compelling art is not necessarily about the story you are telling. If you think deeply about it, leaving things up to your interpretation is the medium that all great creators work. Chefs, Architects, Engineers, Writers, Picasso, Salvador Dali, Fellini, Houdini, God.  I don't think that Lynch himself couldn't even begin to imagine the depths of what people see in his films. I find it commendable that in his art he never intentionally tries to manipulate you into how to think or feel. 
  
  That's the beauty of this Mulholland Drive, and all of his films. It's intentionally grotesque, disjointed and some parts just feel wrong, but there are some deeply memorable moments that somehow resonate with you on some level and somehow wind up deep into this mental visual library of every film you've ever watched. Like the strange guy behind the trash can, baby wants Blue Velvet, the unexplained blue cube in the handbag, Bill Pullman going nuts on the sax, Strange baby with the measles dying. David Lynch works in this magic realm of unsettling minutiae hidden deep within your mind that you didn't even know existed. 
  
  - spidey

  

• You. Lately.

  SPlDEY

  April 2017
  Good topic brother,
  
  Lately I've been spending most of my time working on my health, and all of the closest people around me. Removing parasites from my diet and all of my relationships by focusing on removing negativity, and naturally growing farther away from even my closest friends and family. Creating my own spirituality, following my own path, and selling all of my possessions so I can travel more. I'm only interested in creating healthy music now, because I'm no longer a slave to my ears or my mind or my heart. I've quit working for any companies now, and I've been only using my own intelligence to finance my life. Shedding my vices and western influences, learning to listen to more silence. Always being grateful to the earth, and being alive everyday, and being able to get more knowledge about everything. My thirst for knowledge remains forever unquenchable. 

  
  

  - spidey