August 17, 2011

  • When it comes to rap, I've become a fan of saying that you should find someone's camp to plant yourself in.

    There's a couple of reasons for this. One is the often personal nature of rap. It's seems to be one of those few genres in which every single album deals with the development of the artist and tends to be autobiographical to some extent. That's part of the reason, I would argue, that it was capable of becoming mainstream: people got caught up in what was happening to the artist. It's why someone can get interested in Dr. Dre from being a fan of Eminem despite never listening to nearly all of Dre's old material or being born after the intense influence he would have on the East and West Coast during the 90s. Em and Dre have a very close relationship and people relate to that.

    The second reason is the inevitable rap politics. Biggie or Pac? Jay or Nas? East Coast, Dirty South, or West Coast? Who do you back, who do you support. While beef has done probably more to destroy the community than build it, harmless cliques form, as with all social circles.

     

    As you guys might've caught on by now, I'm becoming a strong Lady Essence fan. When it comes to Pac or Biggie, I have to go Notorious B. I. G. Despite his faults and the fact that he could never hit mainstream for a variety of reasons, Biggie has too much talent for me to say no.

    And, if my constant praises for Reasonable Doubt hasn't made it obvious, I'm a Jay-Z fan.

    And it's largely Jay-Z that makes the recent collaboration album with Kanye, Watch the Throne, worthwhile for me. I may do an album review later of it, but, for now, I want to focus on one song.

     

    Now, any fan of Jay has to admit several things out the gate: he has a habit of dumbing down his material just for sales. This often results in having to disregard tracks because they're just meant to make sales. It can be irritating because the man is capable of such talent, it's an insulting waste. He also seems to think that making a track likable for a large audience is just as important as his own artistic interests for the song, which sometimes results in him doing things which seem stupid which he actually thinks isn't dumbing down. He also has quite the ego, despite often sounding (to me, at least) like he's talking to you rather than at you on most songs.

    Which is what makes "Welcome to the Jungle" such an interesting song (and reason enough for Watch the Throne to have been made, as far as I'm concerned).

    It just may be the most open and honest Jay has been since "Regrets" from Reasonable Doubt (which immediately makes me wonder if he's acting it but I suppose we'll never know).

    The Jungle in question he is in the same sense as the Upton Sinclair novel The Jungle and the Guns N' Roses song "Welcome to the Jungle": a city.

    What's interesting is that Jay does nearly the whole thing and the complete unraveling with which he does it, making it instantly interesting for its emotional appeal alone. Well, for me, in any case.

    The first line Kanye lets off is, "I asked her where she wanna be when she 25: she turned around and looked at me, and she said, 'Alive.'", possibly alluding to Outkast's song "Da Art of Storytellin' (Part 1)".

    Jay and Kanye's first verse just set the details, painting for us the projects and the social enviroment therein. Jay proclaims, "Look to the sky, ask why I was born." It's heavy-handed emotionalism that may be, well, uninteresting, particularly considering the often suave persona he's always put on even in the face of discussing these topics in the past.

    Yet it's the often personal way he drives them that makes them interesting. The surrounding lyrics contain the fantastic wordplay he's been known for and detail poverty which everyone seems to know of and be aware of (yet never care about). It's his nihilism (both in delivery and lyrics) in response to things that were supposed to have meaning that makes the song so resonant.

    "Where the fuck is the sun?
    It's been a while
    Mama, look at your son
    What happened to my smile?"

    Frankly, there's something incredibly terrifying about the statement, as if such a thing could just one day leave. And it drives at not only the poverty but the mental affect of such poverty.

    Yet it's also the simplicity of the statement, which drives home how basic the emotional need is. And its in that baseness that its loss is so tragic, because it's so needed and is yet deprived.

    "My tears is tatted
    My rag in my pocket
    I'm just looking for love:
    I know somebody's got it"

    Again, an almost naïve statement, as if love has to be there somewhere. If it's not evident, then somebody has to be hiding it. The statement also gets at how we're promised certain things in life, from the media to community values. Everyone is going to succeed someday, right? Everyone gets an education, right? Everyone gets to fall in love, right? So assured do we become in these promises that life literally doesn't make sense when it defaults on them. Of course I get love: just where is it?

    "I'm losing myself
    I'm stuck in the moment
    I look in the mirror:
    My only opponent"

    These two bars were the most interesting to me. Anyone acquainted with Jay's ego knows that a statement such as this would be quick to be said. He doesn't actually have any rivals: he's too good.

    Yet in the context of "Welcome to the Jungle", the line takes on a very different connotation. During a song in which he's been trying to make sense, following a few lines where he's trying to reclaim control, the line becomes a self-admonishment. He can do better than this, if only he'd try harder. But it also gets at the inner demons he has to struggle with, thereby making himself his own opponent. Excellent turn on the phrase.

    And it's with such emotional bluntness that he makes this track easily my favorite on the album. It's here, if anywhere, that you get a true human connection with Jay, making real the message of the song.

    "Where the fuck is the press?
    Where the fuck is the Pres.?
    Either they don't know, or don't care: I'm fucking depressed
    No crying in public
    Just lying to judges
    Risking my life: I'm already dying, so fuck it"