Once upon a time in a universe far, far away, HipHopDX used to host blogs. Through Meka, Brillyance, Aliya Ewing and others, readers got unfiltered opinions on the most current topics in and beyond Hip Hop. After a few years, a couple redesigns and the collective vision of three different Editors-In-Chief, blogs are back. Sort of. Since our blog section went the way of two-way pagers and physical mixtapes, Twitter, Instagram and Ustream have further accelerated the pace of current events in Hip Hop. Rappers beef with each other 140 characters at a time, entire mixtapes (and their associated artwork) can be released via Instagram, and sometimes these events require a rapid reaction.
As such, we’re reserving this space for a weekly reaction to Hip Hop’s current events. Or whatever else we deem worthy. And the “we” in question this week is myself Andre Grant, and freelance writer Ural Garrett. I serve as HipHopDX’s Features Staff. Aside from tackling stray topics, I may invite artists and other personalities in Hip Hop to join the conversation. Without further delay, here’s this week’s “Stray Shots.”
Why Is The “Smudging” Debate Raging Around Iggy Azalea?
Andre: Iggy Azalea is being demanded she answer for her success. Azealia Banks has called her out to the ends of the earth for some time now on Twitter, but things got real when Ebro and the crew dove in about her lashing out at Iggy. It even flew into territory about what it means to see a non-black person take home a Grammy in Hip Hop. Heavy stuff.
The interview was sobering and strangely intimate, as we saw the knife-tongued Harlem artist tearing up on air for what can only be described as what she perceived as trite dismissal toward her views and plight as the entertainment world chose to side with Iggy Azalea — at least in their silence. She made some salient and rarely discussed points as Ebro leaned in on how cultural appropriation had always been there, “No, you’re desensitized to it,” she said. “They’re trying to erase us.” This whole thing began when, specifically, Iggy Azalea flipped Kendrick Lamar’s “runaway slave” line into “runaway slave… master.” (The first line is off K.Dot’s “Look Out For Detox,” the second is off Iggy Azalea’s “D.R.U.G.S.”) Since the interview, Lupe Fiasco, 9th Wonder, Q-Tip, T.I. and others have chimed in. Some jumped to her defense as T.I. called those with an axe to grind “hypocrites.” Lupe simply claimed that Iggy’s music had a “place in Hip Hop,” for which he was soundly derided on Twitter. 9th Wonder has been direct about his dislike for Azalea’s music and Q-Tip dropped an amazing history lesson on Twitter to the Australian entertainer. She has not made things easy on herself, though. Her rebuttals can only be described as tone deaf, as she refuses to confront the issues in front of her, calling Q’s olive branch “patronizing” and claiming she was “used to it.” Issues like her kind of blowing off Sway on his own show in 2013 at the thought of performing the “5 Fingers Of Death” freestyle. Which, most would say, is not a very Hip Hop thing to do.
Hip Hop is an all-inclusive sport. It always has been, and no one would doubt The Beastie Boys, Eminem, MC Serch, El-P, Slug, Statik Selektah, Brother Ali, Action Bronson and other emcees have contributed mightily to the genre. No one would also doubt the singers, songwriters, producers etc., that happen to be white and who have also devoted their lives and careers to Hip Hop are not culturally appropriating. Here’s the thing, this debate is more tied into what is happening in our collective lives right now than with Iggy Azalea.
This is really about the fact that in 2013 there were no number one Billboard charting African American artists. And, this year, the highest selling Hip Hop album comes courtesy of J. Cole’s 2014 Forest Hills Dive, and although it has gone Gold, it has not yet achieved platinum status. And who was the sales leader before Mr. Cole? Iggy Azalea. This is about cops getting off without so much as a trial in the killings of Michael Brown and Eric Garner. And, most importantly, this is about Gen Y being shaken out of its apathy by these events. The “Millions March,”and the constant protesting in Ferguson that has now engulfed the country as well as the recent suing of NYC’s prison, Rikers Island, by the U.S. for mishandling minors all add up to all of us questioning what right Iggy Azalea has to be here in this space and at this time. Azealia Banks plea was simple: put her squarely in the Pop category. 9th Wonder’s was to buy the music you say you want to see be successful. There is truth in both of these suggestions. For my money, one of the answers comes down to millennials choosing who they wish to be. Can we find our way out of these woods? The rest of the decade should be very interesting.
