So today I have to do a double since I've fell behind yesterday. I actually had finished Wyclef Jean already, but I was just too tired to write anything.
10:35 PM
Okay, so I've avoided this again for the last two days. I just haven't found an opportunity to really sit down and write. Lakers, basketball, work and school. Also lots and lots of studying. Plus a much delayed drug test that I should've taken last week. Add that up to just the right mixture of laziness and you have my current relationship with my blog.
Anyhow, I was able to listen to these good albums, but at the same time, I'm too tired to really talk about them. I just played a game of 21 with Tostada to vent a bit after that horrible loss in game 4 of the Western Conference Finals. And I immediately went and got my ass handed to me by Tostada himself. Shit! I really got cut back on the stoges.
But what can I really say about these albums that hasn't been said anyways? Everybody knows that Biggie was good. I would even say better than Tupac. All my West Coast brethren are going to skewer me for this statement, but it's true. In the whole Biggie vs. Tupac argument, I have to side with my man Big Poppa. In my opinion, Biggie was a way better rapper than Tupac. And he only had two albums out! But like I said, there's not really much I can add to this argument.
As for Wyclef Jean, he's got a pretty good mix of hip hop and singing goin. And some of it is in Creole. I only know it's Creole because some of the boys I worked with at the summer camp spoke Creole, and I would constantly make them say Creole phrases.
I know. That's fucked up. It's like someone telling me to translate random phrases to Spanish just 'cause it sounds nice to their ears. But they were cool about it. It's not like I'm gonna go to a random person and hope they speak Creole for my enjoyment.
But yeah, both these albums are sick.
I just wanted to comment on one aspect of Biggie's album. I read this (and I will constantly continue to comment on this since it's one of the subjects in my Hip Hop Class, that has the dopest professor) in one of my articles, based on one of my favorite songs, "Suicidal Thoughts." The article stated that the album is a reflection of the black male condition in the ghetto: it is at the same time a boastful anthem of the life of a drug dealer, mafioso, gangster, yet at the same time, he's self aware of his endless struggle, incapable of leaving the condition that he was born into.
His birth is actually the first song. You can hear him coming into this world, with "Superfly" by Curtis Mayfield playing in the background, but this beautiful, triumphant moment is broken by the sound of his parents fighting, his father threatening to beat his mother. Throughout the album, you have moments where he reflects on his position, wishing death in songs like "Everyday Struggle" where he exclaims "I don't wanna live no more/sometimes I hear death knockin at my front door." He celebrates coming up in "Juicy," reflects on his constant struggles with the law in "Gimme the Loot," and his relationships with women throughout the whole album. But in the end, it's too much, calls his friend and shoots himself in "Suicidal Thoughts."
I'm not saying this is the path of all people in the ghetto, but I am saying this album can be taken as a metaphor for the conditions many people (especially those of color) suffer from: the inability to cope with the realities of poverty and discrimination. In this case, Biggie really had some issues with himself that he probably exorcised through his art. Sadly, we would never see his evolution as an artist since he was taken from us. Who knows? He might have been able to figure things out.
But anyhow, I just thought that insight was beautiful. I think it's something I've had to deal with as well, and I'm sure I'm not the only one.
Anyhow, I'm writing this as I watch "Being John Malkovich," which has some hilariously witty parts. But that'll be for another day.
Witty muthafucker.
Peace, bruthas and sistas!
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