#431

Good and informative post.

2 Likes
#432

:smiley: :smiley:

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#434

this is a great post mate, thank you

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#435

OK, so I think I agree in part with what you’re saying - if something’s popular other people think “there must be something in this” and are more willing maybe to listen with open ears.

I don’t think you can lump every popular artist in with this though.

Sometimes there reason something takes off is because there really is something there. For me - and lots of others it seems - Outkast are one of these.

I’ll be the first to admit I’m far from a hip-hop expert, but they seemed to spend their whole career doing absolutely their own thing, creating unique and brilliant albums (IMO) and changed a whole genre and surrounding culture because of it.

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#436

whoever told you that is lying, whatever sells the most has always been accepted as the most popular by definition

#437

Actually, forget it.

#439

whomst among us has not been a Tory at some point?

1 Like
#441

Played golf last week :grimacing:

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#442

it’s wrong to hold up any kind of canon, wrong to say there’s a “higher art” that is more valid when removed from commercial success, trouble is you can’t remove it from commercial success and all acts are political, including and maybe even especially fandom

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#444

The Train is one of my favourite OutKast songs and it never really gets mentioned, so I want to put in a good word for it here

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#445

Got Two Dope Boyz on and the production is actually doing it for me. Grimy.

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#446

:open_mouth:

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#448

Where should I start with Books?

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#450

ATliens too… Bounced off Aquemini again earlier but this is nice

2 Likes
#452

The cadence on Wheelz of Steel is smooth. This album has quite a different feel, huh?

So… One good album, a couple of fun crossover singles, one cracking solo joint and a string of duffers. Middle-to-lower-tier hip-hop, 2/5 :wink:

#453

I love love love the groove in Babylon

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#454

André 3000 has probably done more in progressing positive masculinity and acceptance within rap/hip-hop/R&B than any other contemporary black male figure. Before him, to be a black man that even slightly deviated from the norm, you basically had to be Rick James or Prince and essentially such an androgynous hyper-sexualised almost ridiculous figure that you could in a way ‘get away with it’ within black culture; Prince was effeminate but still a ladies man, etc. Rick James dressed in sequins and glitter but still sang about sex and women.

André didn’t even have to play this angle to such an extreme and he did it from within a more resolutely homophobic and toxicly masculine genre, at the time (easy to forget that both Public Enemy and A Tribe Called Quest recorded homophobic music early in their careers). A lot of their music is hard as you like. There’s a direct lineage from this to, as you say, openly gay rappers, rappers like Thugger who play with their gender and sexuality.

He’s a bit of a millionaire though isn’t he so probably shouldn’t listen to any of his work. Even if he does give huge amounts of his money to nonviolence youth programmes in Atlanta.

27 Likes
#455

The thing that drives me to spend so much time scanning through bandcamp and twitter for new music is exactly the feeling that there is stuff no one has heard that is as good or better than the cannon.

However, if I was to ask the boards to rate the excellent new Ffion EP, we wouldn’t have much of a thread, which would defeat the object.

By the nature of community, we’re bound by shared experiences and liking (or not) stuff we’ve all heard is an important part of this.

I’d actually welcome a bandcamp crate diggers thread to shine a light on the rare / weird stuff though. Think I could spend some significant time there. I don’t think it’s a moral failure to enjoy these threads too though?

So… Outkast - any band that can put out spoddieottiedopalicious and still manage to have top ten singles is a win in my book.

Also… Marley ranked beneath Beyonce???

1 Like
#456

It’s good innit! Tom sent me a link to his next solo thing too - really cool change in direction

#457

I assume you gave Outkast a 2, based on Big Boi liking Kate Bush.

1 Like