Ural: The years were between 1990 and 1991. South Dallas born Robert Van Winkle was on top of the world. Dubbed Vanilla Ice, many saw him as the then ruler of Hip Hop as his debut single “Ice Ice Baby” became the first single in the genre to reach number one on the Billboard charts. There were plenty of iconic Hip Hop singles released around the time including from “Check The Rhime,” “The Humpty Dumpty Dance,” “Mind Playing Tricks On Me,” and “Amerikkka’s Most Wanted.” However, folks flocked heavily to the track sampling Queen and David Bowie’s “Under Pressure” along with Ice’s less technical and unhinged flow. Like former Source editor James Bernard said in an opinion piece for The New York Times, “But Vanilla Ice is white, sexy, palatable in the suburbs and thus highly marketable.” Many radio stations that disregarded Hip Hop at the time as something for poor blacks began to open up their musical repertoire. Hip Hop disregarded Ice simply because he was inauthentic, lacked skill and was seen as popular because he was a white guy who did a average job of emulating party raps. For many, he wasn’t as “down” or inoffensive as other white emcees like The Beastie Boys or 3rd Bass. Most importantly, he had support from one of the biggest rappers at the time, MC Hammer.
The more things change, the more things stay the same.
Fast forward to 2014, Australia-U.S. transplant Amethyst Amelia Kelly or better known to the world as Iggy Azalea is riding high on the success of her Charli XCX assisted single “Fancy” from her major label debut The New Classic. In fact, the single was big enough for Forbes to call her the “Queen of Hip-Hop” and officially made her the top selling rapper of the year (before J. Cole, that is). Regardless of her album having substantially lower scores from both Hip Hop and mainstream music publications, I-g-g-y persevered. It’s easy to see why Iggy had an amazing year. Did she have a catchy pop hook from Charlie XCX? Check! Faux DJ Mustard beat? Check! Music video inspired by a film that lampooned the same white privilege she enjoyed? Check, Check, Check! It was a perfect recipe for success. Despite many false starts, mainstream has its first successful white women in Hip Hop. For most listeners, Hip Hop sucked before Iggy, just as it did before “Ice Ice Baby.”
Like Mr. Winkle, Ms. Kelly’s level of authenticity gets called into question on many fronts. Hell, it’s quite easy when you consider her first video was this…
How does one go from that whisper Britney Spears vibe to this? The world may never know. Despite some inconsistent motives, one Harlem chick with a love for Hip House beats may have found an answer of her own and pretty much started a civil war within Hip Hop. Yup, as Andre mentioned above, Azealia Banks finally got what she wanted for the past couple of years in going after Iggy and people are noticing. Incidentally, the floodgates were open regarding the discussion of white appropriation of black art vs. those who seek cultural unification through artistic integration. This much-needed conversation has been around longer than the time R&B was dubbed jungle music by white listeners before evolving into rock and roll. And look at the genre now. Justin Timberlake and Robin Thicke essentially ruled it last year. Despite how many may feel about Iggy, Timberlake or Thicke, black men have facilitated all their successes. T.I.’s co-sign of Iggy, Timbaland’s production for Timberlake, and Pharrell’s investment into Thicke are indicative of that. As music sales scale downward, many get left behind regardless of talent and ability to make quality music. It doesn’t matter if on a major level, Y.G. and J. Cole had the best bodies of work released this year. They’ll go on to influence the next crop of MCs twenty or thirty years from now. Just like Ice-Cube, A Tribe Called Quest, and Geto Boys inspired this crop of MCs. Those who are saved today are ones that relate better toward the buying masses as 75 percent of music buyers are white and 11 percent black. This leads to the final question; who found themselves inspired by Vanilla Ice and who in the future will claim Iggy?
Ural Garrett is an Los Angeles-based writer and photographer. For the past several years, he’s written for numerous publications ranging from HipHopDX to SoulTrain. When not covering music, video games, films and the community at large, he’s in the kitchen baking like Anita. Follow him on Twitter @Uralg.
Andre Grant is an NYC native turned L.A. transplant that has contributed to a few different properties on the web and is now the Features Editor for HipHopDX. He’s also trying to live it to the limit and love it a lot. Follow him on Twitter @drejones.
“Just like Ice-Cube, A Tribe Called Quest, and Geto Boys inspired this crop of MCs”– I disagree strongly. If anything, early Ice Cube, Quest and the Geto Boys influenced the first wave of superstars (and non-stars) from 1999-2005 or thereabouts. The catalog of those artists are considered ancient history to the rappers who are 18-28 now. The “latest” youth-movement rappers are much influenced by folks who first became widely known from 2000 forward.
this is like watching a Karate movie, where the bad guys surround and attack the hero and he/Iggy takes them all on and beat the daylight out of all of them. they don’t realize it but they have turned Iggy into a real life hero.
America loves heroes, one man/Iggy against an army of villains
People are going to feel sorry for her cause shes a white woman. But if she wants to stick around past this album cycle and maintain any sort of artistic respect she needs to address these disparaging claims in her music. otherwise she will be a fash in the pan artist. She isnt as bad as people say she is but her rap voice vs her speaking voice is very strange, especially considering rapping is speaking in rhyme.
I have a prediction: Because of this Azealia Banks ranting attacks, I have noticed that on mainly white blogs there is a growing resentment and statement of “If whites can’t be Rappers then we shouldn’t buy Rap”,so my prediction is that there will be (perhaps brief, or not) a drop in Rap sales because whites tend to vote with their dollars. A music race war is the last thing the rap community needs, with already faltering sales and kind of boycott could drive rap off the national music stage back to the underground… Even now we have Artist who already sees rap diminishing and have started moving to this Pop-Rap musical melding of people like as an example, Ariana Grande and Rappers or Jessie J and Rappers, or better yet Eminem and Rihanna, I would say Pop-Rap is the future, like it or not.
I’d much rather a white person never buy a hip hop album again if that means creativity and artistic skill will be at the forefront of hip hop again. People act like the only way to make a comfortable living is through hip hop or sports. Get a damn education, become an entrepreneur or a consultant and make bank that way.
So much hate on the new bitch. Fuck y’all…go Iggy. don’t pay attention to these imbeciles
She’s a Pop entertainer using the platform of rap, and doesn’t NEED to address anything…like many female artists before her. People are losing their minds over pointless shit, because she’s done nothing wrong. The general public doesn’t care what colour she is, but the music industry always needs new faces.
Madonna and Eddie Murphy made terrible rap songs, along with Robbie Williams, and plenty rappers have made terrible attempts at singing….what’s the big fucking deal? The more you feed into this shit, the longer her career will be, because people will always have something to talk about.
You are promoting her by simply addressing her name in full, and she is making more and more money because of this. Google tracks searches, and her agents tailor her rates for shows and whatnot to all these things, so keep typing guys!
IGGY, My WCE YOU ARE THE FUCKING BOSS AND QUEEN OF HIP HOP, THOSE OTHER THOTS AINT SHIT LIKE THEIR TALAPIA SMELLIN VAGINAS, EXVEPT TRINA SHE RESPECT RWALNESS AN SHE IS A QUEEN OF THE SOUTHERN HIP HOP
Why are you calling Iggy “queen of hip hop” whem she cannot write nor rap impressively? What is wrong with her fans? Serious question.
I aints no fan of Iggy
But just keep doin wat you doin and ignore all these so-called Haterz.
peace
Theres somethng that I feel yall are forgetting tho.Like many hip-hop fans around the world, Iggy is not american , or at least not american born and raised. Hip-hop is really huge pberseas (thats why US rappers are always touring there) even tho a large portion of the fans dont understand the lyrics because english is not their first language. Thats not Iggys case since shes australian. But what im trynna say is that in other countries, the idea of hip hop is usually very different then in the us and, for exemple, in most national hiphop scenes, race is not much of an issue. Unlike the US, Europe and australia didnt live racial slavery, segragation and other traumatizing and deeply dividing events that could reflect on the music industry. Apropriation is kind of the norm but in a european/australian mind its not like “im a white person taking african american sound” but more like “Im from fucking germany, this music sounds awesome, let me try!”. I dont think iggy saw herself as a white rapper before coming to the US, simply because there are not that many black ppl in australia, and presumably 90% of the rappers there are white sooo, not really an issue…im from italy tho so i dont know for sure, australians here correct me
lmao Australia has always had racial issues with regards to aborigines…and you europeans are racist as hell to black immigrants, especially Italians…
Nene Kumoji,thanks for the correction, as I said i dont know much about Australia. Did this division influence the music scene over there? For the second part of your answer, i cant disagree more. This vision is a very simplistic and caricatural one and by saying that, you are proving to be as intolerent as the so called racists. I can say that because im black myself and italian (not mixed, black with an italian passport) and ive always been treated with respect and openness italians are a curious and generous people and ive found myself much more comfortable and accepted while leaving in italy than in the 3years i did in the US. What europeans, and particularly italians dont like is illegal immigrants wether they come from north africa, middle east or eastern europe (actually ive seen more hate towards polish and albanese ppl who are also white than towards africans) and thats because unlike america, canada or australia who were born with immigration, europe didnt start having massive immigration until the second half of the 20th century (germanic and hunan invasions are too far in time to count) and the economy is not made to sustain that much new ppl every year. Dont get me wrong, europe is more than responsible for fucking up africa and the middle east and forcing this movement, but having everybody moving to europe is just not an adapted solution and italians tend to have the same reaction romans had when the barbarians were theatening their borders, italy doesnt have a race problem, at least not to the depth of the one in america
Truth is so many Black ppl promoting the wrong shit now, and yeah there are some who reach out and condone positivity, but its not publicized like a Young thug, rich homie, all the urban rappers. This is destroying our character in the media; Therefor being judge by that “content”. Before we want a system that been here for years to change…… like yeah right. For such a drastic change this has to be a inside job!!!! “The pot calling the kettle ah nigga” U can say it backwards, but either way were going nowhere…..
That Sway interview………….. LMAO. Thanks for making her look like a fraud Sway.
This is worse than Drake trying to freestyle with his phone.
People should not blame her because she’s white as we see it know. This is more that she is a pop artist using rap platform. And this seems not really honest because it’s an oppotunistic thing. If people want blame her don’t go with the “white stealing culture strategy” it’s misunderstood and can seem racist. Go saying that she’s not a rapper because as we see with “Nothing like me” she’s a bonafide pop singer changing her strategy to sell more. Nothing bad in that tho but don’t go too hard with the she’s white she steal the culture it’s a really really bad move and inefficient.
Queen Iggy getting a lot of misguided hate, smh.
What is she queen of?
Nicki sold over 130,000 more in her first week of sales.
I would like the other layers of this “debate” to be folded into the conversation issues of white slavery and the duck vs. swan pimp mentality.
I agree with everything written here. The state of music is extremely disappointing. I thought Nicki was bad but even she deserves a Grammy more than Iggy. When it is well known Iggy can’t write. I can’t even imagine what was on the minds of the people who nominated Iggy. Seriously. She is a true example of how far race will take you. And her fans wonder why she gets hated on. But than agaIn, I find it hard to believe Iggy even has serious fans.
I agr
I agree to an extent. Nicki is far worse in my opinion. She glamorizes the notion of being flat out raunchy. She glamorizes surgery and enhancement. She glorifies the idea you don’t need talent you need looks. Basically, she’s the WORST thing to happen to hip hop let alone music. I can’t stand Iggy nor Nicki and race is not a factor, it’s the ever obvious lack of musical or lyrical talent.
Have u seen Iggy’s Pssy video???????
Iggy is just as raunchy as Nicki. The difference is she got a new mgt team to clean up her image but she is just as trashy as Kim and Nicki.
At least Nicki and Lil Kim can spit.
welp gotta admit azelia banks was right. im changing teams cause be fr iggy fine an all but she kinda hurt my ears when she try to rap. team banks
This is bullshit! America is a white fuckin country and yes, if a black person and a white person were to do the same thing a white person might reap more rewards but htf is it her fault she can’t help she was born white or that America is STILL racist toward any non-white person. I’ve met plenty of racists (black, white, Hispanic) and I don’t see how her skin color or the fact that she likes and sings hip-hop/rap makes her a racist….don’t see them saying shit about any other rappers but the “little white girl” why? Cuz she “talks like she’s from the hood?” That’s stupid Nicki, for example, has very vulgar lyrics, does different voices (British, proper {some say “white”} and jamaican) and has said before she’s a racist but it’s okay because she black? I’ve met more black racists than any other race. It’s just like a relationship if you don’t put the racism behind you it’ll never go away #StopTheH8
But Nicki isn’t trying to takeover Country music. The same way Elvis Presley took Rock n Roll from the blacks. Its a pattern in America. It has nothing to do with Iggy and more so to do with the way American corporations and executives (who are mostly rich white people who’s families are rich off of slave labor and trading) deciding to give Iggy “Best Rap Album” nomination, or how last year Macklemore won over Drake and Kendick Lamar. These are the Grammys too, voted on by executives within the music industry, not the fans.
I think you miss the point,,,,,,,(and I do not expect most of you pale ales to get it) she does NOT speak with a “hood” accent, she speaks wanna-be Wigger! you see her sound, well it is fake! she speaks with her natural Aussie accent when in front of people of her own kind, then she puts on her Wigger tone when pining to the “urban” (laugh) community. She quite simply is inauthentic, fake and a Britney Spears pop hack, Now wanting to be accepted as a turned legit hoodrat? Vanilla Ice Ur wife is calling! like a fake Jamaican accent sounds fake, ms Igloo from Australia is not black, act Black, and will be white (again) when the spotlight fades!! Tell me why is she doing her best to sound like Shaniqua from Compton? when she is Crocodile Dundee’s daughter?